Nick Flanagan 3rd win earns PGA Tour card

Nick Flanagan shot 63 with an eagle and 5 birdies to come from 7 shots behind and win the Xerox Classic in Rochester New York today. This was Nick's 3rd win on the Nationwide Tour this year and it earns him a battleground promotion to the main tour. Nick is only the 8th player ever to achieve this. The upcoming Fedex Cup playoffs means that he will have to wait patiently for the next 4 weeks before he gets his first start at the Turning Stone event in New York the week after the Fedex Cup final. This is a great result for Nick as he will get about 6 events playing for 4 to 5 million at the end of this year and start next year with a full card which will get him starts in everything except the limited field invitationals. Well done Nick. Now the real hard work starts, but I have no doubt you are up for it.

The Presidents Cup

The PGA was a very good week for Australian Golf. 5 Australians finished in the top 20. Australian Open Champion, John Sendon the best of the 5, finishing 4th and securing a start in next years Masters, which will be his first Masters, and a dream goal for every Tour Pro I know. Stuart Appleby finished 12th, which was good enough to get him in the top 10 automatic picks for the Presidents Cup by 3/10ths of a World Ranking point over Nick O'hern. This will be Apples 5th straight Presidents Cup. Something that only Ernie Els, Retief Goosen and Vijay Singh have achieved as well. When Stuart bogeyed the 18th hole on Sunday to drop just outside a top ten finish, I didn't think he would get enough points to make the top 10 and would have to rely on a pick from Gary Player. Fortunately it all worked out very well with Gary picking number 11 Nick O'hern. Nick has beaten Tiger twice in the WGC World Matchplay, so he is a must pick, because he is probably the only golfer in the World who knows he can beat Tiger. Gary Player also picked Mike Weir. Mike was well back at about 20 in the qualifying, but as Vijay said last week. He is a national hero in Canada and worth at least 2 wins extra with the crowd support the Internationals will get up in Montreal next month. Mike started to come back in to his best form last mont by finishing 8th at the British Open before tweaking his neck and struggling the last couple of weeks. I am sure he will great value and the Presidents Cup in Canada will be a great event for further prospering the game internationally.

PGA Southern Hills

We are at the PGA in Tulsa Oklahoma at Southern Hills Golf Club. Southern Hills was the site for the 2001 US Open that Retief Goosen won. Sunday at the Bridgestone Invitational was disappointing for Apples. He was 1 under for the day and even for the tournament afte 9 holes. Even on the back would have been good enough for a tie for 2nd, but the driver let him down and he missed every fairway to the right except one. He salvaged a birdie on the 18th and a tie for 14th. Stuart is 12th in the president Cup rankings, with this week being the last week to make the top 10. There are two captains picks to make up the 12 man team, however the general consensus is that Gary Player will pick Mike Weir which I totally agree with to get the Canadian crowd support in Montreal. the other pick will probably go to a South African either Tim Clarke, Richard Stern or Chars Schwartzel. Gary picked Trevor Immelman at the last presidents Cup and he had several world class players ahead of him in the rankings. It proved to be a good selection with Trevor going on to big things and winning on the PGA Tour the following year. So the job for Nick Ohern 11, Apples 12, Badderly13 and Richard Green 14 is to have a great PGA this week and get another Australian or two in the team with Adam Scott and Geoff Ogilvy. It is quite amazing that the top 14 players for the rest of the World team are now in the worlds top 30 rankings. I remember the 1998 Team that won in Australia at Royal Melbourne had two players ranked in the 60's to make up the 12 man side.

Bridgestone World Golf Championship

We are at the Bridgestone Invitational at the famous Firestone Country Club in Akron Ohio. Stuart Appleby got off to a good start today in the first round shooting a 2 under 68 and KJ Choi 1 over 71. Stuart putted nicely today and looked very comfortable on the greens again. This was very good to see, as he didn't putt well at the British Open. I think this was due to some lost confidence after five 3 putts in the last round in Washinton 3 weeks ago. Stuart has changed his putter grip to a fat grip called the two thumb grip. The new grip helps him to keep his shoulders level and forearms on plane in the set up and promotes a pendulum stroke, more from the big muscles rather than the hands. In the picture you can see that KJ also is using an oversize grip called the super stroke. KJ feels that he can roll the ball with the palm of his right hand with this grip and his fingers won't rotate and close the face through impact. KJ has putted great the last few weeks and this grip plus his disciplined approach to doing our one hour putting program every day has made him a world class putter every week he competes. In the picture KJ is working with his putting track for technique. He does this for 15 minutes every day.