New Taipei City, Taiwan – Eun-Hee Ji shot 6-under 66 on Thursday to take a one-shot lead over China’s Xi Yu Lin at the Fubon LPGA Taiwan Championship.

The 29-year from South Korea birdied four of her last five holes in windy conditions and holds the lead after
18 holes for the first time since the 2013 Mobile Bay LPGA Classic. Ji, a former U.S. Women’s Open champ, said she used the wind to her advantage.

“Actually, I didn’t fight with the wind,” said Ji. “I just using the wind a lot. My ball flight wasn’t too lower today. I just see my ball line and I just look at my shot, my image was really good.”

Ji has two career LPGA Tour victories and will try to break back into the winner’s circle for the first time since her major breakthrough in 2009. Her season-best finish and only top-10 of the year came at the Evian Championship where she tied for eighth. Ji had two chip ins and only 23 putts in her round today.

“It’s getting better from the beginning of the season to the last of the season,” said Ji. “I just working on my short game last week and the week before, because my chipping wasn’t feeling good. So I was working a lot this week and I just chipped in twice today and I think I worked on a lot of right things.”

A group of four players sit two shots back and in a tie for third including Morgan Pressel, Sandra Gal, Charley Hull and Sun Young Yoo. Rolex Rankings No. 2 Lydia Ko (T7) is three shots back and tied with seven others at 3-under par.

Five-time major champion Yani Tseng and TLPGA member Meng Chu Chen were the top Taiwanese performers on day one and sit six shots back after rounds of even-par 72.

Canada’s Alena Sharp shot a 4-over 76 and tied for 67th.

THACKERVILLE, Okla. – Tim Burke won the World Long Drive Championship for the second time in three years Wednesday night, beating Jeremy Easterly in the final with a 394-yard drive.

The 6-foot-6 Burke, a former University of Miami pitcher from Orlando, Florida, earned $150,000 in the event at WinStar World Casino.

Easterly, from Ponte Vedra, Florida, had a 386-yard drive in the final.

Burke beat Justin Young of Mount Airy, North Carolina, 401-386 in the quarterfinals, and topped Will Hogue of Collierville, Tennessee, 403-390 in the semifinals.

Easterly beat two-time champion Jamie Sadlowski of St. Paul, Alberta, in the semifinals with a 380-yard drive. Sadlowski failed to get a drive in the grid in the match after winning his quarterfinal at 402.

Vancouver – The Mackenzie Tour – PGA TOUR Canada’s season-opening event will return to Vancouver in 2016 and will continue through 2020 with a new name and under new management. The Freedom 55 Financial Open will take place at Point Grey Golf & Country Club from May 23 to 29, 2016.

The announcement sees Freedom 55 Financial – which is also the title sponsor of the season-ending Freedom 55 Financial Championship as well as Canadian Player of the Year and Canadian Player of the Week awards – expand its support of the Mackenzie Tour and Canadian golf with agreements through 2020.

Linx Marketing, which operates the ATB Financial Classic and Syncrude Boreal Open presented by AECON, will serve as the host organization for the event. David Lee-Fay, a partner at Linx Marketing, will serve as tournament director.

“We’re thrilled to be working on another venture with Freedom 55 Financial, which has been an outstanding partner since the launch of the Freedom 55 Financial Championship in 2013,” said Jeff Monday, Mackenzie Tour President.

“We’re excited to be kicking off the Mackenzie Tour – PGA TOUR Canada in Vancouver as we continue to support young Canadian athletes as they pursue their aspirations,” said Mike Cunneen, Senior Vice-President, Freedom 55 Financial. “It’s also a nice complement to our season-ending Freedom 55 Financial Championship in London, Ontario,” added Cunneen.

“We look forward to continuing our strong relationship with the Mackenzie Tour – PGA TOUR Canada, and to helping create a summer of exciting golf with Linx Marketing.”

The Vancouver area is home to PGA TOUR players and Mackenzie Tour graduates Nick Taylor and Adam Hadwin, along with current Mackenzie Tour players Adam Svensson, Kevin Spooner, Brad Clapp, Ryan Williams, Seann Harlingten, Thomas Hay, Adam Cornelson, James Allenby and Eugene Wong.

The 2016 Mackenzie Tour schedule will be announced at a later date.

HONG KONG – Andrea Pavan of Italy made four birdies on his last six holes to take a share of the lead after the first round of the Hong Kong Open with a 6-under 64.

Pavan was tied with Lu Wei-chih of Taiwan, a stroke ahead of a trio that included Justin Rose of England. Rose made four birdies on the back nine in a bogey-free round at the Fanling Course and was tied with Taiwanese player Pan Cheng-tseung and Jeev Milka Singh of India.

Graeme McDowell was in a group of six players another shot back at the joint European Tour and Asian Tour event.

VENICE, Fla. – Professional golfers from all over the world will descend on Venice, Fla., for Stage II of the LPGA Qualifying Tournament. Players are trying to finish in the top-80 and advance to final stage of Qualifying Tournament where LPGA Tour dreams are realized.

Stage II is a 72-hole tournament held at Plantation Golf and Country Club on both the Panther & Bobcat Courses. The first-round is scheduled for Thursday, October 22 with the final-round slated for Sunday, October 25.

The top-80 players plus ties at the end of Sunday’s final round will advance to final stage of LPGA Q-School, which will be held at LPGA International Golf Course – Jones & Hill Courses from Wednesday, December 2 through Sunday, December 6. There is no cut at Stage II and players that complete 72 holes will automatically receive Symetra Tour status for 2016.

A total of 197 players, 60 of which advanced out of LPGA Qualifying Tournament Stage I in late August at Mission Hills Country Club, will be competing to advance to final stage. The white line yardage for the Bobcat Course is 6,536 while the total yardage for the Panther Course is 6,363.

Players that finish in the top-20 at final stage will receive category 12 status on the priority list for the LPGA Tour while players that finish 21 through 45 will receive category 17 status (conditional).

88 INTERNATIONAL PLAYERS FROM 31 COUNTRIES: Of the 197 players in the field, 88 are representing a country outside the United States. There are a total of 31 countries (not including the United States) that will be represented in Venice.

Seven Canadians will play in the competition, including Taylor Candler (Kincardine, Ont.), Laura DeMarco (LaSalle, Ont.), Christina Foster (Toronto), Natalie Gleadall (Stratford, Ont.), Brittany Marchand (Orangeville, Ont.), Megan Osland (Kelowna, B.C.) and Anne-Catherine Tanguay (Québec, Que.).

There are 11 players from Thailand, seven from Canada, six from Australia, China and Mexico and five from South Korea and the United Kingdowm.

There will be 108 players representing the United States.

MEXICO CITY – Tiger Woods has not started rehabilitation for a second back surgery he had a month ago, and he said Tuesday he would face another “tedious and long” process that suggests it might be awhile before he competes again.

Woods last played at the Wyndham Champion on Aug. 23, where he tied for 10th for his best finish at a PGA Tour event in nearly two years.

In a surprise announcement Sept. 18, he said he had a second back surgery after doctors during a routine check discovered a fragmented disc pinching a nerve. Woods had his first surgery just before the 2014 Masters and missed nearly three months. He said later he came back too early.

“Rehab will be soon, and it will be tedious and long,” Woods said at the Bridgestone America’s Golf Cup, an exhibition he was supposed to play with Matt Kuchar until the second surgery. “The last one, it took me awhile to get back. Some players on tour have done the same procedure and to be back pain-free it took them over a year.”

Woods hasn’t won since the 2013 Bridgestone Invitational for his 79th career win on the PGA Tour, just three short of the record held by Sam Snead.

For most of his career, the record with which he was compared was Jack Nicklaus and his 18 professional majors. Woods won his 14th major at the 2008 U.S. Open, and had reconstructive surgery on his left knee a week later.

Woods turn 40 in December. Nicklaus won only three of his 18 majors after he turned 40.

Woods, who dropped to No. 334 in the world ranking this week, has not given up on catching Nicklaus. He just figures he will have to play like Vijay Singh, who won 22 times (but only one major) in his 40s.

“It’s important for me to have more than 18 majors when all is said and done,” Woods said. “It took Jack his whole career to achieve it and mine is not done yet. I believe that I have a very good record for 20 years on the tour. The main thing is to get fit and to reach my 40s with good health to be as successful as Vijay, who won most of his tournaments at that age.

“It’s something that I hope I will be able to do,” he said. “I want to play at an elite level with the new kids for a long, long time.”

What might help this time around is that Woods said he won’t be changing his swing. After returning too early in 2014 from back surgery, he took off the final three months to get stronger and left his swing coach, hiring Chris Como as a consultant.

Woods doesn’t think he’s that far off from 2013, when he won five times and was PGA Tour player of the year.

“But to achieve it, I need to be healthy again,” he said. “This year I tried to play after the back surgery and it wasn’t fun because all of the pain. Also after my last surgery, I was changing my swing and to be able to do that successfully you have to practice a lot, and I could not practice because I was doing the rehab.

“It was a very complicated situation because of that.”

There was no timetable on when he would start rehabilitation or when he would return. Woods typically doesn’t start a new year until the Farmers Insurance Open, which starts the last week of January. That appeared doubtful.

The Masters, which he missed in 2014 for the first time, is April 7-10.

“I need to return with my explosiveness, and to do that, I need to practice for longer periods of time,” he said. “It’s going to take several months of hard work”.

What exactly does a Community Golf Coach look like—Parent? Teacher? Coach? Volunteer? Golfer?

How about all of the above.

“Community Golf Coach is really great for people who are volunteers at a golf club, teachers and folks who are really just into helping out junior golf in Canada,” said Amanda Minchin, head professional at Estevan Woodland Golf Club in Saskatchewan.

Re-launched earlier this year, Community Golf Coach is a community stream context within the National Coaching Certification Program (NCCP) designed strictly for junior golf volunteers. The initiative is backed by extensive research into Canada’s volunteer training curriculums for sport across the country. Industry experts implemented the program to address the gap between PGA of Canada professionals and available volunteer support from family and friends.

The end goal for Community Golf Coach is simple: strengthen support for PGA of Canada professionals in maintaining the focus towards creating a fun, welcoming atmosphere for youth—a key principle in long-term player development.

“We were very excited about involving new Community Golf Coaches into our junior camps,” said Whistler Golf Club’s head professional Duncan Savage. “The more bodies we have on site, the better I’ll feel about all the kids being in a safe environment and getting instruction that is credible.”

About 50 Community Golf Coaches from around the country have been trained since the context launched this past spring.

A high school teacher in B.C., Tim Frechette was one of the first people trained as a Community Golf Coach back in April. For nearly 20 years Frechette has been coordinating the golf program at his high school (which includes instruction by two PGA of Canada professionals) and says the skills he’s picked up as a trained Community Golf Coach will help out this program.

“Our program has kids of varying abilities from raw beginners to single digit players,” Frechette said. “Being able to create different tasks for different kids and learning how to give different feedback to those kids has helped us in our program.”

Becoming a Community Golf Coach incorporates the following: Self Reflection as a Community Golf Coach; CN Future Link Programming; Growth and Development; Teaching and Learning; Safety and Risk Management; Golf Equipment; Technical; Values; Rules and Etiquette; Ethical Coaching; Activity Design; Session Planning Activity; and Session Implementation.

South Muskoka Curling and Golf Club has been utilizing a Community Golf Coach to great success for much of the season. The club’s head golf professional Bruce Rogerson says he believes it has worked so well at his club for a number of reasons.

“I really can’t stress it enough—having a Community Golf Coach here all year has been such a positive for our program,” Rogerson said. “Our Community Golf Coach has been very active with our junior league, as a liaison between the pro staff and the members, and ultimately has freed up time for our assistant professionals to do more instruction.”

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Click here to register for Community Golf Coach workshops conducted by the PGA of Canada.

HONG KONG – With no time to spare, Ian Poulter was rushing from Florida to Hong Kong on Tuesday to keep his European Tour membership, and to save his chances of being eligible to play in the Ryder Cup next year.

And he owes it all former PGA champion Rich Beem, who gave up his spot in the Hong Kong Open.

Poulter was planning to play in the HSBC Champions in two weeks in Shanghai, part of a schedule that would allow him to reach the minimum 13 tournaments required to keep his European Tour membership.

But with Andy Sullivan winning the Portugal Masters and Emiliano Grillo winning the Frys.com Open, they moved into the top 50 and bumped out Poulter, who had to be in the top 50 this week to be eligible for the HSBC Champions. It was too late to enter the Hong Kong Open, and all the invitations had been taken.

That’s where Beem stepped in.

The European Tour said it approached Beem about the situation, and Beem agreed to let Poulter have his spot in the field.

Poulter thanked Beem on Twitter for giving up his invitation. “Where would you like to take you for dinner?” he tweeted.

This might have been more valuable than that. European Tour membership is required to play in the Ryder Cup, even the captain’s picks. Poulter has a 12-4-2 record in the Ryder Cup, and he was largely responsible for Europe’s record-tying comeback to win in Medinah in 2012.

Getting the spot in Hong Kong was only part of the drama. Poulter needed a visa, and that was only returned to him about two hours before he boarded a flight from Orlando to New York to make the connection to Hong Kong.

“A mad 24 hours,” Poulter said on Instagram. “Never dull in the Poulter saga.”

Poulter was due to arrive in Hong Kong on Wednesday afternoon, meaning he will not see the golf course until it begins on Thursday. He is a past champion of the event, and in this situation, simply starting the tournament is more important than his performance. He said he would hire a local caddie for the week.

Poulter monitors the world ranking as close as any player and did not see a scenario where he would drop five spots to No. 51.

“You could say poor play and poor planning,” he said on Instagram. “But thanks to Rich for giving me his spot.”

Beem, who also works as an analyst for Sky Sports, planned to join the European Tour Productions commentary team for the Hong Kong Open.

Thackerville, OK – Long Drivers of America, the organizing body of the World Long Drive Championship, crowned its second champion at this year’s final on Thursday, Oct. 15.

Long Drivers of America Hall of Fame member and five-time open division champion Jason “GolfZilla” Zuback from Calgary,  dominated a world-class field in his rookie debut in the senior division.

Zuback the winningest player in long drive history dominated the sport from 1996-2006 capturing 5 world championships and making nine finals.

Battling a 20 mph headwind on an unseasonably hot day in Thackerville, Oklahoma, Zuback never lost a round and hit the longest ball of the day at 352 yards on his road to the title beating a star-studded field in the match-play finale.

Jason started the competition off strong in the morning breezing through his initial two rounds of competition with drives of 338 yards and 352 yards.  In the pivotal round 5, Zuback blasted one 336 beating his closest competitor by 12 yards easily making him the #1 seed in the Match Play brackets.

In the Semi-Finals, he faced long-time friend and fellow LDA Hall of Famer, Brian Pavlet.  Just months removed from full hip replacement surgery, Pavlet took the long road to match-play through the losers bracket but fell to Zuback for his second straight semi-final finish.

With the win, Zuback pocketed $12,000 (U.S) and adds another world championship to his resume.

“If the facts don’t fit the theory, change the facts.”

It’s a quote made famous by Albert Einstein which came to mind after the release of Golf Facilities in Canada 2015, the definitive report on golf facilities and development in Canada.

Released in June, Golf Facilities in Canada 2015 identifies all existing public and private facilities across Canada. The report – a collaborative effort between Golf Canada and the PGA of Canada – also includes information on facility openings and closings, as well as the number and type of facilities currently in development.

Since its release, I’ve been questioned on what value the report delivers to the golf industry. Quite simply, it provides a factual snapshot of 2,346 golf facilities—from public and private clubs to resorts, residential or nine-hole layouts in communities across Canada. The report outlines boom periods of growth during the 1960’s and again in the 90’s that delivered Canadians the third highest total supply of golf courses in the world.

The report provides a comprehensive breakdown of the golf courses and projects that form the Canadian golf landscape. The facts present a compelling argument that our sport, with the highest participation rate of any in Canada, is affordable, has tremendous accessibility and has options for players of all abilities and wants. The current supply of golf courses may be greater than what is needed to satisfy the 5.7 million Canadians who play more than 60 million rounds annually. Golf’s highs and lows have been cyclical for more than a century and like any industry, competition and market forces will eventually right size the number of golf courses and that’s probably a good thing.

Since 2010, there have been 22 documented course openings. In addition, 31 facilities – all public – are currently in planning or under construction across Canada. The study reinforces golf’s accessibility with facts to show that nearly 90 per cent of all courses are open to the public.

A finding I found most compelling was that more than 37 per cent of facilities are nine holes in addition to countless 18-hole facilities that offer nine-hole pricing. Those who theorize that golf takes too long or is too costly should consider the nine-hole round when formulating their opinion. Golf, like any recreational activity takes a certain time commitment and the facilities report confirms that Canadian golf enthusiasts can take advantage of a multitude of options.

The facts reinforce that golf facilities are the foundation for major sport participation, more than $14 billion in economic impact, tourism, charitable giving and environmental stewardship in communities across Canada.

GOLF FACILITIES IN CANADA 2015– A SNAPSHOT:

• Canada is home to 2,346 public and private golf facilities; ranking it third in the world in total supply.
• Seventy-seven per cent of the total golf supply is located in Canada’s four most populated provinces—Ontario, Québec, Alberta and British Columbia.
• Golf remains extremely accessible in Canada as more than 90 per cent of the country’s supply is open to the public.
• Of the 2,126 public facilities in Canada, half are located in Ontario and Québec, which together account for 61 per cent of the country’s total population and 73 per cent of Canada’s 220 private clubs.
• Nine-hole golf accounts for almost 37 per cent of Canada’s total supply, outnumbering 18-hole supply in Manitoba and Saskatchewan In Saskatchewan, 18-hole courses are outnumbered 3 to 1 by 9-hole courses.
• Canada features nine 12-hole facilities (six of which are in Ontario) and three 6-hole facilities.
• Resort golf, though a small segment of Canada’s overall supply, is a significant contributor to tourism in several provinces. Countrywide, 167 facilities (or approximately 7 per cent) of total supply are connected to a resort or a resort/real estate operation.
• Course construction peaked in the 1960s with the opening of more than 420 facilities and then again between 1990 and 1999, when more than 310 courses—13 per cent of total supply —opened. The growth was highlighted by the opening of 257 facilities in the four largest provinces: Ontario, Québec, Alberta and British Columbia.
• Since 2010, 29 facilities have opened in six different provinces. In recent years, Canada has seen only moderate growth, and currently has 31 18-hole equivalent facilities in various stages of development.
• Of those facilities in various stages of development, 17 have broken ground including seven in Alberta and four in Nova Scotia. Nearly 60 per cent of new projects are tied to a real estate development.
• In the past five to 10 years, 158 facilities have closed. One in five of those closures were located in Ontario, which is home to 35 per cent of the total supply of Canada’s facilities. Three of Canada’s 10 provinces have seen fewer than five facility closures during the past decade.

Download the complete report at: golfcanada.ca/GolfFacilitiesinCanada2015