Woods wins, tightens hold on No. 1 ranking

VIRGINIA WATER, England, July 6 (UPI) -- Tiger Woods has run his reign as the No 1 golfer in the world to 213 consecutive weeks, rankings released Monday indicate.
Woods won his own tournament Sunday, which solidified his hold on the rankings' top spot. He defeated Hunter Mahan, who had a course-record tying 62 Sunday to get into contention while Anthony Kim finished third.
Woods has been the top-rated men's golfer for 555 weeks. Greg Norman (331 weeks) is the only other golfer to be No. 1 for more than 100 weeks in the 23 years of the rankings.
Phil Mickelson is still second on the current list with Paul Casey third, Kenny Perry fourth and Sergio Garcia in fifth.
Geoff Ogilvy, now sixth, switched places with No. 7 Henrik Stenson in the only change in the Top 10 this week.
Steve Stricker is eighth, followed by, in order, Jim Furyk and Vijay Singh.
Mahan's strong finish allowed him to improve 13 spots to a No. 26 ranking. Kim went from 15th to 14th this week.

When 62 isn't good enough

Even after 67 victories, Tiger Woods hadn't had a finish quite like Sunday's at the AT&T National.
Challenged by Hunter Mahan's record-tying 62 at Congressional in Bethesda, Md., Woods plotted his way along the back nine and delivered the decisive birdie with a 20-foot putt on the 16th green, closing with a 3-under-par 67 for a one-shot victory.
With three birdies in a five-hole stretch, Woods surged past Anthony Kim, who finished third, four shots back, in the high-charged final pairing. Mahan finished second after making six birdies on the back nine and tying Kim's course-record 62 set Thursday.
Woods had routine pars on the final two holes to finish at 13-under 267 for his third victory this year.
He won in his second try at the tournament he hosts, just as Jack Nicklaus won his Memorial in the second year.
"It was great shaking my hand today," Woods said.
The 68th victory of his PGA Tour career moved him to the top of the money list and FedEx Cup standings for the first time this year.
It was the ideal final pairing at Congressional - the world's No. 1 player and tournament host tied with Kim, a confident 24-year-old who was the defending champion.
"I had a lot of fun," said Kim, who didn't have a birdie on the back nine. "I know I'll be knocking on the door again. It's only a matter of time. I learned if you have a birdie putt, you better make it."
YI PREVAILS: Eunjung Yi squandered a six-stroke lead, then hit a 10-foot birdie putt on the first playoff hole to defeat Morgan Pressel and collect her first LPGA victory in what might be the final Jamie Farr Owens Corning Classic in Sylvania, Ohio. The 21-year-old from South Korea, who had missed the cut in four of her seven starts this year and collected just more than $11,000 on her biggest payday, won $210,000 Sunday. Michelle Wie made a back-nine rush to finish 16-under, tied for third.
PLAYOFF WIN: Martin Kaymer hit an 18-foot putt on the first playoff hole to beat Lee Westwood and win the French Open in Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines, a PGA European Tour event.

Woods Draws a Crowd at Congressional

Glover, Hoffman Get a Taste of What It's Like to Play With World's No. 1 Player

Tiger Woods was still three holes away, but the audience started to build at the 10th hole. Congressional's clubhouse balcony was full. Fans surrounded the tee boxes, crowded the rope along the fairway and fought for space at the green.
For Woods, the attention is standard. It is not as customary for the golfers he partnered with yesterday.
Lucas Glover and Charley Hoffman both said they enjoyed the hordes of onlookers that watched their round during the first day of the AT&T National. It helped that Glover won the U.S. Open in June, which enhanced his name recognition. Hoffman, with only one PGA Tour victory on his résumé, is not as renowned but did receive supporters wearing wigs that resembled his flowing golden locks.
"To see the support [Woods] gets every week, and see how he deals with it, it's pretty impressive," Glover said. "I tried to hang on to his coattails early, but couldn't keep up."
More so than the airtight crowd, the lasting impression for Glover and Hoffman was watching Woods's talent up close. Woods shot a 6-under-par 64 -- trumping Glover's 1-under 69 and Hoffman's 1-over 71. They were both impressed by Woods's consistency.
Hoffman noted that it was not the outstanding shot that helps Woods, but the infrequency of a bad shot. While Glover bogeyed four times and Hoffman double-bogeyed and bogeyed, Woods bogeyed just once.
"Any time you can play the best in the world, put your game against his -- and see it's not where his is at right now -- it's fun to watch," Hoffman said.

Yet when Woods is involved, it is not simply 18 holes that must be accounted for, but also the uncontrollable surroundings.
Wherever Woods goes, a mass of humanity both awaits and follows. The gallery turns silent as Woods prepares for his shot. Once he finishes his follow-through, cameras provide a chorus of clicks while the crowd reacts.
Even when Woods is not shooting, he remains the center of attention. At the seventh hole, camera clicks capturing an image of Woods speaking with his caddie disrupted Hoffman's putt. When the ball dropped, Hoffman turned and motioned toward the photographers.
"I wouldn't say that's playing with Tiger," Hoffman said. "That's camera people not doing their job."
Hoffman said it's actually easier to play with Woods. Because so many fans watch, it is not noticeable when a single person moves. By crowding the ropes, the fans provide a de facto fence. And a good shot while grouped with Woods in the first round can draw similar reactions to a good shot in the U.S. Open.
"The yells, the urges on and everything were okay," Glover said. "It wasn't a hassle, as it has been before. [The U.S. Open] helped me get used to it. It was a good experience, then and now."
The threesome will return to the 10th hole at 8:12 this morning, at which point Woods will again earn top billing at his tournament. But for Glover and Hoffman, it provides an opportunity to measure their game against golf's best -- and possibly gain some of his fans, too.
"You know you're going to see good shots from Tiger, you know the crowd is going to be rooting for Tiger," Hoffman said. "But you hope you can get some people getting on your side."

No Shame! When It Comes to Clubs

By BILL PENNINGTON
Published: June 28, 2009
If you are feeling embarrassed that a shot-saving club like a 7-wood has crept into your bag, or maybe a hybrid has replaced your 5-iron, you should know that Tiger Woods has faced the same situation and is not ashamed.
“I now have a senior club in my bag,” Woods said at a clinic recently. “It’s a 5-wood. I’m O.K. with my senior club.”
Woods did not win the United States Open last week, but he came close. All around him at Bethpage Black, other top professionals were using hybrids, 5-woods and even the occasional 7-wood. From the rough, these clubs are a godsend. And who is in the rough more than anyone? The average player, that’s who. So if you haven’t already, add one of these user-friendly weapons to your arsenal.As Woods said: “When I was a teenager, I hit a 1-iron. Then I moved down to a 2-iron. So now that I’m in my 30s, I’ve got the 5-wood. When I’m in my 40s, it will probably be a 7-wood. A decade later, it’ll be a 9-wood. And in my 60s, I’ll probably be playing an 11-wood. I have no shame; this game is too hard.”

WSU's Spears Leads US Open

by Bryan Holmgren

Day One of the US Open was mostly a wash - unless you're Wichita State alum Ryan Spears.
The 23-year old has never even played in a PGA event, let alone on one of golf's biggest stages, yet finds himself tied with three others at one-under par.
The catch: He only actually played three holes to get there. Spears birdied the second hole on a long putt from the fringe, shortly before the rains forced a stoppage of play Thursday morning at Bethpage Black. Over half of the field had yet to tee off, and even the earliest groups has only just made the turn.
None of that matters for Spears, a second team All-American for WSU, who snuck into the field as a qualifier and is a long shot just to make the cut. He's two shots ahead of Tiger Woods and a host of other world-class golfers.
Woods double-bogied his fifth hole but came back immediately with a birdie on the sixth to put himself in a 12th place tie at one-over.
Play is scheduled to resume early Friday morning. Officials were hoping to have the second round completed by the end of Saturday with the goal of playing 36 holes on Sunday. That may be overly optimistic with more rain expected over the weekend.

Tiger Woods makes TIME Magazine's 100 Most Influential People list

If you can't be People's Sexiest Man Alive, here's a decent consolation prize.

This week TIME Magazine included Tiger Woods in its 2009 list of the top 100 most influential people in the world. Woods is included in the category of "Heroes and Icons," where he joins an eclectic collection of notables including Captain Sully, Michelle Obama, Sarah Palin and George Clooney. The only other athletes on the list are tennis player Rafael Nadal and Filipino boxer Manny Pacquino.

"You rarely see an athlete who single-handedly changes an entire sport," Woods's friend, fellow Right Guard pitchman and Nike brother Roger Federer writes in TIME. "When Tiger couldn't play last year because of an injury, golf ratings suffered. He has changed the way golfers train and prepare themselves and has brought huge numbers of new fans to the sport, including me. I never followed golf when I was younger. Now I do."

Looks like my invitation to the World's Most Influential People dinner must have gotten lost in the mail.

Tiger Woods Gives Simple Swing Advice

Tiger Woods, who most would agree was a pretty fair junior player, was asked recently at a clinic I attended how to teach a young beginning golfer some basics, like how hard to swing.

“Obviously, you can’t tell an 8-year-old to swing at 85 percent of normal,” Woods said.
“An 8-year-old doesn’t know how to gauge something like that in the middle of a swing, or how to interpret what 85 percent of some movement is. So when I was young, my father told me that I could swing as hard as I wanted, just so long as I was in complete balance when I had finished my swing.
“At the end of a shot, I couldn’t be swaying side to side, falling back or lurching forward. I had to be in balance. I still think it’s a great tip: swing as hard as you like so long as you can be in balance. It puts you in charge of managing the speed and pace of your swing.”
That advice still works for junior players. It would work, most likely, for everyone.