Wentworth worthy of Golf Clubs For Sale

Wentworth worthy of Golf Clubs For Sale

Forget the Players' Championship, the real 'fifth' major is the PGA Championship at Wentworth this week. That's according to Lee Westwood, at any rate. The European Tour's flagship event outside the Open this year boasts a field including all four major champions - Graeme McDowell, Louis Oosthuizen, Martin Kaymer and Charl Schwartzel - and seven of the world's top 10 players. Only the Americans are missing golf clubs for sale (http://www.yourgolfhomes.com/). But, as the argument goes, with a field like this, who needs them? Lee Westwood is among those in action at Wentworth this week. Not Westwood, anyway. "The BMW PGA Championship is the biggest title that I play for outside of the majors. It's bigger than the World Golf Championships because of what the tournament represents for us as the European Tour," the world number one said recently. Westwood's pride for his Tour is commendable, and who are we to argue with a man who has represented Europe on seven Ryder Cup teams? But without delving into the relative merits of the European and US circuits, you'd have to say that an event without the Americans (of whom there are currently 18 in the world's top 50) is somewhat pushing its claims to be the 'fifth' major, just as the Players' would be with golf clubs for sale, shorn of the international contingent. "America is a big place but world golf is getting stronger," said Masters champion Schwartzel. "And the world is slightly bigger." Westwood, who missed the Players' this year, didn't actually say the PGA Championship is the 'fifth' major - that bit of spin was added by the Tour itself, a playful dig, perhaps, at the American media-induced moniker of the Players'. And anyway, how do you define a major? Well, we've talked about the field, so next is the cash on offer, not that the best players really need to be tapping their pockets before deciding whether to take part or not. The PGA Championship has a purse of about £4m, compared to about £5.8m for the Players'. So the PGA event lags well behind the majors and lucrative World Golf Championships and is not even the highest on the European Tour. That honour goes to the £4.6m up for grabs at the season-ending Dubai World Championship. The Byron Nelson Championship in the US this week also carries a pot of about £4m, by the way. History is another string to the major bow. Even the youngest of the majors with golf clubs for sale, the Masters, goes back to 1934. The PGA Championship began in 1955 and has been at Wentworth full time since 1984.

Luke Donald savours world number one status with wholesale golf clubs



Luke Donald put his money where his mouth is and came out on top of the world. Donald said at the start of the week that he felt like the best player in the world and after a roller-coaster four days at the PGA Championship at Wentworth he proved it with wholesale golf clubs (http://www.golfsaleworld.com/). The pre-tournament hype for the European Tour's flagship event talked up the quality of the field - the top three players in the world, six out of the top seven in the world rankings, all four major champions, most of the European Ryder Cup team. In the end it came down to a straight duel between the world's top two and Donald delivered the crucial blow in a sudden death play-off to topple Lee Westwood. Donald, 33, becomes the third Englishman after Sir Nick Faldo and Westwood to be crowned world number one and the 15th overall since the rankings were introduced in 1986. Like Westwood before him, though, Donald said that the top spot is flattering but not a goal in itself. "It's obviously a special accomplishment, something I'll remember forever," Donald reflected. "It's something that will be a great story when I'm an old man telling my grandkids that I was once the best player in the world at wholesale golf clubs. It's a little surreal. "I'm not going to lie, it feels fantastic, but winning is always at the top of the list. Winning is what got me there. A big win at the Match Play and a big win here. I've still got a lot of work to do and a lot of titles to pick up." Donald says his daughter has helped inspire his rise up to world number one. There will be those who say, like they did with Westwood, that a world number one without a major victory is not worthy. But does, for instance, one major title in an otherwise undistinguished career better the feat of being recognised as the most consistent - and therefore, for that spell, the best - player on the wholesale golf clubs? Ultimately, though, majors are the currency in which golf careers deal and Donald's singular aim at the beginning of the year was to contend in all four majors. He was fourth at the Masters and goes to the US Open at Congressional in two weeks on a high. He has now finished in the top 10 in 13 of his last 14 events, including nine in a row, won the WGC Match Play title in February and was second in the World Match Play Championship last week. His current run of form and his biggest stroke play victory to date should now silence the criticism that dogged earlier parts of his career.