Amateur Championship Draws Stellar Field
The 288-player field for this week’s 115th
Amateur Championship in Scotland features
players from 37 countries, including 11 of the
top 20 in the World Amateur Golf Ranking. The
championship begins today at Muirfield and
American Jonathan
Randolph, at No. 4 the
highest ranked player in the
field, leads a 25-player U.S.
contingent hoping to emu-
late fellow American Drew
Weaver, the 2007 Amateur
Champion at Royal Lytham and St. Annes. Two
of last year’s semifinalists, Englishmen Stiggy
Hodgson and Darren Renwick, both return try-
ing to improve on their performances at Formby
last year.
Others in the field include Korea’s Jin Jeong,
No. 6 in the world, and Australia’s Matt Jager,
who won the Australian Match Play and Stroke
Play in consecutive weeks earlier this year. The
champion earns a spot in the Open Championship and The Masters.
Jonathan Randolph
South Africans Ernie Els and Retief Goosen,
who have won two U.S. Opens each, have been
added to the 2011 World Golf Hall of Fame
International ballot. The induction ceremony,
traditionally held in the fall, will take place in the
spring of 2011. A specific date and venue has yet
to be announced.
Tiger Woods is no longer the world’s most
liked golfer, let alone athlete, for the first time
this century, according to Market Evaluations
latest Sports Q Scores list. Woods fell from
first to 25th among athletes, and his positive Q
Score slipped 33 percent, from 44 to 30, while
his negative Q Score more than doubled, from a
15 to 39. Arnold Palmer’s 39 Q Score leads all
golfers, followed by Jack Nicklaus (36), Tiger
and Phil Mickelson ( 24).
Jack Nicklaus and Annika Sorenstam hope
to co-design the golf course in Brazil that will
be used in the 2016 Olympics. The two
earlier teamed to help pitch golf to
the IOC while the organization
was considering adding golf
as an Olympic sport.
They wrote a letter to
the International Golf
Federation requesting
they be considered
as architects.
The Volvo World Matchplay Championship
is returning to the European Tour schedule in
2011, following a year’s absence. The limited-field event will be played at Finca Cortesin in
Spain May 19-22, carrying a $4.1 million purse.
Lorena Ochoa and Sorenstam are coming
out of retirement to play in the Notah Begay
Challenge Aug. 31 at Turning Stone Resort in
Verona, N. Y. They will be among several top-name men and women pros competing in a
mixed-team skins match. The winning team will
split $100,000. Proceeds will go toward helping
fight obesity and diabetes among
Native American youth. l
