By Bill Fields

TOWN AND COUNTRY, Mo. -- The Senior PGA Championship will always stand out in 50-and-over golf because it is by far the oldest of the senior majors, having begun in 1937 at Augusta National GC.

This year, though, for the 74th renewal, a portion of the older set has chosen to compete about 700 miles from Bellerive CC, in the Crowne Plaza Invitational at Colonial in Fort Worth, where they are past champions. Tom Lehman -- who has won the Champions Tour's Charles Schwab Cup the past two seasons -- David Frost, Corey Pavin and Keith Clearwater are teeing it up at Colonial CC in the PGA Tour stop this week.

Hale Irwin is a sentimental choice to win this week. (Photo: Getty Images)

Combined with the absences of Fred Couples, who withdrew Monday citing his back, and John Cook, who will speak at mentor Ken Venturi's Thursday service, four of the top 15 players on the 2013 Champions Tour money list won't be playing outside St. Louis. Another missing player is Nick Price, victorious in the 1992 PGA Championship at Bellerive, who is still on the mend from arm surgery.

Those golfers who are at Bellerive will encounter a course with which they are familiar -- although one that was adjusted by architect Rees Jones following the 2004 U.S. Senior Open won by Peter Jacobsen. It is a formidable, par-71 design whose first turn in the national spotlight was when it hosted the 1965 U.S. Open won by Gary Player.

An 11-year-old St. Louis boy, Jay Haas, was a spectator that summer out with his uncle, Bob Goalby, a prominent tour pro. As Haas recalled Wednesday in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch: "I kind of remember being here and being near the 18th green when Jack Nicklaus walked off. There was a lot of people around him, and I remember my Uncle Bob saying, 'Get that guy's autograph. He's going to be a star.' "

Haas got Nicklaus' signature and, if not Nicklausian, eventually fashioned an endurable and solid decades-long career of his own, which is still going well at age 59. If that would seem too old to win the Senior PGA, consider that in 2011 Tom Watson, 61, became the oldest winner of the championship since the advent of the Champions Tour. Hale Irwin was just shy of his 59th birthday when he won in 2004, and John Jacobs was also 58 when he won in 2003.

Irwin, who will turn 68 on June 3 and lived in St. Louis for many years, would be the ultimate, sentimental, golden oldie longshot this week. But consider that he is coming off two years in which he finished fourth and third in the event of which he is a four-time champion. And Irwin was second to Jacobsen in the 2004 U.S. Senior Open, just ahead of Haas and Tom Kite.

A more logical pick would be Bernhard Langer, the only multiple winner on the Champions Tour this season with two titles, and 18 in his career. Kenny Perry, a past Colonial winner who chose to play with his age group this week, will be another golfer to watch. Perry, 52, only has one career senior win, but has great memories from the final round of the 2012 Senior PGA, when he closed with a record 10-under 62 at the GC at Harbor Shores in Benton Harbor, Mich.

Regardless of who prevails at the end of 72 holes, they will join a who's who of former champions, including Gene Sarazen, Sam Snead, Julius Boros, Arnold Palmer, Gary Player, Jack Nicklaus, Lee Trevino and Raymond Floyd. Even without getting presented the huge Alfred S. Bourne Trophy, all of 36 pounds, a winner knows he has achieved a weighty accomplishment.

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By Bill Fields

AUGUSTA, Ga. -- Will golf justice, elder division, ever make up for the 72nd-hole bogey at the 2009 British Open that cost Tom Watson his sixth Claret Jug at age 59?

For the second straight year at the Masters, the scales have tipped teasingly toward the affirmative after 36 holes.

Fred Couples, 53, who led at the halfway point last April, is in great position again at Augusta National GC. Another green jacket, 21years after he won his only major championship and a few weeks before he will be inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame, is in the realm of possibility.

If Couples were a political candidate, he would have won a couple of early primaries but has a lot of work ahead of him. Instead of raising more money and getting more votes, he has to keep hitting it long and making putts.

He is five years older than the oldest man to win a major, Julius Boros, who was 48 when he won the 1968 PGA Championship.

Related: The winners and losers from Day 1 at the Masters

Boros' swing was syrup; Couples is wielding his driver like a sledgehammer, unloading on the ball as if to channel his younger Boom Boom.

"A couple of practice rounds, I just played horrible," Couples said. "Then on Wednesday afternoon, after the Par 3, I told [coach Paul Marchand], 'I'm going to swing as hard as I can.' You can't play this course driving it 275 or 289. On Thursday I went out there and just picked up a little speed. He said, 'Keep your balance and pound it.' And that's what I've been doing."

Couples didn't hold up well on Saturday afternoon a year ago, getting off to a poor start and shooting 75 en route to a T-12. "I think I was four over after five holes," he said of the disappointing third round. "That really wasn't good."

But the memory of that day hasn't tainted his hopes of what could be this year. "I've said it my whole life: This is my favorite spot in the world," Couples said. "At no given time, have I ever come here and not thought I could win. My goal is to always win this. I've had four probably really good shots at it. I got it once."

He is in position to get it again.

Related: A closer look at Fred Couples' swing

"I think it's possible," said Bernhard Langer, another fiftysomething, who is two under after 36 holes, of whether a senior could win the Masters. "I always thought that Freddie, with his length, can win it because he hits it a good 30 yards by me, which helps a great deal on some of these holes. For me to win, everything has to go my way."

Couples will need good fortune too, the likes of which he got in 1992, when his tee shot on No. 12 seemed to defy gravity on the bank and stayed out of the water.

"Hopefully tomorrow will be a little different [than 2012] and I will play well and have a shot at Sunday," Couples said. "I mean, that's my goal. But it is hard. I'm not going to kid you. You know, I did tee off Thursday with the idea of playing well, and it's Friday afternoon late. I mean, I'm surprised, but I'm not going to freak out over it."

The laid-back, bad-back one would save that for early Sunday evening, if everything had gone right to historic proportions.

"I would like to have another run," Couples said. "Last year Jason [Day] and I really struggled off the bat and we really were a non-factor on Saturday, and that was really not much fun."

He can make amends, then perhaps make some history.

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[Photo: Getty Images]

By Bill Fields

From the April 12 edition of Golf World Daily:

Fred Couples doesn't have gray hair when he comes to Augusta National GC. He doesn't have a putting stroke that can flinch. He doesn't have a lower back that spasms more than the financial markets.

Related: The winners and losers from Day 1 at the Masters

Well, he really does have those things, but being on his favorite golf land mitigates the negatives, the reality of being a 53-year-old on a young man's course. Rae's Creek is a fountain of youth, the Hogan Bridge a span to good memories, the green jacket that he gets to slip into every April a talisman of possibility.

Photo by Getty Images

Golfers play well at places they embrace, and the 1992 Masters champion loves returning to the scene of his finest hour. "There are courses that fit his eye," said Couples' caddie, Cayce Kerr, "and he's so happy to walk the grounds. It's exhilarating."

Despite a bunker-to-bunker bogey on the 18th hole Thursday afternoon, Couples had reason to be buoyant after completing his 109th round in the Masters. He shot a four under 68 and is in a six-way tie for fourth place heading into the second round. For the fourth consecutive time since turning 50 years old, Couples is in the mix at the tournament -- and the course -- he most loves.

"Did I think I was going to shoot 68? No, but I felt I could play a good round," said Couples, who finished sixth, T-15 and T-12 the last three years at Augusta National. "Tomorrow, if I play like this, I'll be right there."

Couples was the old bomber in a grouping that included a young bomber, Dustin Johnson, who bettered Fred by a shot and provided him some positive vibes. "I fed off him a little," Couples said of Johnson. "He was five under, so I got to see a lot of good shots. I like the way he plays. I certainly don't hit 9-iron from 185 yards -- I'm hitting a 7-iron or a 6-iron. It was nice to see someone else make eagles and birdies."

Related: A closer look at Fred Couples' swing

Although not as long as Johnson, who averaged 317.5 yards off the tee, Couples held his own with a 301-yard driving average. Couples wasn't sharp during practice rounds, his shots having "no compression," according to Kerr. But something clicked during a 40-minute Wednesday afternoon practice session after the Par-3 Contest.

"I get fired up [coming to the Masters], but I have to drive it really well," Couples said. "I stepped up on 1 today and hit a really good one. And I hit a good one on 5 and a good one on 7. And I hit a good one on 8. They are all good driving holes. People think this place is wide open, but drive it to the right on 7 and see how many pars you're going to make. I used my length, and it just makes the course play easier for me. Tomorrow, if I can come out and feel good and pound my driver, it'll make tomorrow feel easier too. I know how to play this course."

Couples called the first round 73 shot by 14-year-old Tianlang Guan "phenomenal stuff." The same can be said of a 68 by a 53-year-old who definitely didn't act his age either.

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By Bill Fields

AUGUSTA, Ga. -- A practice round with Ben Crenshaw today. A practice round with Tom Watson tomorrow. A round in the Par-3 Contest with Nick Faldo the day after that. Life is good for Tianlang Guan, the first-time participant in the 77th Masters.

Those green-jacket owners are old enough to be the Chinese golfer's grandfather.

What were you doing when you were 14?

Guan, who won the 2012 Asia-Pacific Amateur Championship to earn his berth as the youngest golfer to play in the Masters (by two years, over Italy's Matteo Manassero, who was 16 when he competed in 2010), is working on his English as well as his golf. He was in the interview room at Augusta National Monday afternoon, flanked by azaleas, member-moderator Rob Johnston and an interpreter (who only had to hit a couple of shots).

Related: Think Young Play Hard: Tianlang Guan

Crenshaw, once a prodigy himself, told Guan to "just enjoy my game."

He is going to try.

"I think it's going to be a little pressure to me, but I'm not going to push myself too hard," said Guan, "and I'm trying to just enjoy my game, play my best, and hopefully play some good scores."

Guan was born 18 months after Tiger Woods won the 1997 Masters. He has already played in Asia with the 14-time major champion, who inspired him to get serious about golf. "I was probably 3 or 4 years old, I was looking at him win the Masters, and it's pretty exciting to watch him," Guan said. "I played with him twice the past couple of years, and he gives me many advice and I will say every time I play with him, I feel a lot better and give myself some confidence."

Related: That kid at the driving range

His performance might be affected his youth or his inexperience, but he should have adequated local knowledge, having played Augusta National "six, seven times" by Monday. He has a strong short game, and he will need it. "I've still got to practice hard here because [these greens are] pretty tough, and it's not the same in China," Guan said.

He'll sleep in the club's Crow's Nest Monday night, perhaps dreaming in two languages about the days ahead.

There will be a lot to enjoy.

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[Photo: Don Emmert/Getty Images]

By Bill Fields

BOCA RATON, Fla. -- Rocco Mediate believes the Champions Tour ought to use a simple marketing slogan: These Guys Are Still Good.

Mediate, making his senior debut this week at the Allianz Championship, one of the game's best talkers, is walking the walk. He shot an 11-under 61 at the Old Course at Broken Sound Saturday to take a three-shot lead over Tom Pernice Jr. into the final round. A 10-foot eagle putt on the par-5 18th hole provided the finishing touch, putting Mediate at 16-under 128 after 36 holes.

Related: Rocco Mediate at 50

Pernice backed up his opening 66 with a 65 to keep himself within striking distance as Mediate, who turned 50 last December, attempts to become the 16th golfer to win his first event on the Champions Tour. Interestingly, Pernice was the most recent player to pull off the feat, at the 2009 SAS Championship.

Bernard Langer is in third place at 11 under, followed by David Frost at nine under.

Many eyes will be on Mediate Sunday. For his part, he is looking forward to being in contention again and trying to prove himself under pressure.

"You get to see what you have," said Mediate.

He certainly had plenty on a sunny Saturday afternoon.

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From the December 10 issue of Golf World Monday:

By Bill Fields

For all the oomph of golf's youth movement, veterans continue to have days when the numbers on a birth certificate have nothing to do with those on a scorecard. Few occasions have been sweeter for an elder golfer than the one enjoyed yesterday by Peter Senior, who at 53 scored an age-defying victory over a field of young bucks in the Australian Open at The Lakes in Sydney.

Photo by Getty Images

On a day when play was suspended for three hours because of winds gusting up to 50 miles per hour, the crafty Senior outclassed the field with an even-par 72 to win his second Australian Open 23 years after his first and become -- by far -- the oldest golfer to win his venerable championship, surpassing Peter Thomson, who was 43 when he won in 1972.

"It doesn't get any better than this," said Senior, the broomstick-putter wielding player who has lost three playoffs on the Champions Tour.

Related: Golf World ranks the year's top-25 newsmakers

Always known as a sound ball-striker, the affable Senior, with son Mitch as his caddie, was steady as others struggled in the strong winds including third-round leader John Senden (82), Adam Scott (76), Geoff Ogilvy (77) and Justin Rose (76).

Just two years ago, when he was 51, Senior proved his game still had some horsepower when he won the Australian PGA. Senior is five months older than Sam Snead was when he triumphed at the 1965 Greater Greensboro Open, setting a PGA Tour record of 52 years, 10 months and 8 days.

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By Bill Fields

Advocates of public golf in San Francisco, who have fought doggedly the last few years in support of Sharp Park golf course in nearby Pacifica, Calif., were taking a deep breath and looking toward the future Friday following Thursday's dismissal of a lawsuit that threatened the 80-year-old Alister Mackenzie design.

"It's a tremendous victory," said Bo Links, co-founder of the San Francisco Public Golf Alliance, co-defendant in the suit with the City and County of San Francisco. "It now opens the door for restoration plans to move forward in earnest, including the restoration of Mackenzie features on the course and hopefully a Mackenzie museum in a new, restored clubhouse."

Various non-profit conversation groups had sued the city for violating the Endangered Species Act, alleging that the course harmed the threatened California red-legged frog and the endangered San Francisco garter snake. In ordering the dismissal, U.S. District Court judge Susan Illston cited an Oct. 2 biological opinion issued by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service that found golf at Sharp Park "is not likely to jeopardize the continued existence of the California red-legged frog or San Francisco garter snake."

Sharp Park's maintenance operations must be done under strict FWS restrictions designed to protect the amphibian and reptile. In its report, the FWS said it anticipates over a 10-year period one adult frog and one snake "will be subject to incidental take in the form of death or injury" because of golf operation and maintenance.

Related: More photos of historic Sharp Park

"This is a common sense result," said Chris Carr, an attorney representing the San Francisco Public Golf Alliance. "And it should lead to a period of cooperation in which San Francisco and San Mateo County can work together to restore habitat for the species, while preserving historic and popular public recreation."

Sharp Park came close to possibly being shut down in December 2011 when the San Francisco Board of Supervisors approved an ordinance that would have transferred the supervision of Sharp Park to the National Park Service. The golf course was spared when San Francisco Mayor Edwin Lee vetoed the legislation, writing, "I believe in striving for equilibrium between environmental and recreational needs."

In the wake of the lawsuit's dismissal, Links reflected on the lengthy battle to thwart efforts to close the course.

"I remember being in the Sharp Park clubhouse one evening in 2005 or so, warning people that this stuff [threat] was coming," Links said. "They couldn't believe it and hooted us out of the room. Now, they're saying thank you for warning us. The property is in jeopardy, and if you want to preserve it, you have to fight to preserve it. That's just the way it is.

"In a way, it's a message for anybody who cares about golf," Links continued. "If you care about it, you have to support it. You can't let your guard down. You've got to educate people, become an ambassador of the game and communicate it to non-golfers too so they understand the values and merit of golf. This game has endured for 500 years for a reason."

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By Bill Fields

It made it to middle age and caused a lot of gray hair in the process.

PGA Tour Qualifying School, 1965-2012.

The beginning of the end of a sports institution commences Tuesday morning with the first stage of qualifying school at six locations after pre-qualifiers last month. First stage will be conducted at 14 venues, followed by six second-stage qualifiers next month, with the 108-hole finals scheduled Nov. 28-Dec. 3 at PGA West, where the top 25 finishers and ties will earn 2013 PGA Tour privileges.

Anthony Kim is one of many to earn PGA Tour playing privileges through Q School.

Q school is out for good after this fall, its 47-year role as a gateway to the PGA Tour over. Starting in 2013, as part of a drastic makeover of the PGA Tour's competitive calendar -- the new season will start in October -- Q school will only award cards to the Web.com Tour.

Instead, a three-tournament series blending golfers who have done well on the Web.com Tour and not so well on the PGA Tour will take place. Fifty golfers will earn PGA Tour exemptions for 2014 through the series, the top 25 on the Web.com circuit guaranteed status as is currently the case, their pecking order up for grabs.

Related: The most historic Q School grads

Q school, the place with the loudest silence in golf, where shots that mean so much are witnessed by so few, will drift into golf's closet of what-has-been.

While the closed-shop argument put forth when the demise of Q school was first percolating has merit (although golfers who have apprenticed on the Web.com Tour have historically done better on the PGA Tour), the only people who have ever loved Q school are those who have never played in one.

A golfer can become infamous at Q school but not famous. It is a pass-fail exam, and the failures have tended to get more attention than the successes. Most of the blunders that have become grisly lore happen late -- during the back nine on Monday of the finals -- but pressure builds, and games crack, in anonymity much earlier.

"Due to the sheer scale of the event, the stories that get passed around are of players who get through 99 or 100 holes in great position, then fall apart for keeps, scattering strokes all over the final homeward nine," David Gould writes in his richly-detailed 1999 book, Q School Confidential: Inside Golf's Cruelest Tournament. "Behind these easily spotted tragedies are the untold stories of players whose courage ran dry at an isolated moment, doing swift but permanent damage that the player alone can appreciate."

But plenty of golfers also show sporting bravery at Q school, coming through in the clutch despite sweaty palms and nervous stomachs to attain -- or, often, regain -- the chance to live out a dream.

Related: Frank Nobilo on why changing Q School is good

Golf, especially Q school, is about keeping on and plugging away. No one showed more perseverance at Q school than Mac O'Grady who qualified 30 years ago on his 17th attempt despite shooting 79-76 in the opening two of his six rounds at the finals.

Donnie Hammond won that Q school at TPC Sawgrass and Sawgrass CC by a record 14 shots, but Q school is one tournament where winning really doesn't matter. A golfer just needs to be "inside the number." That fall those who got PGA Tour cards along with Hammond and O'Grady were Nick Price, Dan Forsman, Ken Green, Russ Cochran, Loren Roberts, Tom Lehman and Jeff Sluman.

Among the competitors in 2012's first stage are a Wadkins (Travis), a Tway (Kevin) and a Sindelar (Jamie).

There is also a Nicklaus.

That's Nicklaus Newcomb, a young Kentuckian in the field at Madison, Miss.

At Q school, it is about the game not the name, but a little karma never hurt.

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(Photo by AP Images)

By Bill Fields

Longtime observers of the World Golf Hall of Fame often have a field day critiquing the selection process and who gets in and who doesn't -- I raise my hand here -- but from my perspective, this is simply a time to salute a good man who, come May 6, 2013, will finally be where he should be.

Monday's announcement that 81-year-old Ken Venturi had been selected through the shrine's Lifetime Achievement Category and will be inducted next spring was a fitting tribute for the player-turned-broadcaster who has been an important part of the game's fabric for so very long.

Related: Ken Venturi's "My Shot" from Golf Digest

"The greatest reward in life is to be remembered," Venturi said, "and I thank the World Golf Hall of Fame for remembering me."

Being grateful has never been difficult for Venturi, for whom golf was a refuge before it became his life.

When Venturi was a boy in San Francisco, words came with extreme difficulty if at all, a doctor telling his mother that her son "was an incurable stammerer." But at 13 he "went out and found the loneliest sport I could find," setting forth on a course that would see him become a national champion and, later, after carpal tunnel syndrome shortened his competitive career, a familiar voice for 35 years on CBS' golf telecasts.

If Venturi's golf life had begun in 1968 when he made the unlikely climb into a television tower for the first time, it would have been a remarkable run. But he had been a headliner on the ground for years. Tutored by Byron Nelson and Ben Hogan, owner of a stylish and effective swing, Venturi nearly made history as an amateur at the 1956 Masters but squandered a four-shot lead in a windy final round to lose to Jack Burke Jr.

Related: The most heartbreaking Masters Moments

That tough loss -- and subsequent valleys along the way to 14 PGA Tour victories -- probably had something to do with Venturi's gentle rather than pointed criticism from his TV perch. But he knew the game, and had walked the walk -- a sapping 36 holes on the final day of the 1964 U.S. Open at Congressional CC in Bethesda, Md. Exhausted from the brutal heat and humidity, a down-on-his-luck Venturi was warned by a physician that going out for the final 18 holes could jeopardize his life.

Venturi played on, persevering for one of golf's most hard-earned victories, forever etching a spot in sport's history. The USGA abandoned the double-round conclusion. Before too long, his health would force Venturi off the tour for good.

"I wouldn't trade being anybody in the whole world," Venturi said Monday. "[But] the one thing I think about is, I wonder what I could have done if I hadn't lost the use of my hands."

Related: The most grueling U.S. Opens

Venturi made the most of his life away from competition, as a talker and a giver -- helping various charities, from raising money for guide dogs for the blind, a children's hospital and the mentally challenged. Nelson, long ago, had given his protege some advice.

"Be good to the game, Ken, and give back," Nelson said.

"That's what I've tried to do," Venturi said, "because I've said many times, the world will never remember you for what you take from it, but only what you leave behind."

When the U.S. Open returned to Congressional in 2011, it was a chance for people to appreciate anew what Venturi had achieved that unforgettably steamy Saturday in 1964. Venturi met with reporters, many of whom weren't born when he won the Open, and looked back.

"I remember a phrase again from my father," Venturi said last summer. "I was at the dinner table one night telling him how good I was. 'I'm the best there is, Dad,' the whole thing. And I ran out of accolades. And he said, 'Are you through, Son?' I said, 'Yeah, Dad.' He said, 'Well, let me tell you something, son. When you're as good as you are, you can tell everybody. When you're really good, son, they'll tell you.' "

In being honored by the Hall of Fame, that's exactly what they're telling him.

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(Photo by Getty Images)