Notebook: Langer continues to lead Charles Schwab race

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The Champions Tour is idle this week after its first official event in Korea. Next week, Tom Pernice Jr. will defend his title at the SAS Championship at Prestonwood CC in Cary, N.C.

LAST WEEK

• Russ Cochran birdied the first sudden-death playoff hole to defeat Fred Funk and capture the inaugural Posco E&C Songdo Championship presented by Gale International. Funk missed a 3-foot putt for victory on the final hole of regulation. Tom Pernice Jr. finished third.

• Cochran earned his first Champions Tour victory and the first by a left-hander on the Champions Tour since Bob Charles at the 1996 Hyatt Regency Maui Kaanapali Classic.

• Cochran's win came in his 405th start since his last win in a PGA TOUR event at the 1991 Western Open. That stretch included 342 starts on the PGA TOUR, 28 on the Nationwide Tour and 34 on the Champions Tour. It was 19 years, 2 months and 5 days since his victory in Illinois. One week earlier, Ted Schulz won the Home Care & Hospice First Tee Open at Pebble Beach ending a drought of 19 years, 6 months and 12 days. Schulz had played in 181 PGA TOUR events since his last triumph at the 1991 Nissan Los Angeles Open.

• Bernhard Langer continues to lead the Charles Schwab Cup race with 2,791 points. Fred Couples is second with 2,216 points followed by Funk with 1,513 points. Tom Lehman (1,420) and Nick Price (1,246) are fourth and fifth, respectively. Cochran (1,037) advanced 10 spots from 17th to seventh.

• Langer (T42) shot 80 in the final round of the Songdo Championship, marking his highest score in 192 total starts on the Champions Tour. Langer's previous high score was 76 (four times).

• Did you know? -- In 2009, Langer played 62 official rounds on the Champions Tour and his high score was 73, which he posted seven times that year.

• Only four players posted three consecutive sub-par rounds at the Posco E&C Songdo Championship -- Funk, Michael Allen, D.A. Weibring and Sandy Lyle. Funk was the only one to record three consecutive rounds in the 60s.

• Korea was a venue for several players to make a mark:
- Cochran posted his first win.
- Lyle finished T10 for his first individual top-10 in 45 career starts (Lyle shared a third-place finish with teammate Ian Woosnam at the 2008 Liberty Mutual Legends of Golf).
- Weibring (T4) had his best showing since winning the 2008 Constellation Energy Senior Players Championship.
- Joe Ozaki (T4) earned his career-best Champions Tour check of $167,500.

• It was the second time Pernice Jr. (3rd) and Mark Calcavecchia (6th) competed in a PGA TOUR sanctioned event in Korea. In 2004, the pair contested the Shinhan Korea Golf Championship, a Challenge Series event won by Arron Oberholser, where Calcavecchia finished T17 and Pernice, T23.

• Pernice Jr. has six consecutive top-10 finishes on the Champions Tour this season.

• Craig Stadler finished T14 in his final start of the 2010 campaign prior to undergoing hip replacement surgery.

• Sang-Ho Choi was the only one of four South Korean players in the tournament to post a sub-par round (71/Round 3). Choi has the most career wins on the Korean Tour with 43.

COMING UP

• Pernice, Jr. will have a quick turnaround when he returns from South Korea before heading to Cary, NC for the SAS Championship Media Day on Monday, September 13. Pernice won the 2009 event at Prestonwood CC in his Champions Tour debut, the 15th player in Champions Tour history to do so.

• Langer, Fred Couples and Funk, 1, 2 and 3 on the Charles Schwab Cup standings, are scheduled to play the next two Champions Tour events -- the SAS Championship and the Ensure Classic at Rock Barn.

• When Pernice Jr. posted a birdie-birdie-birdie-eagle (5-under) streak during the third round of the 2010 Home Care & Hospice First Tee Open at Pebble Beach, he became the fourth "Tom" to do so this season. Tom Lehman (Mitsubishi Electric Championship at Hualalai), Tommy Armour III (The ACE Group Classic) and Tom Watson (Toshiba Classic) are the other three players.

• Two players are tied for the lead in the Champions Tour Pick 'Em Challenge with 641 points -- golfindonesia and kcan120. Visit www.championstourchallenge.com to participate.

ON THIS DATE

9/13/02 -- Bruce Fleisher ties the all-time Champions Tour scoring record with a 10-under-par 60 in the opening round of the RJR Championship in North Carolina.

9/13/98 -- Hale Irwin posts his 19th consecutive top-5 finish, a new Champions Tour record when he finishes T5 at the 1998 Comfort Classic.

9/15/02 -- Bruce Fleisher shoots rounds of 60-64-67 and sets a Champions Tour scoring record of 19-under-par 191 and earns a five-stroke victory at the RJR Championship in North Carolina. His 36-hole score of 124 is the best 36-hole total in Champions Tour history.

QUOTES TO NOTE

"The greens here have a little bit of movement in them, a little bit of spice" -- Jack Nicklaus, designer of the Jack Nicklaus Golf Club Korea, venue for the Posco E&C Songdo Championship.

"We have many players from this part of the world that are actually starting to play very, very well on the world circuit. We're going to see the growth of the game and I think the Olympics have a lot to do with that" -- Nicklaus on the growth of the game in Asia.

"It's always good to come to an exciting new country that's thrilled about having golf" -- Mark O'Meara shares his thoughts on his first visit to South Korea.

"It was my tournament to win" -- Funk, after missing a 3-foot putt for victory on the final hole of the Songdo Championship, then losing to Russ Cochran on the first hole of sudden-death.