Champions tee off '08 in Hawaii

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• The Champions Tour kicks off its season this week with the MasterCard Championship at Hualalai. While it's the first event of the year for most everyone else, Fred Funk has already got two tournaments in Hawaii under his belt. Funk finished tied for 25th at the Mercedes-Benz Championship and tied for 10th at the Sony Open in Hawaii on the PGA TOUR the past two weeks.

Hale Irwin at last year's MasterCard Championship (Ferrey/GettyImages)

• Hale Irwin is the defending champ at the MasterCard Championship at Hualalai after breezing to a five-stroke victory last year. Substantial margins of victory are nothing new to Irwin. He's won 12 of his career titles on the Champions Tour by four strokes or more and 10 by five or more.

• Only two players in Champions Tour history have won the same event 10 years apart. Both Hale Irwin and the late George Archer have accomplished the feat?both at the MasterCard Championship at Hualalai. Archer won in 1990 and 2000 and Irwin won in 1997 and 2007.

• Seven players have claimed the MasterCard Championship at Hualalai in their first attempt. Loren Roberts (2006) was the last to do so. The others are Orville Moody (1984), Peter Thomson (1985), Dave Hill (1988), George Archer (1990), John Bland (1996) and John Jacobs (1999).

• There have only been three playoffs in tournament history, and the 2005 overtime session between Tom Watson and Dana Quigley is the only one at Hualalai. The first playoff was in 1987, when Don January bested Butch Baird with a birdie on the fourth extra hole. The second playoff came in 1995 when Jim Colbert birdied the third extra hole to defeat Jim Albus.

• Bob Gilder starts the 2008 Champions Tour season with a streak of 93 consecutive starts, the longest current streak. The last event Gilder missed was the 2004 Greater Hickory Classic at Rock Barn. Dana Quigley holds the all-time record for consecutive events played, with 264.