Without Sorenstam, women’s golf expected to be in good hands with Ochoa, Creamer and others

CLIFTON, N.J. - Lorena Ochoa can understand Annika Sorenstam’s desire to retire and start a family and is happy for her friendly rival. The current No. 1 player on the LPGA Tour said she will be in that position someday - just not yet.

Ochoa wants to continue the standard she’s set and prove she can rule her sport at the level Sorenstam did for so many years.

“She’s why I’m here,” Ochoa said Wednesday at Upper Montclair Country Club. “I always had in my mind that I wanted to be the best and that I wanted to dominate the game.

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Maryland golfers tumble at World Series of Golf

Maryland golfers did a good job in getting through the first round of the World Series of Golf in Las Vegas on Tuesday but all three were eliminated yesterday. The tournament combines golf with the betting strategy of poker.

Rockville’s Rhett Butler, last year’s WSOG runner-up and a fifth-place finisher in the World Series of Poker Main Event in 2006, was eliminated yesterday on No. 16 at Paiute Golf Resort when he risked his remaining 31,550 “chips” against a player who had about double that amount. Butler, who has a seven handicap, was in the top flight.

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PGA Tour power rankings

The Sports Xchange’s PGA Tour rankings, selected by TSX Golf Staff, are based on results from 2007 and 2008 with more emphasis on recent performance.

1. Tiger Woods, United States

There were reports from other pros last week at The Players Championship that Woods, who missed the tournament for the first time as a professional, has been seen walking without a limp. That means he should be well into his rehabilitation and preparing for his return to the PGA Tour. It’s looking more and more as if that will come in two weeks at Jack Nicklaus’ Memorial Tournament, an event Woods won three consecutive times from 1999 to 2001. Woods underwent left knee surgery on April 15, two days after the Masters, and his agent, Mark Steinberg, called Nicklaus the day after the operation and said Woods’ intention was to be at Muirfield Village for the Memorial. Nicklaus was at TPC Sawgrass last week to receive the PGA Tour’s Lifetime Achievement Award and said he hasn’t heard anything since but that he is hoping that the best player in the world will be in the field in Ohio. The prognosis after surgery was that Woods would be out four to six weeks, and the Memorial would be the seventh week. The only time he has missed the tournament since 1997, his first full season as a pro, was in 2006, when it was played a few weeks after the death of his father, Earl. Two weeks later, Woods missed the cut in the U.S. Open at Winged Foot, the only time he has failed to make it to the weekend in a major since he joined the PGA Tour.

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Sellers Makes PGA Tour Debut

Kelly Sellers of Bartow will make his first career start on the PGA Tour today in the AT&T Classic at Duluth, Ga., near Atlanta.

Sellers, a 33-year-old Nationwide Tour pro, fired a 68 in the Monday qualifying tournament to earn the single spot for the golf tournament at the TPC Sugarloaf.

Former Florida Southern golfers Marco Dawson, Lee Janzen and Travis Perkins are also in the field.

Barona Creek Golf Club ranked One of the Best Tour Courses

Barona Creek Golf Club, which hosted last year’s Nationwide Tour Championship was rated as the 11th “Best Tour Golf Courses You Can Play” by Golfweek magazine and third best in California behind landmark courses Pebble Beach and Spyglass Hill, host properties for the Pebble Beach National Pro-Am.

This is Golfweek’s inaugural ranking list of 136 PGA TOUR, Nationwide Tour, Champions Tour and LPGA courses nationwide.

Golfweek’s course raters are comprised of a team of more than 450 evaluators who surveyed the tour courses on the basis of 10 standards of evaluation.

Golfweek’s Best Tour Courses You Can Play

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The PGA of America adopts anti-doping policy for events

May 15, 2008 — The PGA of America announced Wednesday that this year’s PGA Championship and Ryder Cup will require players to abide by the Performance Enhancement Substance Policy and the Prohibited Substance List developed last year with other members of the World Golf Foundation.

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PGA Tour notebook: Tiger Woods says his rehabilitation is on track

Tiger Woods says his rehabilitation after knee surgery is going well and that he hopes to return to action at the Memorial later this month in his first competition since the Masters.

Woods finished second behind Trevor Immelman by three strokes at Augusta National Golf Club. Two days later, he underwent arthroscopic surgery on his left knee and was expected to be out of action for 4-6 weeks.

With the U.S. Open at Torrey Pines a little more than a month away, Woods said he’s progressing slowly. Speaking Monday in a video conference to promote the BMW Championship, the world No. 1-ranked player told reporters that he’s back to chipping and putting.

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