Ginn sur Mer moves to Palm Coast
BY Bruce Young | US PGA Tour | 2008 Ginn sur Mer Classic | Preview | 28 Oct 2008
The PGA Tour is in Palm Coast, Florida this week for the Ginn Sur Mer Classic, which will be played at the Tom Watson designed Conservatory Course at the Ginn Hammock Beach Resort in Florida.
With only this event and next week’s Children’s Miracle Network Classic in Orlando left on the 2008 PGA Tour schedule much is at stake.
The defending champion is Daniel Chopra who won his first PGA Tour title when he defeated fellow Swede Frederik Jacobsen and Shigeki Maruyama last year. He would go on to capitalise on this win by finishing runner up to Aaron Baddeley at the MasterCard Masters and then win the Mercedes Championship. This is of course another venue and the form shown in the inaugural staging this event in 2007 probably holds little relevance this week.
The tournament is lacking stars in terms of world ranking, Robert Allenby at 30 is the highest ranked player, but several of the leading players in the field including Allenby have displayed good form in recent weeks. Allenby was runner up at the recent Turning Stone Championship in New York State and prior to that had played well enough to make the Tour Championship field where he finished 16th.
Zach Johnson is back close to his best with a very impressive win in San Antonio and a 10th place in Las Vegas.
Charles Howell is another who has turned an ordinary year around of late. He was 3rd at the Turning Stone Resort event and 10th in Las Vegas and after a horror season to that point he seems to be approaching the sort of form that saw him as one of the most promising young players on the PGA Tour several years ago.
Tim Clark keeps making cuts and at some stage he just has to win his first USPGA Tour event. He had a good run through the FedEx Cup finals and then finished 29th last week in Scottsdale which was good enough for him to be a chance this week.
Sean O’Hair’s won in Florida earlier this year but things have not been quite as good since. There have been glimpses of form in recent starts which might suggest that he can contend again.
George McNeil finished runner up to O’Hair in Florida earlier in the season and he has done well in his last few events. He won at this time of year last year in Las Vegas and his form of late suggests this is a good time of year for him.
Steve Allan blew a great chance last week to seal his return to the PGA Tour next year but he has another chance this week and he is playing well. A decision to not be so aggressive through the ball has begun to yield results in recent weeks with three top tens in his last four starts and provided he can put the last hole of last week’s even behind him then he should continue that form.
Of the other Australasians there are plenty lining up, each with different goals on their minds. Nick O’Hern, Peter Lonard, Tim Wilkinson and Nathan Green are all secure for next season in terms of status on the PGA Tour but good weeks could improve their chances of getting in some of the invitational events.
Jason Day, Mark Hensby, Matt Jones, Gavin Coles, Michael Sim, Nick Flanagan, Andrew Buckle and David Lutterus all need big weeks if they are to alter their chances of staying on the PGA Tour or avoiding Stage Two of the Tour school. Coles finished third at the Nationwide Tour event last week and has graduated to their Tour Championship
Michael Sim is an interesting participant having Monday qualified last week for the event in Scottsdale and finished 7th. That earned him a start this week and interestingly he finished 9th here last year.
