FRED COUPLES is having a field day on the US Champions Tour with his third straight win in his rookie season.

The 50 year old set a course record 10 under par 62 to win the Cap Cana Championship in the Dominican Republic.

His total 21 under two stroke win made him the first player in Champions Tour history to win three of his first four tournaments.

In four three round senior tournaments Couples hasn’t had a score higher than 68 and is 77 under par.

Couples is the eighth Champions Tour player to win three straight starts, leaving him one behind the tour record set by Chi Chi Rodriguez in 1987.

He has also pocketed $1,027,821 for his trouble – and some of the older guys reckon the Champions Tour is a licence to print money.

Couples made 11 birdies in the final round, finishing with a total of 195. “It was an unbelievable day,” said Couples, who made five birdies in a row from the second through sixth hole.

“The first six or seven holes, there was an eagle, birdies and putts going in from everywhere, ” he said, including the work of second placegetter Corey Pavin.

The string of wins had Couples looking back to the early 1990’s – and probably to Augusta in two weeks time, when the strength of his good form will be put to the ultimate test.

“I had a great stretch of golf in 1992,” he said, referring to a two month period when he won three tournaments including the Masters. “But I must say that these four weeks on the Champions Tour I’m not missing many shots.”

Peter Senior doing nicely

Not quite reaching Couples’ heights but still trotting along nicely in his rookie Champions Tour season is Australian Peter Senior, who had his fourth straight top 30 finish.

After an opening 74 Senior posted improved rounds of 68 and 69 to finish at T23.

With AUD $102,287 in Champions Tour winnings, Senior is 27th on the Money List.

KIWI golfer Craig Owen has held off a fast finishing Lyndsay Stephen to win the 2010 Peninsula Springs Victorian Seniors Open by three shots today at The Dunes Golf Links.

Owen’s final round two under par 70 was enough to claim the title despite Stephen’s final round five under 67.

Joining Stephen in second place was fellow European Tour player Noel Ratcliffe and Queenslander Ossie Moore.

 “I am so excited to be able to win here today. I have had some doubts about being able to finish off a tournament; I have put those to rest today,” Owen said.

The New Zealander was the only player to go under par during each of the three rounds of the tournament.

Despite inclement weather closing in on the final groups, Owen was able to master the difficult conditions and challenging Dunes layout to post four final round birdies.

Lyndsay Stephen, who divides his time between the European tour and events at home, had the round of the day with five birdies and two eagles.

The PGA E-Z-Go Legends tour now moves to Sorrento Golf Club on Sunday followed by the McMullin Legends Pro Am at Growling Frog in Melbourne’s north on Monday.

LEADING Australian senior amateur golfer Stefan Albinski has been in imposing form over the past three days winning the 2010 West Australian Senior Amateur Championship by six strokes.

The defending champion led after day one and never looked like being headed as he added yet another state championship to his growing collection.

Albinski carded a highly consistent 74-74-73 over three rounds at Royal Fremantle Golf Club.

Michael Jackson, winner of the 2009 Victorian Senior Order of Merit, improved his scoring every day and finished runner-up with rounds of 78-76-73.

Queenslander Grahame MacDonald was in third place another four strokes away with scores of 78-75-78.
Finishing fourth was evergreen 69 year old Tony Gresham (75-81-76) with the top five rounded out by West Australian Nigel Goodall who also improved every day (81-79-74).

Goodall was the leading West Australian senior in an event dominated by the visitors.
Leading Scores:
1    221    Stefan ALBINSKI   74 - 74 - 73   NSW
2    227    Michael JACKSON   78 - 76 - 73   VIC
3    231    Grahame MacDONALD   78 - 75 - 78   QLD
4    232    Tony GRESHAM   75 - 81 - 76   NSW
5    234    Nigel GOODALL   81 - 79 - 74   WA
6    236    Tony KENNINGS   79 - 82 - 75   NSW
7    237    John BEAUMONT   76 - 81 - 80, Will GERRARD   79 - 80 - 78

NEW ZEALANDER Craig Owen had a four shot lead after the first round of the Peninsula Springs Victorian Seniors Open played at The Dunes Golf Links in Rye, Victoria, on Wednesday.

Owen produced eight birdies in his round of six under 66 with two bogies his only blemishes.

After starting with a bogey, Owen reeled off 6 birdies in the next eight holes for an outward total of 31. He had a further two birdies on the back nine with a lone bogey after a 3 putt on the par 3 13th hole.

The Kiwi played some exquisite iron shots that put him in the perfect position to convert the birdies.

“I was hitting it really close today”, he said, “I was able to get the ball close to the hole on holes 3 through to 9.” “I was also able to hit all the par 5’s in two today and two putt them for birdie.”

Three shots back sharing second is 2010 Dunes Big Pot Champion , Rodger Davis (NSW), Garry Merrick (SA) and Mike Fergusson (Qld).

Fresh from picking up the winner’s cheque of $40,000 after two days of matchplay, Davis shot a 3 under 69 in the afternoon field.

Davis’ round took a turn for the better after he was able to eagle the par 5 15th hole (his sixth for the day).

“I was playing really well,” Davis said, “I just couldn’t hole a putt until I rolled in 15 footer on the par 3 6th”.

Five players share 5th place on one under 71, including Lyndsay Stephen and Brett Officer.

One of the days highlights came from South Australian Peter Ormsby as he aced the 135 meter par 3, 3rd.

Day two of the Peninsula Springs Victorian Seniors Open got underway at 8.00am today, with the final round on Friday 26th March.

A NEW one hour golf radio show called ‘Swinging in the Sticks’ will air this Sunday morning on 33 regional stations throughout the east coast of Australia.

The show is aimed at promoting golf, PGA Members and the hundreds of regional golf clubs dotted around the country.

It will run for 26 weeks and will also be podcast on the PGA website to reach golfers Australia wide.

Hosted by Australian PGA member Mark Allen and Crocmedia’s Andrew Lowther, the interactive program will tackle the latest news in golf with a particular focus on what’s happening locally.

Profiling local club heroes and uncovering a few ‘hidden gem’ courses along the way, ‘Swinging in the Sticks’ will help the PGA support its regional PGA members and their local golf communities at the same time promoting golf to an extensive regional audience.

“Throughout Australia we have over 1.2 million golfers playing the game and over 70% of the courses they play are located in regional areas. The number of golfers we can directly reach through ‘Swinging in the Sticks’ is significant,” PGA CEO Max Garske said today.

Aired in a timeslot perfect for catching golfers on their way to the course, the first episode of Swinging in the Sticks will be broadcast this Sunday 28th March, 2010 and the weekly podcast will be available from 8am.

A full list of radio stations and broadcast times can be viewed here.

RODGER DAVIS and Gerry Power have taken out The Dunes Big Pot team event that served as a curtain raiser to the Victorian Senior Open Championship that begins today at the Dunes Golf Links in Rye.

Davis, the 1986 Australian Open Champion and Power, an amateur, claimed the $40,000 first prize of what is an innovative new format open to amateurs and professionals over 50 that has been likened to limited over cricket.

The four ball knockout matchplay event comprises teams consisting of a professional and amateur who play off the stick over nine holes.

Davis and Power won 2 up over 2008 Champions David Good and Paul Lulofs after teams battled over two days.

In a thrilling final peppered with birdies made by both pairs, Davis and Power combined well to finished five-under through the nine hole contest.

Attention has now turned to the 54 hole Peninsula Hot Springs Victorian Senior Open which commenced this morning.

The Senior Open is the 12th Order of Merit event on the 2010 Legends Tour and holds a prize purse of $35,000.

WHEN keen golfer Brian Luckhurst was setting up a new home exchange internet site for the over 50’s it was probably inevitable that golf was going to play a big part.

Brian and wife Catriona are Scottish but live in London and set up Home Exchange 50 Plus in October 2009.

The site caters to all travellers but has a specialised golf section and Brian is keen to develop that aspect.

“We both love travelling and think swapping homes for holidays is a great concept, having done it a couple of times when our children were younger,” Brian says.

“Home Exchanging or Home Swapping is when you agree to swap homes, and often cars, with someone,” Brian explains.

“You stay in their home and they stay in yours, and no money changes hands. It is an economical way to holiday and an exciting way to travel, to experience other cultures and see other countries differently, through local eyes, not as a tourist.”

The couple believe the over 50’s are becoming increasing interested in a concept that ideally suits them.

“The older generation, seniors, baby boomers or whatever name we are being given these days, are becoming great fans of Home Exchanging,” Brian says. “We tend to be more flexible on dates with more free time available, we don’t normally have to worry about school holidays as we are often empty nesters, and cost savings are very important to us. I also think we are of an age when we like the idea of seeing things from a different perspective, we no longer like being seen just as tourists and often prefer to live more like a local when on holiday.”

As for the specialised golfing section, Brian admits he couldn’t help himself.

“As a keen golfer, this is mostly a selfish thing, although we do hope to include other specialised areas within the website in the future,” he says. “Golf at Home Exchange 50plus is aimed at providing the golfers amongst us with the low-cost way to play a round worldwide – a golfing break with a difference and without the accommodation costs. Saving money on accommodation will help greatly with the cost of green fees. Save more – play more!”

“Golfing members can liken this section to belonging to a worldwide golf club which is aimed at golfers everywhere who, not only have the passion for the glorious game and its camaraderie and experiences, but who also love to travel and would like to play new and different courses.

“By developing this section, we hope to be able to offer access to great courses around the world which may be otherwise be unavailable to our members, and perhaps even give them the opportunity of playing them as a member’s guest!”

Although the website is still in its infancy there are an increasing number of members from around the world and annual subscriptions are currently free.

Visit the site here: Home Exchange 50 Plus

LEGENDARY golf coach David Leadbetter is headed to Australia in October to be the keynote speaker for the 2010 Asia Pacific Srixon PGA Coaching Summit.

Leadbetter, one of the most respected and influential figures in world  golf, will bring with him the knowledge that has seen his clients Ernie Els, Nick Faldo, Trevor Immelman, Seve Ballesteros, Greg Norman and Nick Price win 17 Major Championship titles and more than 100 international Tour victories.

Leadbetter will headline the biennial PGA conference to be held at Royal Pines Resort on Queensland’s Gold Coast from October 19-21. The Englishman will share his passion with about 500 Australian PGA Members who each year impart their expertise on the one million plus Australians who play the game.

Leadbetter is known as ‘the Master of the art of teaching the golf swing’ so lets hope some of that knowledge filters down to the rest of us.

TIGER WOODS has given two five minute television interviews in which he says he is excited to be back playing golf but is “a little nervous” about the reception he will receive from fans at the US Masters.

“I’m starting to get my feel back. I know how to play the golf course and that helps a lot, I just got to, play it,” he said of Augusta National on the Golf Channel.

To ESPN interviewer Tom Rinaldi he said: “I’m excited to get to see the guys again. I really miss a lot of my friends out there. I miss competing. But still, I still have a lot more treatment to do, and just because I’m playing, doesn’t mean I’m gonna stop going to treatment.”

Woods said he didn’t know what reception he would get from fans.

“I’m a little nervous about that to be honest with you,” he said.

“It would be nice to hear a couple claps here and there. But also hope they clap for birdies, too.”

The ESPN video is embedded below. You can see the Golf Channel interview here.

THE world will change for Australian golfers with an official handicap at 9am on April 9, 2010.

That’s when, after two days of being off line number crunching, Golf Link’s computers will flicker back to life with either good, bad or unchanged news for Australian golfers.

If it all sounds a bit like The Terminator and SkyNet – it well could be for some golfers.

If you’ve had at least 10 good rounds of late, or even just average to above average rounds, you might be pleasantly surprised.

If your last 20 rounds have been uncharacteristically dismal, you might be in for a shock.

Speaking personally, I know my handicap change is not going to be a shock but it is not going to be good.

The new system doesn’t care if you have been hovering around, say, 14 and 15 for the last few years. Only what has happened in the last 20 count.

If, like me, you have had a bit of a form slump of late and most of your club stableford scores have been in the low 30’s – watch out. And remember, all the scores will be adjusted to the courses’ ACR, not whatever the CCR was on the day.

That means a lot of people could suddenly jump a handful of handicap points.

Back in January when my recent form had been much better, I actually did calculate what my handicap would be under the new system – and it was almost a point and a half lower.

That’s because I had a couple of low 40’s, a few 38’s etc and a number of 36’s.  From memory, I only had to take (as part of my 10 best scores out of the previous 20) one or two scores below 36.

And that’s what they say the new system will provide – a much better representation of your current performances.

The Golf Link computers will be doing all the work – golfers won’t have to do anything differently ( except now three quarters of the way through a round you can’t think I’ll stop trying so hard because I am only going to get .1 back anyway, because every round now could count and be one your best 10).

Golf Link Q & A

Golf Link has published a Q & A about the handicap changes and I reproduce most of the pertinent points below. For the full details check out the relevant Golf Link page.

From 9 April 2010 the method used to calculate your Australian Men’s or Women’s Handicap can be explained in one sentence:

Your exact handicap will be the average of the best 10 differentials (differential = gross score - AMCR/AWCR) of your 20 most recent valid scores, the result of which is multiplied by 0.96.

This is a much more straight forward process than the current incremental calculation system, and is the first step of several on the way to full adoption of the USGA’s handicap system.

What is meant by the term “differential”? 

Your handicap differential is the difference between your gross score and the course rating (AMCR or AWCR) for the course that you played. So for example if you have a gross score of 85 off the stick in a stroke event and the AWCR is 70, (note this is not the par of the course - see below for definition of AMCR/AWCR) then your “differential” is 15.

Simply stated: DIFFERENTIAL = GROSS SCORE - COURSE RATING. The only exception to this rule is when the “tee up through the green” regulation is in effect, in which case the AMCR or AWCR is reduced by 2 shots for that day. You will see the differential for each of your rounds in the “played to” column of your handicap history on Golf Link.

How is the differential calculated in a Stableford or Par event? 

The calculation of the differential is no different in a stableford or par event - it is still based on your gross score, you just have to first work out your gross score using the formula: GROSS SCORE = 36 - STABLEFORD POINTS + COURSE PAR + HANDICAP, or GROSS SCORE = COURSE PAR + HANDICAP - PAR SCORE. For example if you scored 34 points in a stableford competition (or -2 in a par competition) off a handicap of 12 at a par 72 course which is rated 70. Your gross score is 86 (2 worse than your handicap so equivalent to 14 over par), remember though that the differential is based on the difference between your gross score and the course rating, so given the course rating in our example is 70, then the differential will end up being 16.

Why is Golf Australia making these changes? Are we adopting the USGA Handicap System, and is “Slope” a component of this new system. 

The new handicap calculation method being introduced on 9 April 2010 is not the same as the USGA Handicap System, detailed information on Golf Australia’s strategy for adoption of the USGA Handicap System as well as information on the “Slope” component of the USGA’s system can be found here: USGA Handicap System

What are the AMCR and AWCR? 

The Australian Men’s Course Rating (AMCR) and Australian Women’s Course Ratings (AWCR) are similar to the course ratings that were used in the old handicap system. The main difference will be that they are going through a process of being reassessed according to the USGA course rating method for appraising a course’s difficulty.

Is there still a concept of a Calculated Course Rating (CCR) to take into account variable conditions from day to day? 

The USGA Handicap System doesn’t have a daily rating component. We know that the difficulty of a specific golf course may vary due to changes in weather, climate, and course set-up, however the problem has always been in arriving at a system which enjoys golf community-wide confidence and that will reliably produce ratings that are reflective of the actual difficulty of a golf course. By its nature, there will always be unavoidable problems associated with using a statistical method to measure course difficulty. And our experience and continued feedback on CCR over a long period of time is that the benefits are unfortunately outweighed by the drawbacks. At the end of the day, the average golfer is still prone to lack faith in the concept of the daily course rating being determined by the performance of the field. Then of course there are the issues of attempting to derive a statistical daily course rating from a scenario where the field is too small to provide an adequate sample set such as often occurs at country courses or with a large proportion of women’s fields. For all these reasons there will be no concept of a Calculated Course Rating (CCR) in the rolling sample calculation method. However on days when “Tee up Through the Green” is in effect, the calculation of your differential will be affected because the AMCR or AWCR will be reduced by 2 shots for that day only.

What if I have less than 20 scores in my handicap history? 

GOLF Link will still calculate your handicap if you have less than 20 scores, we simply reduce the number of best scores that are averaged out in the calculation.

What if I have more than 20 scores? 

Only your most recent 20 valid scores are used to gather the 10 best scores, hence the calculation is based on a “rolling sample” of your most recent 20 valid scores. Any scores older than your most recent 20 valid scores are not considered for handicapping purposes.

Why is the average of my best 10 differentials multiplied by 0.96? 

This is the “bonus for excellence” as stipulated in the USGA Handicap System. It is an incentive for you to improve your golf, since it results in a situation whereby as your handicap improves (gets lower), the 0.96 factor results in a smaller reduction in your handicap compared to a high handicapper, thus giving you a slightly better chance of placing high or winning a handicap event.

Is my handicap going to be different at different courses? I’d heard that the slope aspect of the USGA Handicap System involves a sort of indexing of my handicap depending on the course I’m playing. 

No, the first package of changes does not include a change to this component of the handicapping rules. As a result you will just have one handicap based on the 10 best differentials from your last 20 rounds regardless of where they were played and you take that handicap to your next round of golf regardless of where it will be played.

Further changes will be made at a later time.

Is my handicap still recalculated after each round I play? 

Yes, GOLF Link will recalculate your handicap as soon as your club submits your latest round to us. At a later point, Australian Handicaps will only be revised (ie recalculated) on a periodic basis (somewhere between two weeks and one month). However, GA has not as yet determined a precise implementation date for this change. We are also as yet to determine the revision time period.

My club is not on GOLF Link what happens to my handicap? 

Non-GOLF Link clubs will need to ensure their calculation processes replicate those performed by GOLF Link. GOLF Link clubs will not need to do anything to instigate the process of recalculating all handicaps in accordance with the new regulations.