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Look Back: Aug. 20 1949: The U.S. Walker Cup team defeats Great Britain-Ireland 10-2 at Winged Foot Golf Club in Mamaroneck, N.Y. 1955: Arnold Palmer wins the Canadian Open at Weston Golf Club in Toronto by four strokes for his first professional victory. 1967: Charlie Sifford wins his first PGA Tour title, the Insurance City Open. 1995: Karrie Webb wins the Weetabix Women's British Open by six strokes over Jill McGill and Annika Sorenstam. |
Events
U.S. Golf Association
announces that tickets for the 2002 U.S. Open at Bethpage State Park (Black
course) in Farmingdale, N.Y., sold out at 42,500 per day as soon as the
ticket application deadline expired on July 31. This is the 16th consecutive
year the U.S. Open has been a sellout.
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more...
Equipment
CHAMP-brand
spikes were worn by 75 golfers at this week's PGA Championship, more than
any other brand. Sixty of those players wore CHAMP's metal spikes.
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more...
CHAMP is also
the most popular brand on the LPGA Tour. At the LPGA Bank of Montreal
Canadian Women's Open, 54 golfers wore the company's cleats, according
to the Darrell Survey.
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more...
SoftSpikes'
Black Widow cleats have been the most popular golf spike among participants
in the three 2001 major tournaments held in the U.S. At the PGA Championship,
66 players wore the Black Widow spikes as compared to 60 players wearing
metal spikes, according to the Darrell Survey.
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more...
Precept introduces
the Tour Premium LS golf ball, featuring new seamless cover technology.
The ball is created using a tooling process that eliminates the seam line
and arranges the dimples uniformly on the cover. Retail is $50/dozen.
For
more on the Tour Premium ball...
For
more on Seamless Cover Technology...
Architecture
Wadsworth Construction
Co. has been chosen to build a new 18-hole Jeffrey Brauer-designed
course at Fortune Bay Resort in Minnesota. The $6.9-million course
is estimated to get under way by September, be complete next year and
open in 2003.
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more...
Public Relations
Laser Link Golf
selects Jamison Communications to handle its public relations campaigns.
Laser Link makes a distance measurement system that provides golfers with
accurate distances to the flag.
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more...
Collectibles
For those interested
in a piece of Old Course memorabilia, St. Andrews Links Trust is
auctioning off the Old Course Starter's Box which dates back to the 1920s.
The winning bidder will be responsible for dismantling and removing the
building.
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more...
People, Places
& Things
Rees Jones
These
are high times for Rees Jones, the current envy of his golf course architect
peers even if they may not want to admit the fact. In a span of 16 August
days in Georgia, Jones' work -- original or re-design -- has served as
the stage for three of golf's premier events.
The Walker Cup visited Jones'
original Ocean Forest Golf Club design on the Georgia coast a week ago.
The PGA Championship concluded Sunday at the Atlanta Athletic Club's Jones-redesigned
Highlands course. And today the U.S. Amateur begins at East Lake Golf
Club, which Jones redid in 1994.
If there were a Triple Crown
for course architects, Jones would have won it by many lengths. While
Jones has developed his own lofty reputation -- better known prior to
this trifecta as the U.S. Open Doctor for his tinkering of old-school
courses -- being the son of Robert Trent Jones has not been a burden,
but a blessing.
"Yeah, I've been chosen partly
because I learned from Dad," Jones said. "I learned his design philosophy
and learned how to contour greens from him. I learned how to do the routings
from him.
"I think I'm the keeper of
his theme. By the same token, I have enough of an ego that I am trying
to embellish them and make them better, and make them what he would be
more proud of, if he were alive."
Father Jones died just a
year ago, having left a legacy as one of the world's premier designers.
Included in his collection was the 1967 design of Atlanta Athletic Club,
which was redesigned in 1974 and again in '87 before Jones was summoned
in 1994.
"It had no continuity. It
did not have a common theme," Jones said. "So when I came in here, I basically
rebuilt it so that it had the same theme, contouring of the greens, same
bunkering style, as many doglegs right and many doglegs left."
Jones' handiwork is just
as prevalent at East Lake, which was an original Donald Ross design that
fell into complete disrepair over the years. Jones, though, followed Ross'
theme and improved upon Ross' philosophy to withstand today's current
players.
"I mean we optimized the
layout and changed the layout and made it a much better facility," Jones
said.
The whirlwind tour of Jones
work began at Ocean Forest, which hosted its first major event and received
high praise from those who matter most -- the players.
"Ocean Forest was such a
wonderfully natural site, almost a throwback site -- a coastal site, with
the dunes, the ocean, the Hampton River, vegetation unlike most sites
in the south, and the saltwater marsh. So you had five elements that really
made it one of the best sites any golf course architect could ever have."
In a business full of healthy
egos, Jones unabashedly promotes his par-5 10th at Ocean Forest as one
of his favorites.
"If you watched them playing
the Walker Cup," Jones said, "they stood over that second shot debating
what to do; they wanted to know what other guys did. That's one of the
great decision-making par-5s in golf."
Jones, whose older brother
Robert Trent Jones Jr. is a renowned course architect in his own right,
has carved out his niche as an architect who does more than just puts
his signature on a course.
"I grew up in the design
business, and my dad looked at it as a craft, I look at it as a craft,"
Jones said. "It's a hands-on business. And I think the reason that I have
so many great redoes -- six U.S. Open sites, five PGA sites coming up
from 2001 to 2010 -- and they are so well-received is that I spent the
time, and I don't look at it as a way to make money."
"I think it's important to
do the hands-on design like Pete Dye does and I do, if you want a great
test of golf and something that is going to stand the test of time of
something that people want to play on a continuing basis."
Doubtful many architects
could pull off what Jones has this month in Georgia.