Golf, but not as we know it
Finally, it’s here! Rory McIlroy may be cutting back on his tour schedule in 2025 but there will be an added workload for the Northern Irishman with the start-up of the inaugural TGL, the new tech-infused golf league he has founded with Tiger Woods in partnership with the PGA Tour.
A year later than originally planned, the stadium golf league’s schedule for the new format of golf – featuring 12 teams of four players – has been announced.
The TGL opener on January 7th will see Shane Lowry’s The Bay Club (which also includes Ludvig Aberg, Wyndham Clark and Min Woo Lee) take on New York Golf which includes Matt Fitzpatrick, with McIlroy’s Boston Common Golf (with Keegan Bradley, Adam Scott and Hideki Matsuyama) scheduled to make its debut against Woods’s Jupiter Links team on January 27th.
All matches will be staged on Mondays or Tuesdays with the leading four teams progressing to the playoffs and the last two teams remaining headed to a three-match decider for the SoFi Cup on March 24th and 25th. Golf, but not as we know it.
Three Irish players gain full status on Ladies European Tour next year
Irish Times Sportswoman of the Year Awards: ‘The greatest collection of women in Irish sport in one place ever assembled’
Two-time Olympic champion Kellie Harrington named Irish Times/Sport Ireland Sportswoman of the Year 2024
PGA decision to pay US Ryder Cup players a fatal blow for the competition’s old ethos
Sarah Byrne continues quest for LPGA Tour card
Sara Byrne’s next step in her quest to win an LPGA Tour card for next season resumes at this week’s second stage of Q Series at Plantation Country Club in Venice, Florida. Originally scheduled to take place a fortnight ago, the event was deferred due to Hurricane Milton.
Byrne, a star of Britain and Ireland’s winning Curtis Cup team last month, successfully came through stage one of the qualifying series (of three, with this second step offering the pathway to the final qualifiers); and the Cork golfer sharpened her game ahead of Florida with a number of appearances on the Ladies European Tour and the LET Access Tour (with a best result of tied-sixth in the Calatayud Open).
While Byrne is in the early stages of her professional career, pioneering Leona Maguire resumes her LPGA Tour season after a short break with this week’s Maybank Championship in Malaysia before moving on to next week’s Toto Japan Classic in her Asian swing of events.
Word of Mouth
“I can’t imagine what Tiger feels like” – a joking Conor Purcell after signing autographs following his win in the Hangzhou Open in China on the Challenge Tour, his second success of the season which elevated the 27-year-old Dubliner to fourth on the Race to Mallorca order of merit standings with only the Rolex Grand Final to go. Purcell (4th), Dermot McElroy (37th) and Gary Hurley (43rd) have all made the limited-field tournament on October 31st-November 3rd with the leading 20 players in the final rankings earning full DP World Tour cards.
In Numbers
3 – Hannah Green’s wire-to-wire win in the BMW Ladies Championship in South Korea gave her a third success of the season on the LPGA Tour. In doing so, Green became the third Australian to win three times in a season, joining Karrie Webb and Jan Stephenson.
On this day . . . October 22nd, 1972
Betsy Rawls was a pioneering figure on the LPGA Tour and her win in the short-lived GAC Classic was significant in that it would prove to be the final one of her career.
Rawls won 55 professional tournaments including eight Majors, the first of which came in the US Women’s Open in 1951.
Over two decades later, she remained competitive although the win in the GAC Classic at the 49ers Country Club in Tucson – where she was the only player to finish under-par and where A-listers including Kathy Whitmorth and Judy Rankin were among those in a six-way tie for second – came as a surprise even to Rawls.
Rawls had undergone surgery in the summer and missed nine weeks on tour before returning and winning in Tucson: “This is a complete surprise. I really wasn’t expecting much. I’ll say this: this is my 55th win but the most thrilling win for me. I had no idea . . . it’s a dream come true.”
What she didn’t know is that it would be her last of a remarkable career, one which earned her a place in golf’s Hall of Fame.
X/Twitter Twaddle
White boxes in the locker from @Titleist! Tested some 2025 Prov1x. Will do some more testing next week but early tests feel good. On a robot, it has little ball speed gains and little extra spin across the board. When I hit them I don’t think I could tell the difference – PGA Tour player Michael Kim is not a robot. Kim’s final round 62 in the Shriners Children’s Open for a tied-fifth finish enabled him to move into the top 125 on the FedEx Cup standings in his bid to retain his tour card.
Just so you know, Arnold Palmer did not like Trump. He hated golf cheats. “If a guy is going to cheat you on a golf course,” he told me once, “he’s going to cheat you in business.” He’d seen Trump cheat like a six-year-old playing Monopoly and wanted nothing to do with him – author Rick Reilly (who wrote Commander in Cheat) adding his tuppence worth on the Trump/Palmer thingumajig. The Palmer family issued a statement denouncing the former president’s references to the legendary golfer at a recent campaign rally in Pennsylvania.
Korea bound. Movement is key the older you get. Bands, massage balls, roller easy wins pre flight. Motion is lotion for your body – Scottish veteran Richie Ramsay on packing the array of fitness tools necessary for life on tour.
Know the Rules
Q: The player’s second shot lands in the greenside bunker. The player hits the ball out of the bunker and it comes to rest just short of the green. The player removes the sand that landed both on the green and off the green using a towel as it was on their line of play. What is the ruling in stroke play?
A: The player gets a two stroke penalty. There is no penalty for removing sand that lies on the putting green (Rule 13.1c) but the player gets the general penalty for improving their line of play by removing sand in the general area (see Rule 8.1a (4)).
In the Bag
JT Poston – Shriners Children’s Open
Driver – Titleist GT3 (9 degrees)
3-wood – Titleist TS2 (15 degrees)
Hybrid – Titleist TS2 (19 degrees)
Irons – Titleist U500 (4), T100 (5-9)
Wedges – Titleist Vokey Design SM10 (46, 50, 56 bent to 55, 60 degrees)
Putter – Scotty Cameron GOLO 5 tour prototype
Ball – Titleist ProV1x
