Notes: Cochran fourth multiple winner this year

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The Champions Tour heads to Conover, N.C., for the Ensure Classic at Rock Barn. The tournament is the 22nd of 26 Charles Schwab Cup events and carries a purse of $1.75 million with $262,500 and 263 Charles Schwab Cup points going to the winner. Last year, Jay Haas birdied five of the last six holes, posting a tournament-record 198, and a two-stroke win over Andy Bean and Russ Cochran.

LAST WEEK

• Russ Cochran won his second career title on the Champions Tour at the SAS Championship and joined Bernhard Langer (5), Fred Couples (3) and Nick Price (2) as the fourth multiple winner this year.

• Cochran joined Couples and Langer as the third player to win consecutive Champions Tour titles in 2010.

• Cochran earned 315 Charles Schwab Cup points, moving from seventh to sixth on the standings. Langer, the 2010 Schwab Cup leader, finished T4 at the Ensure Classic and earned 151 points. Couples, Langer's closest pursuer, finished outside the top-10. Langer now has 2,888 Schwab Cup points this season and leads Couples by 672 points in the season-long race.

• Tom Pernice Jr.'s runner-up finish at the SAS Championship was the best effort by a defending champion this year on the Champions Tour. It was also his seventh straight top-10 performance.

• Keith Fergus holed a 3-iron second shot from 210 yards at the par-5 17th hole during round two of the SAS Championship for the first double-eagle of the year on the Champions Tour.

• Tom Lehman, a champion throughout his nearly 30-year professional career -- on the Nationwide Tour, PGA TOUR and Champions Tour -- and an advocate for several charitable causes, was named the 2010 winner of the Payne Stewart Award.

• Administaff Small Business Classic defending champion John Cook, along with University of Houston graduates Bruce Lietzke and Keith Fergus, joined tournament guests and several members of the media to compete in a unique $10,000 skins match which benefited three local charities.

• Six-time Champions Tour winner Dave Eichelberger shot his age (67) last Wednesday to win the Aloha Section PGA Professional Championship as well as a spot in the 2011 Sony Open in Hawaii, the first full-field PGA TOUR event of next season. Eichelberger, who posted 73-67 140 for a one-stroke win, last played the Sony Open when he was 60, after Monday qualifying.

COMING UP

• The 2010 Ensure Classic at Rock Barn will include 11 players with major championship victories on their career resumes. That group includes Couples, Hale Irwin, Langer, Tom Kite, Hal Sutton, Bob Tway, Larry Nelson, Larry Mize, Price, Scott Simpson and Mark O'Meara. In addition, the field includes four World Golf Hall of Fame members -- Irwin, Kite, Nelson and Price.

• With the Ryder Cup being staged in Wales this week, the Ensure Classic field is made up of almost 25 percent of former Ryder Cup representatives. Four players in the field served as captains (Tom Kite/1997 and Hal Sutton/2004 for the U.S.; Mark James/1999 and Bernhard Langer/2004 for Europe).

• Tom Byrum, the winner of the 1989 Kemper Open, will make his Champions Tour debut at the Ensure Classic at Rock Barn, playing on a sponsor's exemption. Byrum, who turns 50 on Tuesday, Sept. 28, spent over 20 years on the PGA TOUR, earning over $6.5 million. His older brother, Curt, will be serving as a Golf Channel analyst for the tournament telecast.

• Mark Carnevale, the 1992 PGA TOUR Rookie of the Year, will play on a sponsor's exemption at the Ensure Classic at Rock Barn. Carnevale was the former tournament director of this event before working as an analyst for the PGA TOUR Sirius XM Network.

• John Cook, Mike Goodes and Mark Wiebe are the only players to have competed in all 21 previous Champions Tour events this year. Goodes and Wiebe are scheduled to continue the streak at the Ensure Classic.

• Bob Gilder will be making his 166th consecutive appearance in events he's been eligible for on the Champions Tour when he tees it up at the Ensure Classic at Rock Barn. The last time Gilder missed a tournament for which he's been eligible was at this event in 2004.

• The Great Grand Champions Pro-Am begins with a breakfast for fans and golfers at 8:45 a.m. on Wednesday at the Ensure Classic at Rock Barn. Bob Goalby will serve as the master of ceremonies and introduce each of the other Great Grand Champions.

• The top four individual finishers in the Greater Hickory High School Classic on Monday will play in the Dale Jarrett Shootout the next day at the Ensure Classic. Each high school golfer will be paired with a Champions Tour professional, a sports celebrity and a tournament VIP for the Dale Jarrett Shootout. Some of NASCAR's biggest stars will compete in the nine-hole shootout, including Dale Jarrett, Kevin Harvick, Elliott Sadler and Kyle Petty.

• The Mike Goodes and Friends Charity Classic Pro-Am takes place Monday, Sept. 27, at the Bryan Park GC & Conference Center in Greensboro, N.C. Corporate sponsors have signed on to help the Triad Youth Golf Foundation's initiative to support youth golf development in the community. Goodes will be joined by seven fellow Champions Tour professionals at the event.

ON THIS DATE

9/27/97 -- Isao Aoki sets a new Champions Tour scoring record when he shoots a 10-under-par 60 in the 2nd round at the Emerald Coast Classic.

9/28/03 -- Craig Stadler starts the final round two strokes behind Larry Nelson but makes birdies on five of the first seven holes to claim the Greater Hickory Classic at Rock Barn by two over Nelson.

9/29/91 -- Captain Dave Stockton leads the United States team to a 14 ˝ to 13 ˝ victory in the Ryder Cup at Kiawah Island.

9/29/91 -- Lanny Wadkins helps lead the U.S. Ryder Cup team to a victory over the European squad at Kiawah Island (S.C.). Wadkins posts a 3-1 mark in competition.

QUOTES TO NOTE

"So I'm still learning how to win right now, and hopefully I can use this and go on. And I think it's a great, kind of, testament to the level of my game right now, but I still have a lot of work to do on closing these golf tournaments out and playing better down the stretch" -- Cochran, on posting back-to-back victories after going winless for 19 years.

"I never heard of those guys" -- Cochran, on being told he joins Langer, Couples and Price as the fourth multiple winner on the Champions Tour this year.

"You look toward this date and hope you can achieve it. Just get into the field. You look forward to that for a long time" -- Sonny Skinner, who turned 50 on August 18 and made his Champions Tour debut at the SAS Championship after successfully negotiating pre-qualifying (67) and Monday qualifying (65) rounds. Skinner finished T20.

"Last time I won was a senior tour event. Other than Spring Club Day at Waialae, that's about the last thing I won" -- Eichelberger, after winning the Aloha Section PGA Professional Championship as well as a spot in the 2011 Sony Open in Hawaii.

"We have a major left, and then the Schwab Cup tournament itself counts double, so there's still a lot to play for, so I need to continue to play well. But it's, you know, certainly one of my goals to win it" -- Langer, who leads the Charles Schwab Cup points race, chimes in on the remaining 2010 Champions Tour schedule.

"I think it's a strong team. They're playing at home, so to me they're favorites. If I was a betting man, I would put money on them" -- Langer, on the European Ryder Cup team.

"Now my theory is, I'm a Champions Tour player. I'm way better off out here" -- Couples, after playing on both the PGA TOUR and the Champions Tour this year.