Phil Mickelson unveils HSBC Champions official World Golf Championships trophy

Two-time HSBC Champions winner Phil Mickelson has helped to unveil the new trophy for the World Golf Championships-HSBC Champions: 'The Old Tom Morris Cup', reports Tim Maitland.

The new cup and name are in keeping with the other three World Golf Championships events, which also boast similarly-designed Wedgwood trophies named after golfing legends. The World Golf Championships-Accenture Match Play Championship awards The Walter Hagen Cup to the winner, the World Golf Championships-CA Championship offers The Gene Sarazen Cup, and the World Golf Championships-Bridgestone Invitational winner holds aloft The Gary Player Cup.

 “I am really fond of the original trophy, which can happen when you win something more than once,” says Mickelson, who lifted the 2007 HSBC Champions and then became the first winner of the tournament following its elevation to World Golf Championships status in 2009.

“But the new trophy has even greater worldwide significance. First, it is instantly recognizable as one of the WGC prizes, second, it carries the name of one of the legends of golf. Third, and perhaps most importantly, it is proof of just how fast the game of golf in China and Asia has evolved and how significant that growth is to the world of golf,” the four-time Major champion adds.

In choosing Old Tom Morris the world’s local bank has found a figure recognizable to the established golf world. HSBC chose one of the famous names in the history of Scottish golf because the pioneering work “Old” Tom Morris did in the 1800s to shape the game of golf is symbolic of the pioneering work being done in Chinese golf now.

“Old Tom represents the birth of the game of golf. Asia, China and the WGC-HSBC Champions in varying ways represent the future of the sport and, you could argue, will in time be looked at as being part of one of the most dramatic shifts for golf since Old Tom’s era,” says Giles Morgan, HSBC Group Head of Sponsorship.

“The WGC-HSBC Champions could be described as the nucleus which has shaped the way tournament golf in Asia is evolving and developing on the world stage, in the same way the Old Tom Morris helped shape and define the sport of golf” he adds.

Padraig Harrington, Ireland’s three-time Major winner, describes Old Tom as one of the bedrocks on which the sport was built.

“He’s the heritage of the game! He was one of the first Open Champions and won it four times; it adds a lot to an event when it has heritage and I know it takes a long time to build heritage, but this helps" said Harrington. "It’s a trophy that anyone would be proud to lift and they’ll be proud of the association with Old Tom Morris and the history that goes with that. It’ll help the players feel even more about the event and it’ll make it that little bit more special.”

Morris was greenkeeper and golf professional on the Old Course, St Andrews, Scotland; a four-time winner of The Open Championship and ranked among the top links course designers of the 19th Century. Among the 75 courses he designed or remodelled are some of Scotland’s world-famous courses, including Carnoustie, Muirfield and Royal Dornoch.

“You’re talking about one of the legends of the game. You talk about Tom Morris you’re talking about Prestwick and St Andrews and you’re talking about a game steeped in history; the legends of the game are hugely important to us!” exclaimed 2010 US Open winner Graeme McDowell.

“Guys like him shaped the game we play now. How different would it be if you didn’t have Old Tom Morris, Ben Hogan, Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods?  How big is the game now? A TV spectacle, a global game, you just look at the milestones of the game and he’s one of them.”

In one way or another, “Old” Tom influenced almost every aspect of the sport. He helped to set up the first (British) Open Championship in 1860 and competed in every Open until 1896. Various authorities and experts have attributed everything from standardising the number of holes to 18, the size of the golf hole, the appearance of bunkers and several fundamentals of greenkeeping to the influence of “Old” Tom.

“Old” Tom Morris, who was born in St. Andrews in 1821 and died there in 1908, is remembered as a true pioneer and exponent of golf.

In recognition of his service, the R&A has hung his portrait on permanent display in its clubhouse, while the Golf Course Superintendents Association of America's most prestigious honour is the Old Tom Morris Award.

WGC Winners

16 – Tiger Woods (USA)*

3 – Geoff Ogilvy (AUS)

2 – Phil Mickelson (USA)

2 – Ernie Els (USA)**

2 – Darren Clarke (NIR)

1 – Hunter Mahan (USA)

1 – Ian Poulter (ENG)

1 – Henrik Stenson (SWE)

1 – David Toms (USA)

1 – Kevin Sutherland (USA)

1 – Steve Stricker (USA)

1 – Jeff Maggert (USA)

1 – Mike Weir (CAN)

1 – Vijay Singh (FIJ)

1 – Stewart Cink (USA)

1 – Craig Parry (AUS)

*plus 2000 World Cup

**plus 2001 World Cup

HSBC Champions

Format: 72-holes, stroke play, no cut
Field: Approximately 78 players, consisting of tournament winners from around the world and the best players from the International Federation of PGA Tours, as dictated by each Tour’s money list, order of merit, etc.

2009 – Phil Mickelson (USA) 271 (-17) (Sheshan International GC, Shanghai, China)

2008* – Sergio Garcia (ESP)

2007* – Phil Mickelson (USA)

2006* – YE Yang Yong-Eun (KOR)

2005* – David Howell (ENG) 268 (-20)

* = Before granted WGC status

Bridgestone Invitational*

Format: 72-holes, stroke play, no cut
Field: Members of the most recent United States and International Presidents Cup teams and the United States and European Ryder Cup teams. Players ranked among the top 50 on the Official World Golf Ranking. The past year’s Major winners.

2010 – Hunter Mahan (USA) 268 (-12) (Firestone CC, Ohio, USA)

2009 – Tiger Woods (USA) 268 (-12) (Firestone CC, Ohio, USA)

2008 – Vijay Singh (FIJ) 270 (-10) (Firestone CC, Ohio, USA)

2007 – Tiger Woods (USA) 272 (-8) (Firestone CC, Ohio, USA)

2006 – Tiger Woods (USA) 270 (-10) (Firestone CC, Ohio, USA)

2005 – Tiger Woods (USA) 274 (-6) (Firestone CC, Ohio, USA)

2004 – Stewart Cink (USA) 269 (-11) (Firestone CC, Ohio, USA)

2003 – Darren Clarke (NIR) 268 (-12) (Firestone CC, Ohio, USA)

2002 – Craig Parry (AUS) 268 (-16) (Sahalee CC, Washington, USA)

2001 – Tiger Woods (USA) 269 (-12) (Firestone CC, Ohio, USA)

2000 – Tiger Woods (USA) 259 (-21) (Firestone CC, Ohio, USA)

1999 – Tiger Woods (USA) 270 (-10) (Firestone CC, Ohio, USA)

*From 1999- 2005 known as NEC Invitational

CA Championship*

Format: 72 holes, stroke play, no cut
Field: 65-70, including 44 of the top 50 from the Official World Golf Rankings and leaders of the six Tours' Official Money Lists/Order of Merit.

2010 – Ernie Els (RSA) 270 (-18) (Doral, Florida, USA)

2009 – Phil Mickelson (USA) 269 (-19) (Doral, Florida, USA)

2008 – Geoff Ogilvy (AUS) 271 (-17) (Doral, Florida, USA)

2007 – Tiger Woods (USA) 278 (-10) (Doral, Florida, USA)

2006 – Tiger Woods (USA) 270 (-23) (The Grove, Hertfordshire, England)
2005 – Tiger Woods (USA) 270 (-10) (play-off) (Harding Park, San Francisco, California, USA)

2004 – Ernie Els (RSA) 270 (-18) (Mount Juliet Conrad, Co. Kilkenny, Ireland)

2003 – Tiger Woods (USA) 274 (-6) (Capital City Club, Atlanta, Georgia, USA)

2002 – Tiger Woods (USA) 263 (-25) (Mount Juliet Conrad, Co. Kilkenny, Ireland)

2001 – Cancelled (Bellerive, St. Louis, Missouri, USA)

2000 – Mike Weir (CAN) 277 (-11) (Valderrama, Spain)

1999 - Tiger Woods (USA) 278 (-10) (play-off) (Valderrama, Spain)

*From 1999-2006 known as American Express Championship

Accenture Match Play Championship

Format: Match Play

Field: Top 64 available players (Based on the Official World Golf Ranking)

2010 – Ian Poulter (ENG) 4&2 vs Paul Casey (Dove Mountain, Arizona, USA)  

2009 – Geoff Ogilvy (AUS) 4&3 vs. Paul Casey (Ritz-Carlton GC, Arizona, USA)

2008 – Tiger Woods (USA) 8&7 vs. Stewart Cink.  (Ritz-Carlton GC, Arizona, USA)

2007 – Henrik Stenson (SWE) 2&1 vs. Geoff Ogilvy  (Gallery,  Arizona, USA)

2006 – Geoff Ogilvy (AUS) 3&2 vs. Davis Love III (La Costa, California, USA) 

2005 – David Toms (USA) 6&5 vs. Chris DiMarco (La Costa, California, USA) 
2004 – Tiger Woods (USA) 3&2 vs. Davis Love III (La Costa, California, USA) 
2003 – Tiger Woods (USA) 2&1 vs.  David Toms (La Costa, California, USA) 
2002 – Kevin Sutherland (USA) 1 up vs. Scott McCarron 1 up (La Costa, California, USA) 
2001 – Steve Stricker (USA) 2&1 vs. Pierre Fulke (Metropolitan GC, Victoria, Australia)
2000 – Darren Clarke (NIR) 4&3 vs. Tiger Woods (La Costa, California, USA) 
1999 – Jeff Maggert (USA) 38 holes vs. Andrew Magee (La Costa, California, USA) 

Note: From 2000 to 2006 the World Cup was a WGC event. Winners as follows:

2006 - Germany (Bernhard Langer/Marcel Siem) 268 (play-off) (Sandy Lane, Barbados)

2005 – Wales (Bradley Dredge/Stephen Dodd) 189 (Victoria Clube, Algarve, Portugal)

2004 – England (Paul Casey/Luke Donald) 257 (Real Club, Seville, Spain)

2003 – South Africa (Rory Sabbatini/Trevor Immelman) 275 (Kiawah Island, South Carolina, USA)

2002 – Japan (Shigeki Maruyama/Toshimitsu Izawa) 252 (Vista Vallarta, Puerto Vallarta, Mexico)

2001 – South Africa (Ernie Els/Retief Goosen) 264 (play-off) (Taiheiyo Club, Shizuoka, Japan)

2000 – United States (Tiger Woods/David Duval) 254 (Buenos Aires GC, Argentina)

Golf for Beginners thanks Tim Maitland for this informative article.

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What will Olympic status do for golf in Brazil?

August 5^th 2011 marks five years to go before Rio de Janeiro hosts South America’s first Olympics and golf returns to sports’ biggest stage for the first time since 1904. Tim Maitland looks at how the sport is evolving in Brazil as 2016 inches nearer.

From Rio de Janeiro’s perspective, the final piece of the Olympic jigsaw was put into place in June when, during the IOC Coordination Commission’s visit, the decision to build a new course in Barra da Tijuca, rather than to refashion the nearby Itanhanga Golf Club, was made. For the Rio 2016 Organising Committee it meant that the venue master plan was complete.

With the five-years-to-go point upon us, it gives golf fans a clearer picture of what golf in the Olympics will be like, with the International Golf Federation still working on the qualification premise it presented to the Olympic family when it successfully made its bid for inclusion in 2009: the top 15 men and women in the world rankings (with a limit of four per country) will be there, with the rest made up by working down the rankings with a maximum of two players per country until the sixty-player field is filled.

2016 Olympics in Rio

Concerns about whether all of the top players will take their places in the field in 2016 are frequent and, now at least, may seem relevant. One suspects that will be a moot point by the time the Games arrive for the simple reason that the entire multi-billion dollar global golf industry – players, tours, the International Golf Federation, golf courses and the golf apparel and equipment brands – all need the injection of renewed interest a successful Olympics will provide, especially in the wake of the Credit Crunch.

So what will Olympic status do for golf in Brazil? Well, just as for the golf world in general, the opportunity is far greater than two four-round Olympic events; it’s already put golf into a whole new stratosphere of Brazilian sport.

“After the IOC decided golf will enter in the Olympic Games, things have changed completely in Brazil,” says Rachid Orra, the President of the South American Golf Federation (the Federacion Sudamericana de Golf) and of the Brazilian Golf Confederation (the Confederacao Brasileira de Golfe).

“Golf in Brazil was growing steadily every year, but now with this new opportunity and with golf returning to the Olympics here in Rio de Janeiro, things are changing dramatically. Even the Brazilian government is interested in helping us develop golf in Brazil. It’s an opportunity that we have to take very seriously in order to take profit… to give big steps in the development of golf. The investment in money is not yet significant, but I’m sure this will grow very fast in the future.”

Hosting two successful tournaments is of paramount importance for Rio and Brazil but, as Brazil’s former LPGA player Candy Hannemann puts it, that is just part of a far bigger aim.

“It’s a project. Our goal is not just the 2016 Olympics. It is “how can we help the 2016 Olympics kick-start more of a golf tradition in the country? And then how can we go on from there?” I think the project is more than just 2016,” says the 32-year-old Hannemann, who played for five years on the LPGA until a wrist injury forced her off the tour in 2008.

Things are already changing…starting with attitudes. That’s beautifully summed up by another female professional, Maria Priscila Iida. A third-generation Japanese-Brazilian, Iida talks of moving to Japan eight years ago without a word of Japanese and experiencing a vastly different rural world to the megacities of Tokyo, Osaka and Nagoya that she had envisaged. However her tone of incredulity is just as strong when she describes coming back for the first time in six years to play the 2010 HSBC LPGA Brasil Cup.

“I had culture shock backwards. Everything was different. There are so many celebrities playing golf right now and you see it in the magazines. It is like, “What is this? Everybody knows about golf now?” I played with a Brazilian actor last year and learned that Formula 1 driver Rubens Barrichello takes lessons with my ex-coach,” explains the 32-year-old Iida, who played with Hannemann in Brazil’s junior national team before either reached their teens.

“The way I hear things it’s becoming much bigger. You can’t count the golf courses anymore; there are so many. They’re golf courses one here and one there. It’s bigger and it’s growing,” she adds.

Rio’s Dilemma

Rio’s challenge is that the Japeri Golfe Clube, the only public facility in the entire city, it is losing two of its nine holes because of road expansions prior to the Olympics. The other two golf courses, Itanhanga Golf Club and Gavea Golf and Country Club, are the high-end private members facilities.

“It’s a Catch 22!” says Candy Hannemann.

“It’s like the chicken and the egg story. Without the egg you don’t have the chicken, without the chicken you don’t have the egg,” echoes Enio Ribeiro of Brasil1, the biggest of the country’s sports marketing companies involved in the golf industry.

“There needs to be people playing for somebody to invest in it, but nobody will play unless there is a place to play,” Hannemann continues.

“Here the investment needs to come with a leap of faith; a belief that the game’s going to grow and be marketed in a way that will bring the game to the mass, because that’s when golf becomes big. We could have thousands of people out there with the potential to be PGA or LPGA golfers but we don’t know they have the talent because they don’t have the access to it,” she points out.

Right across the board in Rio there’s a consensus that the issue of accessibility to the sport needs to be solved if golf is going to benefit from the Olympics.

“The most important thing is the facilities. That’s simple math. Brazil has 200 million people and only 25,000 golfers. Argentina has 50 million people and 200,000 golfers. Because of the economy we definitely have around 10 million people that could play golf. What we need to do is have facilities that can allow them to try it,” says Ribeiro.

“We need some big magic…not magic…we have to work harder,” adds Rachid Orra.

“It would be easier if we had a lot of public courses to put a lot of people from schools directly into playing golf, but the Brazilian reality is not like this so we have to work 10 times harder than in America for instance. We need much more driving ranges here. Brazil has a lot of land. The major new courses are the resorts, the hotels further out of the cities. In the Northeast of Brazil, the greater part of the new hotels in Brazil are planning golf courses. Tourists like to play golf in Brazil; it’s an economic need, which is good for golf in Brazil.”

The good news from Rio’s point of view is that, with almost every major stakeholder in golf engaged in the process of preparing for the Rio Games, help is more available than it has ever been in finding the fix to the Catch 22 issue.

“Everyone from here, that’s what they want to talk about: every single one of them. It’s a vicious cycle that we have to figure out how to break, and we can. It’s more about awareness,” says Jane Geddes, a two-time major champion and chairman of the International Golf Federation, during a short break between meetings arranged for her trip to the HSBC event.

Thriving Economy

Historically, the kind of investment golf needs has been an issue in Brazil where spiraling inflation prohibited long-term projects, but since 2000 the number of golfers has increased from 6,000 in that year, stabilising in more recent years at around 25,000. The number of courses has increased too in those 10 years, up nearly 25% to 110, while another 30 are under construction, but as Rachid Orra mentioned, some of that growth is far away in sparsely populated states like Bahia and Pernambuco catering only for European tourists a surprisingly short six-hour flight away.

The fact that this development is happening at all is a product of a period of growth that has seen Brazil develop into one of the world’s top 10 economies by gross domestic product.

“The economy in Brazil for the past 10 or 15 years has really been a stable economy and one where you see significant amount of foreign investment for a variety of different projects. One of the largest offshore oil finds in recent history, the Topi oil field, is offshore of Rio so there’s a lot of investment taking place in the oil and gas industry in and around Rio. Similarly in other parts of Brazil; investments in agriculture, investments in other industries are taking place,” explains David Kotheimer, Vice President of HSBC Bank Brasil.

“The economics are there. The financing capability is there. The economy in Brazil is there. From a demographic perspective, you see more and more people improving their socio-economic condition year-on-year and that’s predicted to continue over the next 30 years. The prosperity in Brazil is continuing to increase. The stability, you’ve had that in the Brazilian economy for a long time now and that’s why HSBC is here; we’re helping with that growth and we’re making those types of loans to companies that need to invest. That will continue on. I think the stability is there and the financing is there; it’s having a sufficient demand for that type of investment in a driving range or golf course,” Kotheimer adds.

So the financial climate ripe, and the socio-economics suggest a significant sector of Brazil’s population are in the process of moving into the level of wealth where golf becomes aspirational. Growing and meeting that demand, which you could break down as a combination of awareness and opportunity, stand hand-in-hand as Rio’s big obstacles.

The second part of Tim Maitland's article, Golf and Brazil's International Olympic Growth Potential, will be posted tomorrow is now posted on Golf for Beginners blog.

Photo credit: StanfordReview.org


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Yani Tseng Hopes Number One Rule Applies at HSBC Women's Championship in Singapore

New women’s world number one Yani Tseng is hoping that the HSBC Women’s Champions rule that its winners belong to the exclusive club of top-ranked players still applies when she gets to Singapore next week. Tim Maitland reports.

The three champions of the tournament at Tanah Merah come from the elite group of six players to have been rated number one since the rankings were introduced in 2006: Ai Miyazato of Japan, Korea’s Jiyai Shin and Lorena Ochoa of Mexico.

“That sounds really good! Yeah! Thanks for reminding me of that!,” said the 22-year-old Taiwanese star Tseng, who won the Honda LPGA Thailand this weekend by five strokes extending her 2011 record to four wins in four events!

 

credit:Zimbio

“I’m really looking forward to this year. I know I have lots of confidence right now and I can’t wait to get to Singapore and see my old friends, to play that tournament and see all my HSBC friends over there. It’ll be pretty nice,” said Tseng, who is eager to test herself on the Garden Course after winning the Taifong Ladies Open on the Ladies Asian Golf Tour and claiming the Handa Women’s Australian Open and the ANZ Ladies Masters in Queensland in successive weeks.

“It’s a great golf course. You can play all 14 clubs on that course; it’s not just driver-wedge, driver-wedge. You hit a three wood off the tee, you hit a rescue off the tee all the different kinds of shots you have to hit. You really need to focus on what your strategy is and every hole is different. Some of the par fives are reachable, which makes it more fun and then there are island greens; it’s just a fun golf course to play. You never know the winning score and there are big crowds too,” Yani says.

However Tseng will face fierce competition to keep hold of her number one ranking when she gets to Singapore. As well as 2009 HSBC Women’s Champions winner Jiyai Shin who Tseng toppled from top spot on the Rolex Rankings at the start of this week, Suzann Pettersen, Cristie Kerr and Na Yeon Choi are all one win away from taking the number one ranking away.

“It’s an incredibly exciting time for golf at the moment. We had Lee Westwood arrive at the HSBC Champions in Shanghai last November as the new number one with Tiger Woods, Martin Kaymer and Phil Mickelson all with the opportunity to toppling him that week and it made for a great tournament. The HSBC Women’s Champions is going to have that same buzz and excitement,” said Giles Morgan, HSBC Group Head of Sponsorship.

“Last year was the first time that a tournament in Asia had impacted the very top of the men’s world rankings, now we have young talented Asian women fighting for the right to be world number one in an world-class event in Singapore. It all proves Asia’s emerging in to the top echelons of the golfing world,” he added.

For Tseng, just being able to return to the Lion City as number one, to a place where she played and won some of her earliest junior tournaments as a girl, will be a memorable moment.

“That would be great! I’d really wish that. I’m trying not to think too much about only staying number one for one week, but sometimes you never know. I really just want to stay focused and keep working hard,” she says.

“When I first started playing [tournaments] in Singapore, I didn’t even think of being women’s number one; I just came to play and to try and win those championships. I didn’t think about the world. I didn’t even know how big the world is. It’s only since I went to the United States that I started to know how big it is. But all the tournaments I won in Singapore gave me a lot of confidence too. I’d win a tournament, come back the next year and win again.”

YANI TSENG INTERVIEW

Q: So, little Ruby* Tseng is the world number one! How about that?

A: It’s very exciting for me to be world number one. For the last five or six months everybody in the top six in the world has had the chance to be number one and then finally I’ve got to world number one. It’s really, really exciting. I’ve dreamed about being world number one and I’ve talked about being world number one and now that moment has come it feels so unreal. I wasn’t expecting that it was really going to come. It makes me so appreciative. I appreciate my friends, my team, my coach and all the people around me that are always supporting me. I just really appreciate it.

Now, I have lots of confidence. I know how to be on top. I feel like I know more how to win a tournament. I’m not afraid to be in the lead. I’m happy to be in the lead. Everything’s started to change a little bit; I feel like I’m improving and improving every year and it’s very exciting for me to see how I’m getting on this year.

[*Ruby was the western name Yani used for a time when she was an Amateur]

Q: Was there a moment when it really sank in?

A: Not really. All the moments are there in my mind. I’ve looked back at every day from the first time I started playing golf and I’ve finally become world number one, but you know we’re all still very close; you never know what will happen this week or next week. So I just want to keep working hard, because everybody’s working, so it’s very challenging for me. There are still a lot of things to learn. It’s not just for the short term. I want to be long-term; like Annika and Lorena.

When I first started playing [tournaments] in Singapore, I didn’t even think of being women’s number one; I just came to play and to try and win those championships. I didn’t think about the world. I didn’t even know how big the world is. It’s only since I went to the United States that I started to know how big it is. But all the tournaments I won in Singapore gave me a lot of confidence too. I’d win a tournament, come back the next year and win again. Through all the years it’s been very successful, as an amateur playing all over Asia. Going back for the HSBC [Women’s Champions] I was always very happy to go back there again.

Q: Can you believe the little girl who used to go over there to play tournaments is now number one?

A: No. I was expecting that, but I didn’t know it would be so soon. This year I set out the goal to be world number one, but it’s been just two weeks! After three tournaments this year I’ve become world number one! It feels unreal.

Q: Your game seems to be so good. It’s not just that you’re winning, but you don’t seem to be making mistakes!

A: Yeah. I’m trying. I’m working out with my coach Gary Gilchrist and I’ve been changing my swing and I think my swing is better now. I’ve been working on my putting; my putting has always been sometimes up and sometimes down, but I’m working to be more consistent. My putting is working pretty well and I think everything is all set.

Q: And the HSBC Women’s Champions? A course you HAVE to be straight on…

A: Yeah, that’s for sure. It’s a great golf course. I’m really looking forward to playing that course. You can play all 14 clubs on that course; it’s not just driver-wedge, driver-wedge. You hit a three wood off the tee, you hit a rescue off the tee all the different kinds of shots you have to hit. You really need to focus on what your strategy is and every hole is different. Some of the par fives are reachable, which makes it more fun and then there are island greens; it’s just a fun golf course to play. You never know the winning score and there are big crowds too.

Q: And always a good champion. The three champions so far have all been*…

A: Number one! That sounds really good! Yeah! Thanks for reminding me of that! I’m really looking forward to this year. I know I have lots of confidence right now and I can’t wait to get to Singapore and see my old friends, to play that tournament and see all my HSBC friends over there. It’ll be pretty nice.

[*Strictly speaking, it’s better to say the three winners of the HSBC Women’s Champions also belong to the group of six women to have been ranked number one since the Rolex Rankings were introduced in 2006]

Q: Is it important to you to keep that number one so you can go back and see those friends as number one?

A: That would be great! I’d really wish that. I’m trying not to think too much about only staying number one for one week, but sometimes you never know. I really just want to stay focused and keep working hard.

Q: And what’s happening in Taiwan? They must be going crazy.

A: Yeah, I think so. On Sunday (at the ANZ Masters) I wrote on Facebook ‘Everybody wear pink. I’m going to wear pink and want everyone to support me’ and lots of people were wearing pink on Sunday in Taiwan. That was really interesting. I want to thank them for their support in Taiwan. It’s huge. I’m going back to Taiwan after the HSBC.

Q: So you have two homecomings? A homecoming in Singapore and then a homecoming in Taiwan.

A: Yeah. Yeah.

The HSBC Women's Champions event will be played February 24-27th on Tanah Merah Golf Course. Sixty-three of the best female golfers in the world will converge in Singapore in the fourth edition of the tournament.

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Italy's Quiet Golf Champion – Francesco Molinari

A year ago Francesco Molinari put the seal on a remarkable twelve months with one of the most sensational tournament displays ever seen in Asian golf, when he and Lee Westwood finished streets ahead of a world-class field at the WGC-HSBC Champions. Tim Maitland reports.

When Francesco “Chicco” Molinari briefly raised his hands in the air and gazed momentarily up the cheering Shanghai crowds in the grandstand at Sheshan last year, you would have had little clue from his body language that he had just gone eyeball to eyeball with the hottest player on the planet and won. 

Even now, when he looks back at the best performance, the biggest victory, the most spectacular year of his career and a season unparalleled in the history of Italian golf, his voice – a deep baritone – rumbles along at exactly the same steady, careful, unflustered pace. 

"It was very, very good. It was probably the best golf I’ve played so. When you’re playing against the number one in the world it doesn’t get any tougher than that, especially the way he was playing. It was just a great week for my confidence and my self-belief to see that I could compete against the best in the world," the 28-year-old explains, his tone showing no hint of the kind of excitement of someone describing the day and the week where he delivered a performance that he had strived for most of his life.

There’s no hint of exhilaration when he considers the culmination of a remarkable twelve months in his life. It started when he won the Omega Mission Hills World Cup for Italy with his older brother Edoardo in Shenzhen and continued when he twice played alongside Edoardo as his brother won his first European Tour events in Scotland. If that wasn’t enough the brothers, who were born a little under two years apart, paired up again to help Europe win the Ryder Cup and, circling the globe, Francesco returned to China to claim the biggest prize of his career taking his season earnings to within a few Euros of 2.8 million.

 The vanquished in this case is far more effusive than the victor.

“Last year’s event was great! Myself and Francesco ran away from the field! We played a different golf course that week!” exclaims Westwood, who was starting his first of what would be 22 weeks at number one.

“It was pretty much flawless golf,” Molinari muses modestly.

As the quiet champion, Molinari is perhaps destined to be filed in the same place that the 2006 Shanghai winner Yang Yong-Eun occupied until he became Asia’s first male Major Champion and his 2009 PGA Championship cast his previous achievements into a new light. Both are symbolic of the arrival of relatively new golfing nations to the sport’s top table and, at the times of their win, neither golfer had the same superstar status as some of the other names on the HSBC Champions roll of honour like Phil Mickelson (2007 & 2009) or Sergio Garcia (2008).

They have one other thing in common: to win both produced a performance so perfect that they remain a regular reference point.

“I try to revive the feeling I had that week. I played with such poise. It was my perfect tournament,” Yang said the week before he enshrined himself as a legend of Asian golf.

Molinari’s emotions are he’s exactly the same.

“Definitely! What is left for me from that week are the feelings that I had on the golf course; being competitive, being really in the moment and just the attitude I had on the golf course, rather than the game itself,” he says.

It’s hard enough to believe Francesco would need such a reference point, so unchanging is his demeanour: even people close to his family say that while brother Edoardo rides a more typically Italian emotional rollercoaster, Francesco never deviates.

What’s almost impossible to believe is his claim that, as a child, learning the game in Turin, his dentist-father frequently banned him for ‘throwing the toys out of the pram’.

“I used to throw clubs as a kid and swear and if my Dad saw me from other holes throwing clubs he wouldn’t let me play for a couple of weeks. That was the punishment for not behaving on the golf course,” Francesco explains.

“I think I was lucky to learn the lesson as a kid. When you turn professional you try really hard think about what you’re doing and not about what happened or what is going to happen. I think that’s what I did really well in Shanghai.”

Patience has proved a virtue in other ways too. At the insistence of their parents, both Edoardo and Francesco had to complete degrees at the University of Torino (Edoardo studying Engineering and Francesco choosing Business) before starting their golf careers.

Although the younger Molinari initially singles out improving year-on-year rather than his victories, there have been plenty of highlights in his professional life.

“The World Cup and the Ryder Cup were two of the biggest moments in my career. The win in Shenzhen was great, playing against Rory (McIlroy) and G-Mac (Graeme McDowell) in the last round and winning by one shot at the 18^th is always something special. Being the first World Cup success for Italy alongside my brother Edoardo was just something really unbelievable.

“The Ryder Cup is an unbelievable experience; different from any other emotion you can feel on the golf course. The first morning we were not even playing and when we went to the tee they started chanting “There’s only two Molinaris” and it was just a lot of fun. I thought it was one of the best chants of the week. It’s a lot of tension and a lot of pressure but at the same time it’s also a lot of fun because you don’t play for money, you don’t play for world ranking points… you just play for winning and the team.”

As for the steady improvement, Molinari admits that the law of diminishing returns applies as you get into the jet set of tour society. This year he has strived for a little more distance and in the process lost some of the pinpoint accuracy.

That’s not the only change. This year Molinari has played fewer events to make room for the Majors and other WGC tournaments that his HSBC Champions win has allowed him to add to the cream of the European Tour’s events.  The results haven’t been bad – top 10s in the Abu Dhabi HSBC Golf Championship, Volvo World Match Play Championship and the BMW Italian Open and, the highlight, a third place finish at the WGC-Cadillac Championship – but they haven’t been as consistent as previous seasons.

The other big adjustment has been the arrival of his first child, a son Tommaso, born this year on February 5^th.

“Life changes after a baby. You have to adapt to the new condition of being a parent, but it’s fun. As soon as he smiles you forget about anything that happened – good or bad – on the golf course. It gives you a different perspective,” Molinari reveals.

So, Molinari returns to the HSBC Champions not quite on the crest of the wave that swept him to the biggest win of his career, but looking forward to defending his title on what he describes as “a phenomenal” 18 holes of golf.

“It’s going to be different! We won the World Cup in China and now I’ve won in Shanghai; obviously I really like playing in China! It’s going to be fun to be back there another year. The HSBC Champions was just the climax of a fantastic year for me. I’m really looking forward to going back there this year and try and do the same,” he says.

How he’ll be received will be interesting. Perhaps like “YE” Yang Yong-Eun it will only be a Major championship that will make a nation relatively new to the sport re-evaluate the near-perfection he displayed last year.

If Francesco Molinari doesn’t get the recognition from the golfing public, the player he vanquished believes the Italian certainly has got it from his peers; the people that matter most.

“I think he did by all the players. That’s who you want recognition from,” Westwood says.

“He played very nicely,” the Englishman adds.

It’s a comment that sums up Francesco Molinari perfectly; simply because it is so understated.

Francesco Molinari Profile:

Personal

Nationality: Italian

Born: 8^th November 1982, Turin (Torino) Italy

Height/Weight: 5ft 8in/11st 5lb (172cm/72kg)

Family: Wife Valentina (m. 2007). Son Tommaso (b. 2010)

Lives: London, England

Education: Degree in Business, University of Torino (Università degli Studi di Torino/UNITO)

Other interests: Snowboarding, Football (Supports Inter Milan and West Ham United)

Career

Professional wins:

2010 WGC-HSBC Champions, Sheshan International Golf Club, Shanghai China

2010 Ryder Cup, Celtic Manor Resort, Newport, Wales

2009 Omega Mission Hills World Cup, Mission Hills, Guangdong, China (with Edoardo Molinari)

2006 Telecom Italian Open, Castello di Tolcinasco G & CC, Milan, Italy

Other Professional Landmarks:

November 2010: career-best 5^th place in the European Tour’s “race to Dubai” order of merit

October 2009: reached top 50 of the Official Golf World Rankings for the first time

2004: Turned pro after earning his European Tour card at his first attempt at Q School

Amateur wins:

2004 Italian Amateur Stroke Play Championship; Italian Match Play Championship; Sherry Cup, Spain

2002 Italian Amateur Stroke Play Championship; Italian Amateur Foursomes Championship (with Edoardo Molinari)

2010 HSBC Champions victory:

Became the first wire-to-wire winner in the history of the HSBC Champions

His first European Tour victory since the 2006 Italian Open – a gap of four years and 185 days and 125 European Tour events between victories

His first WGC victory of his career, in his fifth WGC appearance

Moved into the top 15 of the Official World Golf Ranking; his highest career position

Marked the first time since the WGC events started in 1999 that European Tour members had won three events in the same year (Ian Poulter (WGC – Accenture Match Play), Ernie Els (WGC – CA Championship)

Became the 17th different winner of a WGC event, while Italy became the ninth different country to win a WGC event

The Molinaris joined Seve and Manuel Ballesteros, who in 1983 both won, as the only brothers to win in the same European Tour season. (1983 Seve – PGA Championship, Irish Open and Trophée Lancôme; Manuel – Timex Open. 2010 Francesco – WGC-HSBC Champions; Edoardo – Barclays Scottish Open and Johnnie Walker Championship)

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The "crying shame" about Tiger Woods golf vs Westwood, Molinari duel

When it comes to deciding the highlights of 2010 there are plenty of contenders for most dominant display and an obvious winner of the most exciting moment of the year in golf. However a special category should be saved for the display of Francesco Molinari and Lee Westwood at the WGC-HSBC Champions for producing one of those most-cherished moments in tournament golf; a good old-fashioned duel! Tim Maitland reports.

No-one in their right mind could argue against that rain-sodden reenactment of the Somme – the drama at the Monday denouement of the Celtic Manor Ryder Cup – as the highlight of the year. Special mention would go to the three-way play-off for the PGA Championship at Whistling Straits (Dustin Johnson eventually being penalized for grounding his club in a “bunker” on his 72^nd hole, while Martin Kaymer saw off Bubba Watson): an Oscar winner in any other year. The individual performance? Louis Oosthuizen taking the Open Championship by seven shots at the home of golf would probably eclipse Cristie Kerr’s 12-shot victory at the LPGA Championship in most books, mainly because it’s St Andrews above Locust Hill.

They wouldn’t have a category for what happened at Sheshan International Golf Club in the WGC-HSBC Champions for the simple reason that two players almost never run away from a world-class field the way that Francesco Molinari and Lee Westwood did in finishing ten and nine shots ahead.

“It’s very rare: very unusual indeed. Often you get one person that streaks away, but two separating themselves that much is unusual,” said former Ryder Cup player and winner of the inaugural tournament in Shanghai David Howell.

“It just goes to show how well both of them played, ultimately how much Francesco deserved to win and how unlucky Lee was.”

A quick straw poll of the professionals on the driving range produces a lot of scratching of heads as to when they personally witnessed a similar moment of classic head-and-shoulders-above-the-rest hand-to-hand combat.

“Probably once every five years you’ll see two guys; it’s sort of like they get on a crest of a wave and they’re playing each other, feeding off each other and they just keep going. With a top-class field it’s very rare,” said Australian veteran Tony “TC” Carolan.

“You see these old classic tournaments where you get these fantastic duels because they’re playing together. They go along together, they played together over the weekend because they were so far ahead and they just kept going away from the field. It’s basically two different tournaments running at the same time! One and two are playing it out and the others are playing for third.”

True to that patent, the Molinari-Westwood encounter began from the start. The Ryder Cup teammates were first and second just one shot apart after the first round at Sheshan and finished each day in the same positions with the same margin as they left golf’s great and good trailing in their dust. There is one obvious comparison to make: The Duel on the Bund and the great, the legendary Duel in the Sun.

“The classic one was, of course, Nicklaus and Watson; the Open Championship at Turnberry in 1977.

Shanghai? It definitely belongs with it. What was good about Shanghai was that they’d drawn away; the only one that was similar was 1977, because they were away from everybody else and there were just the two of them at it,” declared TV commentator Renton Laidlaw, himself something of a legend in the game and one of the few people qualified to make the comparison because he was at both Turnberry 30-odd years ago, working as BBC Radio’s report and covering for London’s Evening Standard, and at Sheshan in November as a Golf Channel commentator.

“It was absolutely fantastic. Watson had won the Masters that year. They lapped the field. The guy that was third, Hubert Green, was 10 shots behind them, it was rather similar to Shanghai.”

There was one other person present in Shanghai, who was also at Turnberry in 77. Laidlaw’s Golf Channel colleague Warren Humphreys, a former English Amateur champions and winner on the European Tour (the 1995 Portuguese Open), not only played the Open Championship that year but had a hole in one. He agrees that isn’t a stretch to start comparing the two duels.

“It was a special week. If you look at Shanghai, in the end it was the first round score that won the tournament and after that they matched each other score for score. That’s similar to the Duel in the Sun; they matched each other score for score apart from one shot in the final round,” Humphreys said.

“The Duel in the Sun: Watson was at his peak and holing putts and Jack played OK… and it’s one of the legendary performances.  Jack with his B+ game and Tom had everything going – A plus-plus – and that’s right because Nicklaus was so much better than everyone else. Like Tiger, Nicklaus’s 15^th club [his mind] was one shot a round – that’s four shots a tournament – better than anyone else. He would win more just because of the way he could think and the way he could handle pressure"

For a six-year-old event to even be allowed into the same conversation with one of the greatest tournaments in golf history is flattering to say the least.

“Obviously, what Francesco and Lee did was world-class – I think, even in such a short history, the HSBC Champions has proved you don’t win it unless you’re playing at the highest level – but to hear it’s being mentioned in the same breath as the Duel in the Sun is one of the greatest compliments that can possibly be paid,” said Giles Morgan, HSBC Group Head of Sponsorship.

“The history of the sport is so precious and so revered I don’t think I would have dared make the comparison, but then when you hear people talking who were at Turnberry, and in Warren’s case played in the ‘ 77 Open, and who were also at Shanghai, you have to respect their point of view and be grateful for it.”

There are, of course, some ways in which the Duel on the Bund can’t begin to rival the Duel in the Sun. When Nicklaus arrived in Turnberry he already had 14 of his record 18 major championship victories under his belt. By the end of that week Watson would have three of his career total of eight and would become only the fourth player in history (after Arnold Palmer in 1960, Gary Player in 1974 and Nicklaus himself in 1975) to win multiple majors in the same season.

“There were two players at the top of their game,” explained Laidlaw, who is also the editor of the annual R&A Golfer’s Handbook.

“And I think Jack (Nicklaus) always enjoyed the competition more than he enjoyed winning. I think he would have won more if he’d been more intent on winning. He liked to win, but what gave him the real thrill was the competition. If he lost, but it had been a great competition, that satisfied him. "

Laidlaw went on to say, "That battle with him and Watson was a classic. I always remember Watson saying that he knew, even at the last green, at which point he was one ahead, and even though Nicklaus had been in the bush and had played a recovery shot onto the green and was some 20 or 30 feet away, he said “I knew he would hole it”.  And of course he did. 

Watson said, because I knew he would hole that, “I’d already made up my mind that I would have to hole my putt” – it was only a short putt, 2 ½ or 2 feet – he said “I knew that I’d have to hole it to win”. It meant so much to Watson to beat Nicklaus; beating Nicklaus was always the key. He was as happy to beat Nicklaus as [Isao] Aoki was unhappy to lose to Nicklaus when they battled very closely in the 1980 US Open at Baltusrol. They came to the wire as well and Nicklaus refused to let Aoki win that one. Aoki was trying to become the first far eastern or Asian winner of a Major. That was a great battle.”

It’s debatable, as with so many of the other great battles, as to whether the Aoki-Nicklaus encounter of 1980 qualifies as a duel. Aoki only got on terms with Nicklaus in the third round and he and the Golden Bear only escaped the rest of the field – led by Watson, Lon Finkle and Keith Fergus – on the final day.

“It is really hard to come up with other tournaments, Majors anyway, where two people have fought it out. If you could really put your mind to it you could probably think of a few more, but there’s not that many. Sometimes you find there’s a duel over one round or over the last 27 holes, but you don’t get it for four rounds,” Humphreys said, having racked his brains along with Laidlaw to compile a list of possibilities.

“With the best will in the world, Faldo at the [1996] Masters with Greg Norman, where he caught up on that big lead, wasn’t the same, because Faldo played well but Norman collapsed. In Shanghai you had two people peaking, not one falling apart and one playing well. Every now and then you get special weeks. Normally it takes one player to be on their peak form to win a tournament. If you get two players who are peaking at the same time and who are not afraid to win and are confident in their own ability then you get a very special moment, but it happens rarely. I think it was an exceptional performance. I think the way that Molinari played stretched Westwood and then Westwood stretched Molinari and when you get two players that play like that, and they were both very confident in their game (and I think Molinari produced one of the best putting weeks of his career), then you get a special week.”

What’s interesting is how far we have to look back for comparisons and how few times during Tiger Woods' domination that anything approaching a duel came to fruition. The main exception would be Tiger’s 14^th Major – the 2008 US Open at Torrey Pines – when Rocco Mediate took him through an 18-hole play-off into sudden death. But then even that doesn’t fit with our definition of the duel, as Westwood was only one shot behind after 72 holes.

“That’s the Tiger influence, isn’t it? For a lot of the Major championships he’s decimated fields himself and he hasn’t had anybody to play against when he’s been on top form. I think that’s the crying shame about the era of Tiger Woods,” said Humphreys.

“The Nicklaus era was tremendous because he had so many rich players, talented players exciting players, charismatic players alongside him; Palmer, Player, Trevino, Floyd, Watson… you can name a whole bunch of them. Lots of talented players… Curtis Strange… and he beat them all over a 30-year period. Tiger, in a way, hasn’t had that. I think in a way it’s to the detriment of Tiger because I think he in a way would have liked to have been stretched and to find out what he would have done if he had had someone pushing him.”

For the 2010 WGC-HSBC Champions to truly deserve to sit in proximity with the 1977 Open Championship, it may take time: time for history to ferment, time for Westwood and Francesco Molinari to cement their reputations so that their battle becomes a part of golf folklore.

At this point Laidlaw, a recipient of the PGA Tour’s Lifetime Achievement Award in Journalism, disagrees:

“The plain fact is you can take all these duels, just as the duels of that time. If they never do anything ever again – in both these cases I think they will [be successful again] – you can’t take away from them the fact that their duel in the HSBC Champions was marvelous to watch. One holed a putt then the other holed a putt; it was just fantastic how they did that. Whether they do or don’t go onto to win Majors doesn’t take anything away from the excitement and drama they produced in Shanghai, which was riveting, riveting!” the 71-year-old Scot states.

The fact is though that, if Westwood turns his spell as world number one into a fully-fledged reign and if he can turn his 2000 European Tour Order of Merit and 2009 Race to Dubai wins and his consistency in Majors – two third places in 2009 and two second places in 2010 – into the Major victories that define greatness, then what both he and Francesco Molinari achieved in Shanghai will be looked on in a new light, not that what Westwood did wasn’t incredible enough as it is.

Troubled by an unusual calf injury that left his ankle swollen, the Nottinghamshire native limped to second place at the Open Championship, withdrew because of the injury from the WGC-Bridgestone Invitational, came back only for the Ryder Cup and returned rusty for the WGC-HSBC Champions just in time to replace Tiger Woods at the top of the Official World Golf Rankings. He also faced a four-way struggle for his right to keep that title and faced questions, particularly from the States, as to whether a non-Major winner could be considered worthy of the top spot.

“Perfect timing!” said Howell of Westwood’s showing at Sheshan.

“It was daunting, it’s a wonderful position to be number one in the world, but there are responsibilities and the expectations that come with that and, as always, Lee dealt with them brilliantly. Obviously winning would have been doing it in style, but he put on a world-class performance as well!”

The other half of the equation is what Francesco Molinari does from here. Apart from claiming the Omega Mission Hills World Cup with his brother Edoardo in 2009, Francesco hadn’t won since his maiden European Tour victory at the 2006 Telecom Italia Open. However, if his HSBC Champions win proves to be typical of how he is going to play in 2011 he will be looked upon in a very different light by the end of the year.

“Molinari is almost beginning the journey, although he’s been a good player for four or five years. I think with Molinari, if he continues to putt with the sort of confidence he had that week [in Shanghai] then you could be looking at another very special player,” Humphreys declares.

“The thing with Molinari is his stature. He’s not a tall guy. He’s got to be playing at his best and at his peak all the time to compete against some of the big boomers that are in the game. Francesco’s got a wonderful game from tee to green and he hasn’t changed that for a number of years. His swing is consistently sound year on year. The biggest killer for most people; they get to a certain point and they think I must change to get better and they actually change to get worse. If he stays that way and his short game stays good… I think the overriding thing about Molinari’s performance is he doesn’t get scared. That’s a fantastic quality to have as a golfer. He talked about it afterwards as a pressure situation, but he never showed it. The fact that he went out against Tiger in the Ryder Cup and was two up after two and Tiger had to shoot nine under to beat him: Tiger would have beaten any other player on either side the way he played on that particular day. It shows strength of character and I think that strength of character is a big club in the bag for Molinari.”

It was incredible that Molinari seemed to stay completely unflustered as the pressure in the tournament mounted. Bogey-free in his final round, he made perhaps one mistake on the Sunday: missing a short par for birdie on the par five 14^th hole. Westwood was bogey-free the entire weekend, but at the pivotal moment – Sheshan’s world-renowned driveable par four 16^th – it was the Englishman who blinked first. It’s hard to call his three wood off the tee a mistake though. He missed his target by a matter of a yard, got a hard bounce forward and found himself snookered behind the evil pot-bunker that guards the left side of the green. Like Tiger did in exactly the same position the year before, Westwood left the gossamer-fine chip in the long grass above the bunker and the pressure was off.

Still, on eighteen he could have forced a play-off. His five-iron second seemed certain to take the slope down to the hole, but somehow circled the ridge and stayed on the higher level and the duel was over.

“I feel sorry for Westwood because he’d come second in two Majors earlier in the season and here he was coming second again to a guy who was playing, arguably, the best golf of his career. I don’t think he’s ever played as well as that. He may never again, but let’s hope he does,” Laidlaw declares.

“He’s now shown he can do it. What an inspiration it might be to Molinari, wwho knows what he’ll do having hung on and proved himself that he can do it.”

And if Molinari does go on from here?

“We will look back and say that’s when it started. It started because suddenly he realized just what he was capable of. He was always sure he had that capability, but in Shanghai on the course, he did it for real against one of the strongest of opponents: Westwood had played well all season,” said the doyen of British golf writers and broadcasters.

There is one final aspect that the Duel on the Bund does compare and deserves to stand alongside the Duel in the Sun: the level of sportsmanship showed. Refreshingly there was no sense that Molinari felt he had banished, triumphed over, conquered or even that he had defeated Westwood. Westwood himself afterwards said there were “no negatives” in a performance like his and, when his attempt at an eagle putt on 18 rolled past the hole, there was nothing in his behavior at that instant that suggested otherwise.

“Watson and Nicklaus both respected each other so much; they enjoyed battling with each other. It was one of the great adverts for the game. It was in the most sporting manner between two players who between them won eight Open Championships,” Laidlaw recalls. 

“When Watson and Nicklaus were finished, Nicklaus was right there to say “well done, many congratulations”. When Molinari won, Westwood was right there saying “many congratulations”. That’s what it’s all about! The competition! They love the competition! It’s part of the game!”

The Duel on the Bund vs. The Duel in the Sun

First Round

2010 WGC-HSBC Champions

1   Francesco Molinari                      Italy                   65        -7

2   Lee Westwood                                 England                     66        -6

T3 Yuta Ikeda                                    Japan                 67        -5

     Henrik Stenson                             Sweden              67

     Noh Seung-Yul                             South Korea       67

1977 Open Championship

1   John Schroeder                                 United States            66        -4

2   Martin Foster                                    England                     67        -3

T3 Jack Nicklaus                                    United States           68        -2

     Lee Trevino                                       United States            68

     Tom Watson                                    United States           68

Second Round

2010 WGC-HSBC Champions

1   Francesco Molinari                      Italy                   65-70=135       -9

2   Lee Westwood                                 England                     66-70=136       -8

T3 Ernie Els                                       South Africa       72-65=137       -7

     Jaco Van Zyl                                 South Africa       71-66=137      

     Richie Ramsey                             Scotland             69-68=137

1977 Open Championship

1   Roger Maltbie                               United States       71-66=137       -3

T2 Hubert Green                                United States       72-66=138       -2

     Jack Nicklaus                               United States       68-70=138

       Lee Trevino                                 United States       68-70=138

       Tom Watson                                United States    68-70=138

Third Round

2010 WGC-HSBC Champions

1   Francesco Molinari                      Italy          65-70-67=202              -14

2   Lee Westwood                               England    66-70-67=203             -13

3   Luke Donald                                 England     68-70-68=206             -10

1977 Open Championship

T1 Jack Nicklaus                               United States    68-70-65=203  -7

     Tom Watson                                United States      68-70-65=203

3   Ben Crenshaw                              United States     71-69-66=206  -4

Fourth Round

2010 WGC-HSBC Champions

1   Francesco Molinari                     Italy                65-70-67-67=269        -19

2   Lee Westwood                            England            66-70-67-67=270        -18

T3 Richie Ramsey                           Scotland            69-68-71-71=279        -9

     Luke Donald                                England            68-70-68-73=279       

  

1977 Open Championship

1   Tom Watson                               United States    68-70-65-65=268        -12

2   Jack Nicklaus                           United States    68-70-65-66=269        -11

3   Hubert Green     

picture credits: Getty images/Tim Maitland

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