Tiger - The Legend Grows

Image by Jim Epler via FlickrIn almost 40 years as a golfer, having attended many Majors and having watched hundreds of televised golf tournaments, I've never seen a more thrilling 6 holes of golf than Tiger played at Torrey Pines today.
In obvious pain from his recently repaired left knee, Tiger overcame a deficit of 5 strokes with 6 to play.
In 13 previous US Open starts he had only two eagles, today he had two eagles in 6 holes. One can only imagine how far ahead he would be if he was 100% healthy. This was a performance to rival Ken Venturi's Congressional win and Hogan's post car crash wins.
Unfortunately, win or lose tomorrow, we've probably seen the last of Tiger for several weeks. I will be very surprised if he even returns for the British Open. If this week was a regular Tour event he would probably not have played, but it's a Major and Tiger lives for Majors. I just hope that he doesn't miss the rest of the season, having re-injured his knee.
Only time will tell but for now I'm more excited about tomorrow's final round than I've been in years.

Amateur's in the Women's Open

Image via WikipediaOne of the notable things about this year's USGA Women's Open will be the number of amateurs that qualified - one of my student's qualified for the third consecutive time as an amateur.
At the San Diego qualifying site, 9 of the top ten qualifiers were amateurs, the exception being Liselotte Neumann, a former Open winner.
Last year at Pine Needles, 4 amateurs made the cut. I'll be surprised if any amateurs play on the weekend at Torrey Pines.
The presence of great amateurs is a good sign for the long term health of the game and it's a great incentive to juniors coming up on the ranks to see that they have a change to play in the national championship as they are grooving their games for the pro ranks.