Though the provenance of golf is associated with Scotland, historians have deemed early descriptions of golf are reported in history as far back as the Roman Empire. Golf also popped up in large numbers of other places, such as the Holand. From its provenance, golf was a game with rigorous clothing – no jersey wholesalers necessary for this developing sport.

The first golf club in the world was formed in Scotland – the Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers, in 1744. The club stipulated the initial set of laws of the game. About ten years after that, the Royal and Ancient Golf Club in St. Andrews turned the sanctioned managing organization for the golf. Though there are accounts of golf around this time in the American colonies, the inital golf club in North America actually formed in Canada in Montreal in 1873. Golf clubs sprung up after that in Unite States of American and the United States Golf Association was soon built. The USGA and the Royal and Ancient are now the best ruling organizations in the world of golf.

GOLF RULES

From its first days, golf has been a sport unlike from many others. There is no body touch involved, and courtesy and decorum are two of the most radical fundamentals of golf. Until the 1940s, player in professional golf had on shirts and ties, a scary situation for the jersey wholesalers who are so involved in many of today’s sports.

Golf occurs on a course that customarily has 18 holes with groups of between two and 4 golf players. The regulations of golfing stipulate that golf athletes can carry no more than 14 clubs. Today’s regulations also set out what type of technology is allowed in golf clubs. The golf holes extend in distance from about 130 yards to over six hundred yards. Each hole is given a mass of strokes that equals “par”, or the average acceptable score on that hole. The number of strokes extends for three to five. The objective of golf is for athletes to shoot the ball from the tee to the green, and then into the hole, in the lowest total strokes. Most courses have par totals for the round between seventy and 72. A athlete who beats par on a hole by 1 stroke gets a “birdie”; while scoring two strokes under par on a hole is called an “eagle” and is infrequent. A golf athlete who gets the tee shot into the hole on a Par three hole makes an eagle that is called a “hole-in-one”.

A stroke-play match is won by the golf athlete with the least number of shots for the eighteen-holes. Professional golf tournaments normally span over four days. In match play golf, a athlete plays heads-up versus his or her opponent. The golf player who scores lowest on the most holes is named the victor of the match. If no one is winning after eighteen holes, the match goes on until the 1st athlete wins a hole.

Golf, once named the gentlemen’s game, has much of the flavor of its beginning years. Athletes no longer wear ties, but the dress still is more reserved and regulations depend on athletes calling out themselves.

So what are the equipments needed for Frisbee golf? Unlike the regular Frisbee game, Frisbee golf is a bit different. Some of the equipments are the following:

1. Golf Frisbee disc – the Frisbee disc used in Frisbee golf is different from that of the regular disc. It also flies at a greater distance and it has better accuracy depending on the strategy of the player. You can get the golf disc for as low as $8.66 but there are also pricier discs. The discs also have different designs and so you can pick the golf disc that fits your taste and personality.

2. Frisbee golf portable dispatcher – you will need this equipment especially if you’re playing the nine-hole game. Portable dispatchers cost more than $400 depending on the brand.

3. Personal Retriever – you can get this equipment at a discount in some online stores but it usually costs over $100.

4. Aerobie SharpShooter – this is very affordable and you can get this for as low as $7.97 from online stores like Amazon

Those are some of the equipments of Frisbee golf. Since Frisbee golf is a bit different from the regular Frisbee game, you need to play it in a special golf field. There are already many Frisbee golf fields especially in the different states of the US. You can also find many Frisbee golf fields in other parts of the world like UK, Europe, Canada, etc.

When shopping for Frisbee golf equipments, you have to know more about Frisbee golf and the equipments being used by the players. It would be best to conduct a bit of research on the internet about Frisbee golf and once you’re familiar with the equipments, you can start shopping for it. Having your very own equipments will make you a better player of the game because you can play anytime you like. Try to look for Frisbee golf clubs in your area so that you meet all the other players. You can even get many playing tips and ideas form fellow players.

If you don’t want to shop online, you can try searching for Frisbee golf equipments in your local sports store. Most sports stores already sell Frisbee equipments. Shopping around will allow you to have many choices. With so many choices, you will surely be able to purchase the Frisbee golf equipments that you like.

Another great consideration when purchasing Frisbee golf equipments is your budget. Do you have enough budget to purchase the equipment you like? If you have a limited budget, try to consider purchasing inexpensive equipment but you should not sacrifice quality. If you shop around, you can find good quality Frisbee golf equipment which are sold at a very affordable price. Don’t be an ‘impulse buyer’ because if you’re like that, you won’t get the best deal in the market; in fact, it could even cost you more.

Shop around now for the best deal Frisbee golf equipments. Take your time in shopping around and don’t rush yourself. Keep in mind that if you want to become a good player of Frisbee golf, you need to have all the necessary equipment.

With the adoption of the second shot, and with the principle of each team playing it’s own ball, this primeval game became golf and at the same time acquired a strategy, something that it’s medieval rival, football, did not until the invention of the scrimmage in the 19th century. It also rapidly acquired such a popularity, which so utterly eclipsed the sport of archery (which was vital to Scotland’s preparation for national defense), that playing golf in Scotland was made a criminal offense punishable by hanging. No idle threat that, for at least one poor golfer did pay this sorry price for his round – but ultimately a peace with England was achieved and the Scots devoted their renowned intensity to the study of what would become their national game.

Since that time, there doesn’t seem to be any aspect of ball-striking or mental technique that hasn’t come under scrutiny, particularly in our own highly scientific 21st century. Stance, grip alignment, swing plane, waggle, wrist cock, shoulder turn, and angle of attack have all been addressed by the parade of teachers, visionaries, kinesthetic, scientists, engineers, mystics, duffers, and well-meaning Uncle Bobs who have over the past 600 years plunked a ball on the turf and offered the magic phrase “let me show you…”

19th century

The show-and-tell of golf instruction took on new importance in 1848 when, with the invention of the gutta percha ball (or “guttie”), golf became both exportable and cheap. Prior to 1848, golf ball construction was a laborious and costly art practiced by a handful of cottage manufacturers in the vicinity of Edinburgh – and if a ball was expensive, freight was prohibitive. Golf at this time simply had no chance to expand beyond the Scottish lowlands. Since all of golf was compacted into such a tiny area, golfers were able to learn simply by imitating the great players of the day on the handful of courses then in existence.

The guttie changed all that. By 1865, the game had expanded to England, Ireland, France, and India. These new clubs hired full-time professionals, many of them expatriate Scots, and with them came the flowering of formal golf instruction as the canny professionals undertook the task of teaching golf in foreign lands and foreign conditions. The first book of golf instruction can be firmly dated to this period, with the publication in 1857 of A Keen Hand, by H. B. Farnie. The 19th century was a time of slow advancement in technique, with concentration primarily on a long-running disagreement as to whether an open stance or a closed stance was the better way to address the guttie, which for all it’s low cost was something of a dodo and difficult to put into the air. The controversy was only truly resolved when the modern wound (Haskell) ball appeared in the early 1900’s and made the guttie obsolete.

At roughly the same point in time as the Haskell, golf instruction was advanced even more directly by the arrival of the touring professional golfer. Soaring popularity and plummeting travel costs ushered in the barnstorming era when golfers such as Harry Vardon could earn a living from personal appearances, tournament purses, and exhibition matches, avoiding the low status and even lower pay of the golf club professional.

Vardon’s tournament success and his proselytizing work in far-flung places such as Canada and the United States led to popular adoption of two of his innovative techniques- a steady, rhythmic, and utterly simple swing technique, and the overlapping (Vardon) grip, which is still the most popular method of gripping a club. Vardon did not personally invent either – but his success stamped them first with legitimacy and finally with a certain inevitability as he racked up six British Open crowns and the 1900 U.S. Open title

20th Century

Although both the first golf magazines and the British and American Professional Golf Associations appeared early in the 20th century, barnstorming professionals and Bobby Jones would continue to dominate golf instruction right up to the Great Depression. Huge crowds flocked to see Jones and Walter Hagen on both sides of the Atlantic, learning such secrets as Hagen’ straight-line putting: drawing the clubface back from the ball in a straight line rather than a slight arc popular at this time. His innovation was important in the 1920’s and allowed him to win many tournaments – but it is even important today with the increased emphasis on fast difficult putting surfaces.

The modern sand wedge and bunker techniques were also a by-product of the era – this popular innovation the work of several golfers, most notably Gene Sarazen. But the Great Depression had a devastating effect on touring professionals, and the age of coast-to-coast exhibition tours came to a close. The years between 1932 and 1956 are not celebrated in golf instruction lore, but that isn’t to say that the instructors of the era weren’t any good. In fact, club-level and local instruction were better in this era than at any time during golf’s history, as aging tour pros such as Tommy Armour retired to club jobs while young pros like Tom Harmon decided not to join the nascent PGA tour, owing to it’s low purses and often appalling conditions.

Ernest T. Jones was at his studio on Fifth Avenue in New York City, preaching the virtues of “swing the clubhead” at five dollars a lesson to all comers. In addition, the best northern pros would travel to Florida in the winter and pick up new teaching styles and techniques in winter teaching meetings, or on the winter tournament circuit. Finally, modern golf range equipment began to appear, eliminating the need for a ball-shagging caddie, and sparked a boom in driving-range construction. College-based instructional programs were also adopted by many major universities during these years, attracting future stars such as Arnold Palmer.

In the mid-1950’s, largely due to television, a new golf boom began, and with tournament purses soaring and golf acquiring a certain cachet, younger amateurs and club pros abandoned careers in insurance, or on the practice tee, for glory on the PGA Tour. Prize money and endorsement income made millionaires out of Arnold Palmer and Jack Nicklaus, and with thousands of dollars now resting on the success of this putt in the Masters or that five-iron in the Open, leading professionals began to openly seek the advice of golf gurus such as Gardner Dickinson, Bob Toski, Harvey Penick, and Jack Grout.

At the same time, Palmer, Nicklaus, and Gary Player parlayed their tournament success into an empire of instructional publications- magazine articles, television tips, and ghost written, handsomely illustrated books. National magazines such as Golf and Golf Digest capitalized on the newfound popularity of the game to achieve relatively mass circulations and a national forum of cutting-edge instructional techniques. Golf instructors too, found that golf magazines, and their increasingly visible work with touring professionals, brought them more business than they could handle on a local level. So, although golf schools had been in existence since just after the war, in 1968 the first national golf schools would evolve.

Golf did not sustain in the 1970’s the same level of popularity it had enjoyed in the 1960’s, but significant changes were looming for the game as golf’s expansion had created a large enough golf economy to allow for substantial investment in research and development. The groundwork was laid in the 1970’s for radical transformation of turf preparation, golf club technology, and instructional technique. The cavity-backed iron, the metal wood, the graphite shaft, as well as revolutionary changes in irrigation technique and turf-laying, date to the 1970’s. All would have substantial impact on the game as golfers achieved better and better control over the golf ball (in flight direction, overall distance, and spin characteristics.)

Golf instruction, particularly golf schools, would not enjoy a real economic boom until the 1980’s but the influential theory of connection, video analysis of the golf swing, and the emphasis on big-muscle leadership date to the pioneering work of David Leadbetter, Chuck Evans and others in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s. Golf instruction also became more specialized, as teachers by the mid 1980’s began to emphasize their expertise with “practical instruction” (John Jacobs), “short game instruction” (Dave Pelz), “women’s instruction” (Penny Zavichas and Linda Craft), or “mental conditioning” (Carey Mumford and Chuck Hogan).

Today

By the 1990’s, and into the new millennium, golf instruction in the U.S. had boomed to the point that there are now a multitude of national golf schools offering hundreds of programs across the country, with a cornucopia of techniques, price points, regimens, and training goals. The largest of these is America’s Favorite Golf Schools with more than 40 locations nationwide. Virtually all of the national golf schools offer books and videotapes for sale. Prominent golf gurus such as Dave Pelz, Bob Toski, Rick Smith, and Jim Flick are in demand not only with the touring pros but at skyrocketing master class rates at the finest resorts. Harvey Penick’s Little Red Book also became the biggest selling sports book of all time. In short, golf instruction has expanded into one of the largest and most vibrant sectors of the substantial golf economy.

Looking back over the entire grand parade of gurus and teachers, if one were to assign a grade to golf instruction as a whole, six centuries into it, one would pencil “I” for “incomplete”. It’s well-worth knowing that even in this day of gurus and their technical wizardry, fewer than half of the world’s players can regularly break 100. It’s also fitting to mention that when James Durham recorded 94 at the Old Course at St Andrews in 1767, he set a course record that lasted 86 years. Golf instruction has indeed come a long way.

There are so many golfing destinations to choose from, but these five hot destinations are attracting lots of interest. Innovative new courses and excellent facilities in Turkey, Cyprus, Tunisia, Argentina, and British Colombia have created excitement in the golfing world. The attractions include a range of challenging courses, all year round golf, and surrounds that are more exotic than more traditional golfing destinations.

History, culture and golf on Cyprus
One of the most beautiful islands in the Mediterranean, with a warm climate year round, Cyprus has excellent golf courses with challenging greens and fantastic views. The new par 71 Aphrodite Hills course, perched above a beach, is surrounded by protected forest, and is divided in two by a deep ravine. The oldest course on the island, Tsada Golf Club, set 500 metres above sea level, has natural fairways running through old fruit orchards and vineyards.

Golfing in Turkey – the perfect winter break
A golf holiday in the region of Belek, in the south west of Turkey, gives you access to miles of golden-sand beaches and unspoilt natural attractions as well as an exotic national culture. Here are eight excellent courses, many five-star hotels and lots of water sports activities. And the excellent value of a golf holiday in Turkey is a bonus. The main resort of Antalaya, with its 300 days of sunshine a year, pretty parks and palm-lined streets, is perfect for a winter break.

Sand, sun and golf in Tunisia
Although its hundreds of miles of sandy beaches, bustling markets, and stunning architecture, make it a popular tourist destination, Tunisia is also becoming one of the Mediterranean’s foremost golf holiday spots. Affordable accommodation, year-round sun, and a choice of 10 courses, with reasonable green fees, is a very tempting combination. The courses at Hammamet, designed around six lakes and 430 acres of olive trees, include Golf Citrus, with two 18-hole, par 72 championship courses, and the short and demanding par 72 Yasmine. A basic round can cost as little as £25. On the island of Djerba, further south, the resort Tabarka has a 27-hole course surrounded by date palms and overlooking the Mediterranean.

Scenery and golf in Argentina
Argentina is becoming increasingly popular as an exotic destination for golfers, and golfing facilities are available in most parts of the country. Being in the Southern Hemisphere, summer is from December to March and winter from June to October. The old par 72 Buenos Aires Golf Club, one of the world’s top 100 courses, has water features, bunkers and well-maintained greens. At the southeast tip of the country, in Patagonia, the Arelauquen Golf Club, near Bariloche, is surrounded by mountains, lakes of crystal-clear waters. Playing the 18-hole, par 72 course is an unforgettable experience, with views of the summits of Mount Catedral and Mount Otto and the backdrop of Lake Gutiérrez.

British Columbia – golfing contrasts
The province of British Columbia, on the West Coast of Canada, is a rugged frontier for golfers, from its desert courses in the interior to the breathtaking mountain courses in the east. Around Vancouver, the Furry Creek Golf Course has ocean and mountain views from every hole, and the Westwood Plateau Golf and Country Club was proclaimed the top new course in Canada in 1994. The four championship courses at Whistler includes the Jack Nicklaus designed Nicklaus North Golf Course, and the Chateau Whistler Golf Club, a pre-eminent mountain course. For contrast, try The Dunes Golf Course at Kamloops Golf Club, where lush fairways have been carved through sand that was once a riverbed. With four different sets of tees, The Dunes is both fun and challenging.

It’s also amazing how many activities one is able to cram into a short amount of time. I wanted to give them a really good taste of everything that I love about the city of Toronto and my new country. So occasionally I put a few too many things on our plates and we ended up racing through a few of the activities. On the whole though, I think our European guests had a fabulous time and they fell in love with Toronto, just like I did, many years ago.

Saturday all six of us went golfing to a little par-3 golf course in the East end of Toronto. None of my Austrian guests had ever golfed before, so a couple of days earlier we started with a few buckets of balls at the driving range, followed up by an indoor putting practice session on the carpet. Saturday we would get to try the real thing. The attempts at the driving range didn’t look all that great, with balls spraying all over the place, to the left and to the right. But on Saturday afternoon, another gorgeous day, our four Austrian guests performed quite admirably and only lost 2 balls in the water hazard.

They really enjoyed golf, a sport they had never even dreamed of playing, but the Toronto area with its several hundred golf courses, many of them reasonably priced, made it easy to give this sport a try. All preconceived notions about golf only being a sport for old people went out the window, and they enjoyed the challenge of trying to sink the round little ball in the hole.

Sunday came our second big excursion: a driving tour through the Kawartha Lakes. I had only planned two major driving tours: a wine-tasting tour through the Niagara Peninsula, and a second one to the lake district of the Kawarthas. We started by driving east on Toronto’s 401, a 12 to 16 lane highway whose size duly impressed my European visitors. Then we headed north-east through rolling farm country to Peterborough, a rural university town with a population of about 70,000. From there we drove north into the Kawarthas, a gorgeous lake region set in the rocky landscape of the Canadian Shield.

Our first stop was Buckhorn, where we watched the mechanics of lift locks of the Trent-Severn Canal that links Lake Ontario with Georgian Bay. We saw how several boats assembled inside the lock following by an opening of the sluices and the water level equilibrating itself with the level of the lower portion of the river. The Parks Canada lock supervisor explained the whole process to us and it only took about 10 minutes for the boats to reach the lower level.

From Buckhorn we drove through rocky and marshy countryside to the quaint village of Bobcaygeon where we took an extended stroll. We had a nice waterfront lunch, looking across to the marina, seeing the the boats come in an out of the canal. Particularly our Austrian friends Luis and Isabella love boating and seeing the many houseboats on the Trent-Severn Canal gave them a few ideas for future vacations in Canada.

The lunch was delicious and we took a little stroll around this charming town, admiring the waterfront parks and picnic facilities that allow great access to the water. From Bobcaygeon we drove on to another little picturesque country town: Fenelon Falls, whose name comes from a waterfall in the middle of town that has been used for electricity generation since the 1870s.

After a sizeable line-up we picked up a few delicious cones of Kawartha Dairy ice cream and strolled over to the bridge over the falls and then down to the little peninsula that sticks out into the river. From there you can look into a rocky gorge where both sides of the river are surrounded by high rocks.

Again, we watched boats being lifted and lowered, this time in lock 33 of the Trent-Severn Canal System. This is another town with a beautiful little park right by the locks with lots of opportunity for barbeques or simply for a relaxing snooze in the sun . Time was flying by and by this time it was already 3:30 pm so we had to start our return to the city. We only took back roads and my brother lost count of the numerous golf courses that dotted the landscape. It was a nice relaxing drive through rolling countryside and we made it back to Toronto in less than 2 hours. All four of my Austrian guests had fallen in love with the Lake District and the prospect of another vacation in Canada to explore the waters north of Toronto seems ever more likely.

Yesterday was their last full day in Toronto, and we took our bikes out for a spin one more time. Since we all love water we rode down to the Eastern Beaches again, and leisurely explored the waterfront. We watched some lawn bowling, and one of the participants kept coming over to us to explain the rules of the game to us since none of us was familiar with this sport. My guests commented several times on the friendliness of people in the stores, restaurants, in line-ups and even I myself was surprised at the approachability of Torontonians, often known as a more reserved breed of people. But we truly kept having very positive experiences, equally with people employed in the service sector, as well as with regular citizens, taking a stroll, playing a game of lawn bowling or going for a walk with their dog.

Of course we admired the inukshuks by the beach, a public play area for adults with rocks of various shapes and sizes that are used by passers-by to create interesting stone sculptures. We watched a few tense points at the Kew Gardens Tennis Club, and checked out the picturesque Kew Gardens park itself. From there we headed west past the beach volleyball facilities to the little peninsula west of Ashbridges Bay which always offers a fabulous view of Toronto’s skyline. We took in the tranquil atmosphere and soaked in the sun for a while before we started our return back along the waterfront. My European visitors commented several times how incredible it is to have all this publicly accessible land right along the waterfront and how in some secluded spots you don’t even realize that you are in a major metropolitan area.

To get back up to our house we had to climb back up from the waterfront and this time we chose the Glen Stewart Ravine, where a little brook has carved a valley into the slopes leading down to the waterfront. It is a densely forested area and when you are in there it feels like you are in a remote forest somewhere, not right in the middle of Toronto.

Once back at our house, preparation got started for our final goodbye barbeque and we had invited a few extra friends to join us to give our Austrian guests a proper sendoff back home. We enjoyed some excellent food and they sampled a few more varieties of Canadian wines and beers, all of which they had commented quite favourably on. We didn’t sample much restaurant cuisine since my brother is a talented chef, but the fresh ingredients that he purchased in Toronto’s various markets made for some truly delicious dinners.

In the evening we took one more spin in the car, first to revisit the Distillery District at night. Luis had wanted to buy some beer glasses at the Mill Street Brewery as a souvenir, but unfortunately the brewery and restaurant were closed. The whole Distillery area was a little quiet, not surprisingly, since it was Labour Day, the last official day of summer, and the final day of respite before school would begin again. We continued our driving tour with a little spin through downtown and up Yonge Street before we turned east on Bloor Street. We crossed the Bloor Street Viaduct and arrived on the Danforth, Toronto’s Greek area. As always, Greektown was quite busy and people were milling about. We sat down on the patio of one of our favourite restaurants and enjoyed some Greek snacks before we headed home after another long day, all of us a little sad, commenting how nine days can pass so quickly.

Today we’ll have to take their four rented bicycles back and around 2:30 we’ll have to start the trek to the airport. It’s been a fabulous 9 days, an extended sleepover with four great people and we won’t forget this holiday for a long, long time. We are already hoping for another reunion, either in Austria, or back here in Canada, to deepen this fabulous connection.

Pat Perez, the uber-talented, sometimes self-critical slasher, got the year started with a win at the 50th Bob Hope Classic hosted by Arnold Palmer. Perez, who is as well-known for his fiery temper as he is for his booming drives, overtook Steve Stricker and a host of others down the stretch on a blustery Sunday in the desert. For the veteran Perez the first win was a long time coming. Although the rest of the year didn’t go as well as he would have wanted, it seems likely that he will be a factor again soon.

Perhaps the biggest surprise among the first-time winners came in March at The Honda Classic. Y.E. Yang’s name was rarely mentioned before he tamed PGA National and held off an impressive field that included defending champion Ernie Els. What we couldn’t know in March was that Yang was just getting started. He would capture another, even bigger title less than a half a year later when he overtook Tiger Woods at the PGA Championship.

No one was surprised when Paul Casey won the Shell Houston Open in early spring. Before suffering a rib injury that ended his season later in the summer, Casey ascended to the No. 3 ranking in the world. Don’t forget about him in the majors next year.

While all eyes were on Tom Watson and Stewart Cink at the British Open, Bo Van Pelt finally reeled in his first win at the U.S. Bank Championship in Milwaukee. Van Pelt, who had been close on several different occasions during his career, broke through in dramatic fashion in a playoff over John Mallinger.

The next weekend Nathan Green and Retief Goosen made it a two-man race north of the border at the RBC Canadian Open. Green, who had lost in a playoff to Woods back in 2006 at the Buick Invitational, this time took down a major champion in Canada.

Ryan Moore closed out the regular season with a win at the Wyndham Championship. In 2005 he became the first person since Woods to bypass q-school and earn his TOUR card. Moore finally joined him in the winner’s circle this year.

Martin Laird was the season’s final first-time winner at the Justin TImberlake Shriners Hospitals for Children Open. It took a brilliant shot on the third extra hole to set up a birdie and the playoff victory for the Scotsman. If you don’t know much about Laird you soon will. At 27 he has two full years behind him on the PGA TOUR and one win notched on his belt.

For some of these gentlemen this will likely be the best year they ever have on the PGA TOUR. For others it was just the beginning. Whatever the case, after 2009 they will forever be known as PGA TOUR winners.
 

President in Swing

Top Events on Calendar

There’s a new one to add to the let-me-try collection, namely Nathan Green’s escape from someone’s Cobb salad up near the dining room, the single critical piece in his somewhat unexpected triumph as the sunshine finally broke through at Glen Abbey.

The man from Toronto, Australia – that would be the Toronto with garbage pickup – provided one of the nuttier among the 100 finishes so far at the Canadian Open. He actually did it twice and Retief Goosen did the rest, botching a six-foot putt to win, then chopping around the second playoff hole to hand the big cheque to the par-shooting Green. Had Goosen made his 8 1/2-footer for par on the second playoff hole to send Green to the 18th hole for the third time in an hour, it would have been great to see where he got up and down from this time.

Because, surely, he was going to.

Needing a birdie at 18 to win in regulation, he hit it into the crowd, but rescued par from what is called Bob Friend Country. He hit it to the waterside fringe of the green, which, luckily for him, had not been mowed this day. Normally, that shot keeps going into the pond, as Friend found out the hard way from a similar spot in the 1998 playoff against Billy Andrade.

Before he could hit the shot, Green was frozen for 10 minutes as playing partner Martin Laird lost a ruling and walked back to hit another approach shot.

“About the worst thing you could have happen,” said Green, who tried to keep his mind blank and later said he was “happy the way I settled myself down.”

Half an hour later, in a playoff necessitated by Goosen’s clutch eagle putt from 15 1/2 feet at that 72nd hole – Goosen’s last good putting stroke, for sure – Green saved par again despite a gruesome approach 40 yards over the green into the scoring area. Given line-of-sight relief from the TV towers – unless someone calls in complaining today and nervous officials review the call – he went looking for a place to drop. Hundreds of displaced spectators and a flower bed away, he finally found one.

Then he hit it back to the same far fringe, the one that usually is mowed and wasn’t. He bellied the chip close enough to make the par and survived when Goosen honked his six-footer to win.

Speaking of honking, Anthony Kim came to 18 needing eagle to have a hope to sneak into a playoff. Kim hit a monster drive, but spun his approach back into the pond and stormed off with a cuss.

Kim was the other “name” player in contention and golf is strange in this way: most fans – and certainly all tournament sponsors – are rooting for the overdog. Clearly, though, the same golf gods who had soaked this tournament repeatedly for four days were now deciding that another non winner would break through in Canada. Green was the underdog, but did what he needed to do – and from wherever he needed to do it.

So that’s it for Glen Abbey for a while. It’s St. George’s next year, then Shaughnessy and probably Montreal in 2012. It’ll be a while until Glen Abbey stages its 26th Open. We’ll be busy until then with all these shots to try.

Source from shoppinginjoy.com