Golf: Big hitters will have an edge at PGA

DULUTH - David Duval has more confidence. Tiger Woods is more relaxed. And the Atlanta Athletic Club has more yardage than most of their golfing rivals can handle.

The result is an anticipated long-hitters showdown between two-time defending champion Woods and British Open champion Duval at the 83rd PGA Championship, the year's last major tournament, which begins late tonight (NZT).

"This course really favours someone who hits it long and high," world No 3 Duval said. "You can't roll it off the tee. It's all carry out there."

Rain has made the 6595.5m layout play longer than usual in practice, adding to the advantage enjoyed by Woods and Duval, who will be grouped with US Open champion Retief Goosen of South Africa for the first two days.

"They have set this course up perfectly for Tiger," Goosen said. "They think they are making it difficult for Tiger. But it isn't. He's smiling. He knows he's got a big advantage over everybody. All the trouble is out there about 280 yards [off the tee] and he flies it 310."

World No 1 Woods said he felt worn out this year, which was why he has rested since losing his British Open crown to Duval last month.

Asked to rate his present game on a scale of 1 to 10, Woods replied: "Somewhere in there.

"My preparation coming here, I didn't really do much. I just took it easy and relaxed at home. Practised here and there, played a little golf, just took it easy.

"I know I'm not that far off and I have been hitting the ball better."

Duval's first major title, won in July at Royal Lytham, has brought the 29-year-old American more smiles and greater self-assurance.

"I do think I have greater confidence because of what happened at Lytham. More than just winning, I was proud I played well," he said.

"There's a definite change in how you are perceived after winning a major. You get looked at as a little more of a champion."

Woods, who won the Masters in April to hold all four major crowns at once, could become the first man to win the same major title three years in a row since Australia's Peter Thomson won the British Open from 1954 to 1956.

"You can't look at the past and say, 'I have won two of these' and then try to win three in a row," Woods said. "You have to play one shot at a time. Whatever is in the past has already been done. I'm trying to do the best I can in the here-and-now."

The only man to win three consecutive PGA Championships was Walter Hagen, from 1924 to 1927, when the event was matchplay.

Another long-hitting hopeful is left-hander Phil Mickelson, still seeking his first major title.

"It has taken a lot more time than I had anticipated," he said. "I hope it will eventually come. I believe it will."

The world No 2 sounds like a man poised to break through this week. The smooth-swinging Mickelson has been concentrating on positive thinking and "minimising his misses" in the hope of eliminating the kind of mistakes that have cost him major championship titles in the past.

"I've been playing well. I'd like to think that I have a good shot at it," Mickelson said yesterday.

"I've worked very hard this year, especially in the last few weeks with Rick [coach Smith] on making some refinements and I've been able to minimise my misses even more so, and I feel as though this golf course is set up for me to take advantage of that."

Mickelson, who threatened this year at both the Masters and US Open, feels at home on the Georgia courses that feature bentgrass greens and Bermuda rough, to which he grew accustomed growing up in California.

He has had success in the past in the Atlanta area, winning both the BellSouth Classic at the TPC at Sugarloaf and the Tour Championship at East Lake last year.

Mickelson said that, despite all his success in the past - including 19 PGA Tour victories - he understood that great players were measured by their performance in the majors.

"It would mean a lot to finally break through and win a major, just to prove to myself that it can be done and that all of the hard work that I have put into my game in trying to refine it and minimise the misses and play smarter on difficult tests is paying off," he said.

Mickelson said he was even comfortable with the tag of "best player never to have won a major" - a dubious honour that has rankled many a player in the past.

"I don't see anything negative about it," Mickelson said. "I think it's a very complimentary label. What I would see as being a negative is having not won a major and not even being included among the best players to have not won a major. That is basically saying, 'Gosh, you may never do it.'

"But I'm hoping that my being on that list will be short-lived."

Gifted Spaniard Sergio Garcia is relishing the chance to go one better than the 1999 PGA when he went head-to-head with Woods on the Sunday to finish in second spot.

He will be worth watching. The 21-year-old world No 7 insisted he had never been in fear of Woods.

"I have never been intimidated by him. If I'm playing with Tiger I just get more excited at being in that position. What I enjoy most is playing with the best players in the world."

He said his newly acquired consistency had put him alongside the likes of Woods and David Duval.

"It's not that I didn't feel like I could belong there, but I felt I wasn't consistent enough to belong there. Now I'm more consistent," he said.

"I still have to improve and I still have to learn, but even when I don't play my best golf I'm still able to shoot a decent round and that's what keeps you in the tournament and that's what shows a good player."

Of the other candidates, world Nos 4 and 5, Ernie Els and Vijay Singh, will have their supporters.

Apart from Garcia, the best European candidates should be Darren Clarke and Colin Montgomerie. The world No 8 and No 9 respectively have the form and skill to put out a decent challenge.

Montgomerie, like Mickelson, has the bogey on his back of being a non-major winner and will also have to contend with the kind of boorish crowd behaviour which invariably accompanies his trips to the US.

- AGENCIES