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Real Estate
Toll Brothers, the developer of Brier Creek Country Club in Raleigh, N.C., introduces the opening of their new Hampton Georgian, an 8,000 square-foot estate model home.
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Players
Tiger Woods and Annika Sorenstam, the respective players of the year on the PGA and LPGA Tours in 2001, have been nominated for the 2002 Laureus World Sports Awards at the New York Athletic Club.
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Karrie Webb, who last year became the youngest player in history to complete the career Grand Slam, will play the 11th Chick-fil-A Charity Championship scheduled for April 29-May 5 at Eagle's Landing Country Club in Stockbridge, Ga.
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Vijay Kumar's victory at the Royal Challenge Indian Open has moved him up to seventh place on the Davidoff Tour Order of Merit.
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Tournaments
Honda Classic Executive Director Cliff Danley announces that the purse for next year's event will be $5 million, up from this year's $3.5 million. Next year, the Honda Classic moves to the new Country Club at Mirasol in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla.
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Technology
Loudeye Technologies announces it is to provide services and technology to support the PGA TOUR's Live@17, an online feature that shows all of the action on the historic 17th hole at the Tournament Players Club at Sawgrass during The Players Championship.
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Integrated Business Systems introduces IBS PhoneRes, a new integration between phone systems and the IBS Tee-Sheet and Point of Sale. PhoneRes allows golfers to the oportunity to reserve and cancel bookings, set up reservation windows and give pertinent course information. (Note: This information ran yesterday with an incorrect link.)
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Accessories
When Rachel Teske won last week's PING Banner Health tournament, she joined John Jacobs as one of two 2002 tournament winners to wear a QLink pendant. Thirty-six players on the three major tours have won a tournament while wearing the QLink, which helps reduce stress.
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Associations
The Royal Canadian Golf Association selects Eaglequest Golf Centre at Coyote Creek in Surrey, B.C. to become the its National Training Center for British Columbia. Eaglequest will provide free access and coaching to top young golfers in the RCGA's Player Development Program.
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The Professional Caddies Association launches a new "Looper Line" of products which it endorses for use by caddies, starting with sun protection and insect repellant products made by ALLSPORT.
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Turf
Professional turf care supplier LESCO expands its business into the consumer market. The company will offer products such as its premium golf course fertilizer line, Novex, to nurseries, garden centers and other independent marketers.
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Media
The Golf Channel and Scholastic, Inc., have announced a partnership to introduce a family literacy program titled Stay the Course: Read, Write, Succeed to 30,000 classrooms nationwide, involving more than 3 million school children.
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People
A memorial service for Don Shevorski has been set for Monday, March 25 at the Rose Hills Mortuary in Whittier, Calif. The service will begin at 3 p.m. with a reception to follow at the Hacienda Golf Club.
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The Board of Directors for apparel company Sport-Haley appoint Kevin M. Tomlinson as Chief Executive Officer. Tomlinson had been serving the Company as its Chief Operating Officer and Executive Vice President -- Operations.
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Apparel
Clubjacket, a provider of sportcoats to the golf industry, announces the addition of The Western Golf Association to its user base.
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Equipment
According to the Darrell Survey, more golfers wore CHAMP golf spikes than any other brand at the LPGA's Ping Banner Health. CHAMP golf spikes were worn by 60 golfers while the closest competitor had 44 spikes in play.
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Adam Scott and Peter O'Malley won their respective European and Australasian Tours last weekend using Titleist equipment. Both used a Titleist Pro V1 golf ball, along with Titleist driver, fairway metal and forged irons. On the U.S. tours, Tiger Woods won the Bay Hill Invitational using Titleist irons, wedges and putter and Dana Quigley won the Senior Tour's Siebel Classic using a Titleist Pro V1 ball.
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Sponsorship
Hyundai Motor America is named the Official Car for the Office Depot Championship Hosted by Amy Alcott benefiting City of Hope, which will be held April 1-7 at El Caballero Country Club in Tarzana, Calif.
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Business
Fortune Brands, which owns Acushnet Company and its golf brands Titleist, Footjoy and Cobra, announces it expects its first-quarter earnings per share to be above analysts' estimates.
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Courses
Within 15 months of opening, Barona Creek Golf Club in San Diego earns mention in Golfweek as the fourth best course in California and the 100th best course in the United States.
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Commentary
Challenges Ahead for Pro Golf

Next year the PGA Tour will begin a new television deal worth somewhere in the neighborhood of $1,000,000,000 -- yes, that's nine zeroes, as in a cool billion.

But once you get past that good news, professional golf is looking a little shaky.

The PGA Tour is hustling to keep sponsors and advertisers for their events on the PGA Tour, not to mention the Senior and Buy.com Tours. The first defector was Michelob, who decided that the cost of a PGA Tour event was more than they could afford and opted to sponsor a LPGA event. While this is only one sponsor, it could be just the beginning -- after all, when beer companies don't shell out the money, we all need to take a look.

The PGA Tour is also struggling to find a sponsor for the Buy.com Tour. While the PGA Tour has come to an understanding with Buy.com and will keep that name only until another sponsor can be found, no worthy candidate has popped up who is willing to pony up the green.

Through multiple name changes, from Ben Hogan to Nike to Buy.com, the developmental tour has grown by leaps and bounds. But it lacks a concrete identity and the players are not household names, keeping golf fans from becoming too enthusiastic.

The Senior Tour, while stronger financially than its younger brother, is also hurting. In its early days the Senior Tour was a nostalgia tour, a tour that showcased the game's greats one more time -- Palmer, Trevino and Casper to name a few.

But somewhere along the way the tour started to be competitive. It lost its nostalgia handle and became a full-fledged competitive tour. That was great for TV and a fan base grew. In recent years the Senior Tour has hit the skids, not helped by the sworn statements of Commissioner Tim Finchem, who downplayed the competitive nature of the tour during testimony in the Casey Martin trial.

The Senior Tour left ESPN and went to CNBC. We were told it would improve the promotion for the senior tournaments, but when events were shown tape delayed it ended up being a bad move.

Now the Senior Tour is trying to promote itself and the older golfers as providing a more fan friendly tour. At the same time, Fred Couples and others are pushing for an over-40s tour for major champions that could siphon off many of the popular players from the PGA and Senior Tours. The new tour would guarantee participants a certain sum for their involvement, but golfers would have to resign their tour membership. Fox is said to be interested in broadcasting the events. Stay tuned as to whether this helps or hurts the seniors.

Finally, the LPGA Tour is trying to take a new direction. By cutting events this year it has become a smaller tour. It lacks zest, and while it has a trio of fantastic players -- Annika Sorenstam, Karrie Webb and Se Ri Pak -- those players are the cautious, shy types who don't come across well on television. And unfortunately, in the sports world, TV is everything.

LPGA Tour Commissioner Ty Votaw took a few days before the 2002 season began to provide his players with an overview of the tour and instructions on how they can make the tour better, more prosperous. We will see if the players listened.

And all the tours struggle with the equipment issue and with keeping traditional courses competitive in the era of common-place 300-yard drives. The PGA Tour, especially, may be forced to look at adopting different equipment guidelines, and Augusta National officials are said to be looking into requiring all competitors to use a restricted golf ball.

It is possible that within five years we could have four different organizations -- the PGA Tour, Augusta National, the R&A and the USGA -- making equipment rules. You'll have to take a library to the course in your golf bag just to know what's permissible.

Rather than everything being rosy, professional golf is facing several challenges in the future.