Aronimink

And just like that, the rains finally stopped, the skies cleared a little, the small committee of worried tournament volunteers stopped secretly building an ark, and the 64th Senior PGA Championship got under way yesterday. It was a beautiful thing. "Biggest attendance for a Thursday in the history of the Senior PGA," said tournament director Jason Soucy, who had worried that iffy weather might prompt many fans to blow off the first day. Not that it will matter in the grand scheme of things, but the lead after the first round was shared by a trio of mudders who slopped it around the Aronimink track at 68, 2-under par: John Jacobs, Bobby Wadkins and Florida club pro Mike San Filippo.

David Trainor of Aronimink Golf Club finished first with 3-over-par, 36- hole score of 75-70-145 in the USGA Junior Boys' Championship qualifying tournament yesterday at Laurel Creek Country Club in Moorestown. Two others qualified for the national junior championship, to be played July 27-31 at Waverly Country Club in Portland, Ore. They were Craig Cochran of Merion and Gregory Kelbon of Indian Hills in New Jersey, each at 146. PGA PRO-AMATEUR The Bent Creek Country Club team of Brett Upper, a former tour player, and Dan Burton shot a better-ball 8-under-par 64 to win the $9,925 Ping Pro- Amateur Championship of the Philadelphia PGA at Cedarbrook Country Club.

For Jim Furyk, the last six weeks have been strange and unusual. If you throw out his injury-plagued 2004 season, Furyk has missed a total of 18 cuts from 2003 through 2010. That's just 10.6 percent of the 170 tournaments in which he has competed during that time, or an average of 2.57 per season. But the West Chester-born Furyk, the reigning PGA Tour player of the year, hasn't been anywhere near that pace recently. Entering this week's AT&T National at Aronimink, Furyk has three straight missed cuts, and four in his last five tournaments, astounding numbers for a man who has built a record of consistency over the years.

Here is the TV schedule for the AT&T National at Aronimink for Sunday. Sunday: noon-2:30 p.m. 9:30-11:30 p.m. (CBS replay). The team: Terry Gannon, play-by-play; Nick Faldo, analyst; Peter Oosterhuis, tower; David Feherty, tower; Matt Gogel, on-course reporter; Steve Sands, interviews. Sunday: 2-6:30 p.m. The team: Jim Nantz, anchor; Nick Faldo, lead analyst; Ian Baker-Finch, 17th hole, and Gary McCord, 16th hole; David Feherty and Peter Kostis, on-course reporters.

The Hopewell Valley (N.J.) Country Club pair of Mary Liz Cahill and Hope Dugenske won the women's Aronimink Golf Club Invitational handicap tournament with a net score of 79-18-61 in better-ball competition yesterday. Philadelphia Country Club's Kerry Rutan and Maripeg Bruder won low gross with a 3-over-par 77. PGA PRO-MEN'S TEAM Doylestown assistant pro Frank Abbott partnered with Andy Sivak, Tom Kardish and Jay Ewing to win the $7,225 Philadelphia PGA Pro-Men's Team Championship on the third hole of a playoff at St. Davids Golf Club.

When Aronimink Golf Club decided not to host the 1993 PGA Championship, the Philadelphia region may have lost more than a major golf tournament and the $30 million in revenues the week-long event could generate. Philadelphia now may find itself harder pressed to lure back professional golf, either for special occasions or for an annual PGA tour stop. "Obviously, there's a sizable economic loss," David Brenner, head of the Philadelphia Sports Congress, said yesterday. Brenner and his agency in 1988 helped Aronimink secure the '93 event from the PGA of America, sponsor of the PGA Championship, one of golf's four major tournaments.

The PGA of America announced yesterday that its next four PGA Championship hosts had agreed to consider its new policy regarding minority membership. John Brooks, general counsel and board member at Aronimink, which will host the 1993 tournament, said last evening that the Newtown Square club had not agreed to comply with a PGA of America policy, announced Wednesday, that clubs chosen to host the championship from 1995 on will have blacks and women as full members. But he said that the club, which has no black members, would look into the issue.

Mark Murdock was tempted to pinch himself to make sure it wasn't all a dream. The 42-year-old native of Houston was still having a hard time believing he'd just gotten a fist bump from Tiger Woods after his shot out of a bunker on the No. 2 hole Wednesday at Aronimink dropped into the cup. "I was still trying to get oxygen in my lungs from being so nervous as we started," Murdock said. "I didn't think it could get much better than that. " Murdock was in Woods' foursome at the AT&T National Pro-Am and, for the amateur golfer, it was the thrill of a lifetime.

After a breakthrough season last year, Webb Simpson finally appears to be comfortable playing on the PGA Tour. And that's not necessarily a good thing. The way the 26-year-old North Carolina native figures it, sharper golf comes from not being comfortable, from having to overcome nerves in a tough situation. "I think as an athlete, you're so used to feeling nerves and performing under pressure," Simpson said this week in advance of his trip Monday to Aronimink Golf Club in Newtown Square for an outing with Chase Sapphire card members.

Philadelphia Section PGA McQUISTON SR. PRO-JR. PRO At Bala; par 66. Don DeAngelis, LuLu; John Appleget, Wildwood. . . 62 Al Balukas, Edgmont; John Allen, Linfield. . . 63 George Forster, Radnor Valley; George Forster Jr., Merion. . . 63 Don Allan, Woodcrest; Fran Mulholland, Atlantic City. . . 65 Frank Palumbo, Rolling Green; Eric Figueroa, McCall. . . 66 Tony Perla, Bellewood; Tony R. Perla, Radnor Valley. . . 66 Rick Flesher, Lederach; Mike Tobiason, Applecross.

SO, WHERE TO NOW? The curtain closed on the second and last AT&T National at Newtown Square's Aronimink Golf Club Sunday afternoon, with Nick Watney - the highest-ranked player entered in the field, at No. 15 on the planet - staving off a late surge by K.J. Choi (the next-highest, at 16) to claim a two-stroke victory. Next summer the event will head back to its original home, Congressional Country Club outside of the nation's capitol, which took a 2-year hiatus while it hosted the U.S. Open.

With Nick Watney going bogey-free in Sunday's final round on his way to victory in the AT&T National, he stayed a little too far ahead of Charles Howell III for Howell to challenge him during the final 18. But Howell also went the entire way without a bogey and found a nice prize at the end - a trip to the British Open. Howell's 66 put him in a three-way tie for third at 9-under 271, 4 shots behind Watney. Under rules set by the Royal & Ancient Golf Club, which administers the Open Championship, a player who finishes in the top five at the AT&T National and is not previously eligible receives an invitation.

Nick Watney remembers the day nearly 11 months ago when he couldn't finish the deal at the PGA Championship, and has managed to use those memories as guidance for when he enters the pressure-cooker of being in the final group with the lead at a PGA Tour event. Watney found himself in that spot Sunday in the AT&T National and handled himself beautifully. The 30-year-old from Las Vegas went without a bogey the entire day at challenging Aronimink Golf Club and carded a 4-under-par 66 to hold off K.J. Choi, capture his second win of the season, and take over the lead on both the tour's money list and in its FedEx Cup race.

As Rickie Fowler sized up a 6-foot birdie putt on the par-5 ninth, a young fan pulled out his cellphone real quick to take a picture. Trying his best to look like Fowler with his matching bright orange Puma shirt and hat, he looked on, hopeful, as Fowler's putt hugged the right side of the hole and barely rimmed out. Disappointment shook the boy's head back and forth, as he looked at the ground. Nick Watney had, moments earlier, hit a picture-perfect shot from a sand trap to set up a three-foot birdie attempt.

Even at 22, Rickie Fowler has become accustomed to playing in front of large crowds, training that started with his two appearances on the U.S. Walker Cup team, including the 2009 competition at Merion Golf Club. After shooting a 6-under-par 64 Saturday that moved him into a tie for the 54-hole lead with Nick Watney in the AT&T National, Fowler said he has said hello at Aronimink to three caddies who worked for the U.S. side at Merion, and appreciated the support he has received from people who saw him compete there.

There was blood on the course at Aronimink on Saturday, with red numbers bleeding down the leader board of the AT&T National until the records of the grand old track lay in ruins. Rickie Fowler, the coleader after three rounds, shot a 6-under-par 64 on Saturday. Had he done so on Friday, he would have tied the course record. As it was on this turkey shoot of an afternoon, his score was only tied for the fourth best of the day. Fowler and Nick Watney are locked up for the lead at 9 under entering Sunday's final round.

Justin Leonard just turned 39 last month. He has won a dozen times on the PGA Tour. In 1997, he lifted the claret jug at Royal Troon. Two years later, he drained the most memorable putt in Ryder Cup history to cap the greatest comeback ever in that event. So the game has been good to him. But it can also be cruel. In his last 43 tournaments, he's had a single top 10, none this season. He has missed the cut in seven of his last 10 starts. But there he was yesterday at Aronimink, going around in 3-under-par 67 to grab a share of the second spot through 36 holes of the AT&T National, two shots off the lead.

This is the way it's going these days for Jim Furyk. He began the second round of the AT&T National seeking a subpar number to make the 36-hole cut, but his drive on his first hole - the treacherous 10th at Aronimink Golf Club - came up against a root in the left rough that he did not see. He skulled his second shot across the fairway and wound up with double bogey. And that was pretty much it for the West Chester native. He finished with a 71 for an 8-over 148 total and his fourth consecutive missed cut on the PGA Tour this season.