Ogilvy Successful With His New 3-Wood
February 28, 2009 by Editor
Filed under Golf Equipment
MARANA, Ariz. Four months before he won the 2006 U.S. Open, Geoff Ogilvy defeated Davis Love 4 and 3 to win the WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship. The following year, the Aussie advanced to the final before losing 3 and 2 to Henrik Stenson . On Friday, Ogilvy defeated Camilo Villegas 2 and 1 to advance to the quarterfinals of this season’s event. When I spoke with him this week on the range, Ogilvy said he made a tough equipment change last week at Riviera and started carrying a new Cobra S9-1 3-wood. “The 3-wood is the hardest club in your bag to get right,” he said. For most Tour players, the 3-wood is the only wood that needs to create the same launch conditions, and fly the same distance, both off the tee and from the fairway. Ogilvy had been using a King Cobra X-Speed 3-wood. “It was awesome, and I could choke down on and do different stuff with it,” he said. “It was quite versatile. The new one is very good, too.” For Ogilvy, who said he tends to create a lot of spin with his swing, finding just the right 3-wood is especially tough. “I tend to hit the ball high, but if I find a 3-wood that creates the flight that I want to see it tends to go too far because it doesn’t have enough loft,” he said. That may sound like a nice problem to have, but for Ogilvy, it genuinely is cause for concern. “I would be hitting it 300 with a driver, 280 with a 3-wood and 225 with a 2-iron. That’s not right,” he explained. That large distance gap between the 3-wood and 2-iron could put him in a bind on the course. “The balance for me is finding one that goes far enough for me to be happy, but not go too far.” Ogilvy had been testing the S9-1 on the range since the Mercedes Championship in January, an event he won . He admitted its performance has always been a little better than his old 3-wood, but, as he repeated, “It’s just changing a club that is hard to change.” This week, Ogilvy also swapped out his King Cobra Pro CB Forged 2-iron and put in a 5-wood. The 5-wood’s loft has been bent from 18 to 20 to help Ogilvy make the ball stop faster on the undulating greens of the Ritz-Carlton Course at Dove Mountain . Here is a complete list of the clubs in Ogilvy’s bag this week: Driver:
Tiger Woods knocked out of match play
I watched every hole of Tiger’s loss against Tim Clark yesterday. Tim Clark wasn’t afraid of Tiger, which was refreshing. Clark hit some great clutch shots en route to his 4&2 win. Rusty Tiger Tiger’s game looked a little rusty yesterday. His normally deadly short game wasn’t quite working. His distance control on
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Tiger Woods knocked out of match play
Tiger Woods shakes off cobwebs, wins at World Match Play Championship
So far, so good for Tiger Woods. Woods’ long-awaited comeback got off to a great, if predictable start Wednesday when he disposed of overmatched Australian, Brendan Jones, 3-and-2, at the Accenture World Match Play Championship.
“It felt like nothing had changed,” said Woods, who plays South Africa’s Tim Clark in Thursday’s second round. “Walking down the fairway, it felt like business as usual. It just came down to just playing the game again and that felt good.”
Woods, playing for the first time since knee surgery eight months ago, didn’t bring his A-Game, particularly with his irons on the front nine.
But his 64th-seeded opponent was still no match for the world’s No. 1 player, no matter how rusty he might be. And the galleries loved it.
They crowded around the first tee at the Ritz Carlton Golf Club as Woods split the fairway with a 3-wood, then ran his iron with kick-in distance of the back pin. He pulled driver for the first time on the second tee and hit a majestic power fade that climbed against the wide Arizona sky and finished 330 yards down the fairway. He followed that with another precise iron and with Jones in trouble, was conceded the short eagle putt to go 2-up.
He could not have started out more perfectly and Jones, a Japan Tour player who had played less golf than Woods lately, had to be shell shocked. He pulled his first two drives, blocked a third into the desert and skulled an easy chip-shot when he could have won the par-three third.
That tee shot was Woods’ first poor shot, an iron that went right immediately off the club face.
“Easy, easy,” Woods said as the ball headed toward the right bunker.
“God damn it … you’ve got to be kidding me.”
Woods would actually bogey three of the first seven holes but Jones won only one of those holes to pull back to 1-down after seven. Woods promptly won the par-five eight hole by rolling in his first sizable putt, an eight-footer, won 12 when Jones chunked a chip from the rough behind the green and 13 with another eagle, this time on an 19-foot putt from just off the green.
Jones kept the match going when he drained a 10-foot eagle putt on 15 after both players drove the green on the 315-yard par four. Woods closed him out on 16 when he got up and down from the greenside bunker.
Jones missed a 20-foot birdie try before Woods ran in the three-foot clincher.
Rough start for Tiger’s 2009 return: BIRDIE-EAGLE
I tuned in today to the match play. I’d say Tiger is back in a BIG way. He birdied the 1st hole and made an EAGLE on the 2nd. As it sits now he’s 2-up after two over Brendon Jones.
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Rough start for Tigers 2009 return: BIRDIE-EAGLE
Alice Cooper should hire me
I’m a rock & roll drummer in one of my other lives so I like Alice Cooper. I’ve seen him perform many times and he puts on a killer show. He’s one of the few people who can combine rock & roll and golf. Hey Alice, hire me as your drummer.
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Alice Cooper should hire me
Stewart Cink’s New Putter and Unique Wedge
February 25, 2009 by Editor
Filed under Golf Equipment
MARANA, Ariz. Stewart Cink was the runner-up last year at the WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship. He defeated Angel Cabrera, Colin Montgomerie, Padraig Harrington, Miguel Angel Jimenez and Justin Leonard before losing, 8 and 7, in the 36-hole final to Tiger Woods. Twelve months later, Cink is hoping a new club will help him earn the title here. “I’ve got a brand-new putter,” he told me with a grin. “I’ve been using that Never Compromise putter for about six years, but now I’m going with a putter from Yes! Golf . I really like their ideas, and the guys who work for them, so I’m experimenting.” The putter Cink is using is a Lizzie , and like his Never Compromise, it’s a belly putter. The Yes! Lizzie is a mallet forged from 303 stainless steel that is available in four different hosel styles. Cink has gone with a toe-down balanced model with half a shaft’s width of offset. (For a better look, click on the top photo.) But the most interesting club in Cink’s bag is his Nike Victory Red 54sand wedge. “Because I’m so tall, I am trying to get my clubs a little bit longer,” he said. “They’re standard length, but I’m trying, and my first little toe in the water is that wedge, which is a little bit longer.” It’s just 1/4-inch longer, but that slight difference increases the swing weight of the club, making it feel heavier. To offset that added swing weight, two small holes have been bored into the back of the head. (Click on the bottom photo for a closer look.) Reducing the overall weight of the club cancels the extra swing weight to match Cink preference.
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Stewart Cink’s New Putter and Unique Wedge
Angel Cabrera’s Unique Not-Quite-Belly-Length Putter
February 25, 2009 by Editor
Filed under Golf Equipment
MARANA, Ariz. One of the most interesting matches slated for the first round of the WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship pits Angel Cabrera , winner of the 2007 U.S. Open Championship , against Phil Mickelson . The Argentine has experimented with many different types of putters including blades, mallets and belly putters since his win at Oakmont . This week he’s using a 39-inch Ping i-Series 1/2 Craz-E B . It’s four to five inches longer than most standard putters, but shorter than a belly putter. Click on the photo for a better look. When I asked him about it Tuesday afternoon, Cabrera said through an interpreter, “I used a 39-inch putter in 2005 when I won the BMW Championship on the European Tour. I played well with the putter back then.” Cabrera explained that he had lost some feel on the greens recently, and he hoped that going back to this putter would help him regain his touch. Not only is the length unique, so is the grip. It’s designed for a belly putter and extends well down the shaft. However, Cabrera holds it and swings it in a traditional style. “It’s to compensate for the weight of the putter,” he said. According to Ping, the head of Cabrera’s putter weighs 385 grams, which is 20 grams heavier than the head of a standard-length i-Series 1/2 Craz-E putter. Therefore, the weight of the grip improves the putter’s balance.
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Angel Cabrera’s Unique Not-Quite-Belly-Length Putter
Become a Total Driver
Video: Steve Dahlby shows you how to become a complete driver.
Over The Top
How to smother the slice for good
With todays enormous drivers, it has become easier to hit the ball a long way. But if you slice the ball, youre probably not getting the type of distance you deserve, since sliced shots not only miss the fairway, but also rob you of powerful distance.
A sliced shot is caused by two factors: the shaft swinging down on too steep a plane and a clubface thats open at impact. For a quick fix, address the ball with your normal posture. From this position, elevate your driver head approximately one foot above the ground. From here, make a few full swings from above the ball (as shown). Its important to keep the arms and hands soft to encourage an aggressive release and a turning over of the hands through the impact area. This drill will help you feel your hands and arms rotating as they pass the center of your body.
Furthermore, this drill motion is vital in allowing the clubface to square itself through impact. By swinging above the ball, youre effectively swinging on a shallower plane, which helps speed up the hands through the impact zone in order to do so. Give this drill a few tries (even mid-round if you find yourself flailing tee shots to the right), and in no time, youll see and feel your tee shots drift less to the right and more toward the middle of the fairway or green.
John Stahlschmidt, PGA, is the Head Instructor at the TOUR Academy at the TPC of Scottsdale in Arizona. For more information, visit www.pgatourexperiences.com.
NBC expects to show Tiger this weekend
Expect to see Tiger Woods as part of NBC Sports’ coverage this weekend, even if he’s not playing.
In the most anticipated return to golf since Ben Hogan recovered from a car accident, Woods ends his eight-month hiatus from knee surgery at the Accenture Match Play Championship on Wednesday. The first three rounds will be televised on The Golf Channel.
NBC Sports does not start its coverage until Saturday, and given the unpredictable nature of this event, Woods might be eliminated by then. In his nine times playing, he has reached the weekend only four times.
“We will have to deal with showing what happened to Tiger because this has gone from being a golf tournament to a news event,” said Tommy Roy, the golf producer at NBC. “There’s a lot of people who aren’t going to be able to watch his play on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, if he makes it that far.
“People tuning in on the weekend, we’ll document whether he’s out or he’s still alive,” Roy said. “We’ll make sure they have a chance to see that. There’s a definite buzz about golf and about this event that we know will carry over to the weekend.”
Whatever happens, Woods’ return has worked out well for NBC.
Depending on how his knee reacts this week, Woods likely will next play the CA Championship at Doral or the Arnold Palmer Invitational at Bay Hill – maybe both – which are broadcast by NBC Sports.
CBS Sports, the tour’s other network, will get its first crack at Woods at the Masters, which gets the highest ratings of any golf tournament.
