Champions, LPGA skins games on tap
By Ann Miller
Advertiser Staff Writer
Next weekend, the ConAgra Foods Champions Skins Game (formerly Senior Skins Game) and the ConAgra Foods LPGA Skins Game will be at Wailea's Gold Course on Maui. Both have a $600,000 purse.
The Champions field will be Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus, Lee Trevino and defending champion Hale Irwin. They tee off at 9:45 a.m. on Jan. 25.
Annika Sorenstam, Karrie Webb, Laura Diaz and Laura Davies are in the LPGA event, which begins at 8:30 a.m. on Jan. 26. The starting time was moved earlier to avoid a conflict with the Super Bowl, which begins at approximately 1:15 p.m. in Hawai'i.
Davies won the last LPGA Skins Game in 1998. The LPGA played its Women's Kemper Open at Wailea's Blue Course from 1990-92.
Skins promotions benefitting the Hawai'i State Women's Golf Foundation will be held this weekend on Maui.
On Saturday, junior golfer Michelle Wie will make an appearance at the Queen Ka'ahumanu Center. A putting contest will be held from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. that day and also Sunday at The Shops at Wailea.
Tickets for the Skins Games are $25 each day. Tickets for the Jan. 24 Pro-Am, which features all eight players, are $10. Children 12-under are free with a ticketed adult. Advance tickets are available at Wailea Golf Club and other sites on Maui. They can also be purchased online (SkinsGamesSeries.com).
For more information, call (800) 332-1614.
The Champions Tour opens its season the following week (Jan. 31-Feb. 2) with the MasterCard Championship at Hualalai Golf Club on the Big Island. Tom Kite is defending champion. Advance tickets are on sale at (800) 417-2770.
New season of 'Golf Hawai'i'
A new season of "Golf Hawai'i" television shows, with Kapalua's Mark Rolfing, starts Tuesday on The Golf Channel.
Rolfing interviews Davis Love III in the first show. Love talks candidly about his evolving career goals and how he can compete with the younger players on Tour.
Other segments of the half-hour program include a golf tip, addressing the Chip Shot by Johnny Miller and a feature on the Wailea Resort.
In "My View," Rolfing talks about Tiger Wood's absence from the Mercedes Championships because of arthroscopic surgery on his knee, and what a two-month hiatus will do for him.
