Notebook: Funk, Perry strong, Senior finds success

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The 2010 Champions Tour season is complete.

LAST WEEK

Funk

• After being tied for the lead headed into the final round, the Champions Tour duo of Fred Funk/Kenny Perry finished tied for fifth at last week's Shark Shootout in Naples, Fla. The teammates finished six back of the winning team of Dustin Johnson/Ian Poulter. Tournament host Greg Norman teamed with Matt Kuchar to finish ninth. Mark Calcavecchia paired with Jeff Overton to finish in a tie for 10th.

• David Frost, who won the 3M Championship on the Champions Tour this year, eagled the final hole of the Mauritius Commercial Bank Open on the European Senior Tour to force a playoff with England's Roger Chapman. Frost went on to win on the second extra hole. Chapman will make his debut as a member of the Champions Tour in 2011 after earning conditional status at the Qualifying School last month.

• Australia's Peter Senior won the rain-delayed Australian PGA Championship, beating Geoff Ogilvy with a par on the second playoff hole to become the oldest player to win the Australian PGA Championship. The 51-year-old Senior, a regular on the Champions Tour, now owns three Australian PGA Championship titles. He also won the event in 1989 and 2003. Fellow 51-year-old Australian Peter Fowler finished tied for third.

• 1960 British Open winner Kel Nagle celebrates his 90th birthday on December 21. When Peter Senior won last week, Nagle lost his claim to being the oldest winner of the Australian PGA title. He was 48 when he won the 1968 Australian PGA Championship in Melbourne.

• The House of Representatives recently passed legislation introduced by Congressman Joe Baca (DRialto) that honors and salutes golf legend Juan Antonio "Chi Chi" Rodriguez for his commitment to programs assisting Latino and at-risk youth. The resolution (H. Res. 1430) was approved by the House with a 405 -- 2 vote. Rodriguez was the first Puerto Rican ever to be inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame, and was elected to the World Humanitarian Sports Hall of Fame in 1994.

• Two weeks ago, Tom Lehman finished tied for third at the Torneo de Maestros Copa Presonal in Argentina, a title he won last year.

• Sonny Skinner, who finished tied for 20th at the SAS Championship, one of three Champions Tour starts this year, made a two-putt par on the first playoff hole to win his third PGA Tournament Series event last week.

• PGA TOUR Agronomist Jay Sporl was awarded the 'Employee of the Quarter' during a staff meeting at PGA TOUR headquarters last week. Sporl's dedication to his job saw him spend two months living in South Korea to oversee operations at the Jack Nicklaus Golf Club Korea in preparation for the Posco E&C Songdo Championship, an inaugural event on the Champions Tour in 2010.

COMING UP

• Two of the greatest performers in sports -- Jack Nicklaus and Tom Watson -- will defend their title against fellow World Golf Hall of Fame members and major championship winners at the 24th Ka'anapali Champions Skins Game on Maui, Hawaii at the Royal Ka'anapali Golf Course on Jan. 29-30, 2011. The other teams include Fuzzy Zoeller/Ben Crenshaw, Nick Price/Fred Couples and Bernhard Langer/Mark O'Meara. The Champions Skins Game is the week following the Mitsubishi Electric Championship at Hualalai.

• Frankie Minoza will compete in this week's Philippine Open, making his bid for a third title in the country's premier golf event at the Valley Golf Club in Antipolo. It will be Minoza's final local tournament before the former two-time champion embarks on his first Champions Tour campaign after qualifying by finishing joint second at the q-school in Florida last month.

• Nearly 200 golfers, including Champions Tour professional Dave Eichelberger, will play the Palmer and Fazio courses this week in the Turtle Bay Resort Hawaii State Open. The tournament moved to Turtle Bay last year. It started in the 1920s as the Hawaiian Open.

NUMBERS

• 7,967 -- The number of dollars per round Mark Wiebe earned on the Champions Tour in 2010. Wiebe was the only player to play all 26 events (78 rounds) and finished 29th on the money list with $621,446.

QUOTES TO NOTE

• "I'm going to try out for the Senior Tour. It's actually called the Champions Tour, but I don't feel right calling it that because I'm no champion." -- Joe Tranelli, the down-on-his-luck character played by Ray Romano on the TNT series "Men of a Certain Age", who aspires to play professional golf when he turns 50.

• "I am always trying to follow in Bernhard Langer's footsteps and to see that I have now won an award that he was the first to win back in 1985 is very satisfying indeed. But he is still many steps ahead of me." -- Fellow German Martin Kaymer, after winning the European Tour's Golfer of the Year Award.

• "It's been a long dry spell, so I'm getting a lot of rust of the hinges. You lose the feel for what the body does during the swing. It takes a while to get it back." -- Greg Norman, who has played just three events in the past year.

• "I did consider playing the Champions Tour q-school this year and I will probably go next year. You have to play pretty good and I wasn't playing well enough and my fitness was still a bit dodgy so I was settling for this year and then see where I am at for next year." -- Peter Fowler, 51-year-old former Australian Open winner, who finished tied for third at the Australian PGA Championship last week.

• "I go to bed early and I wake up at 2 a.m. and all I think about is body position. Then I'll doze for a while but my mind is always going over my golf game which, to me, shows me I'm still interested in playing well." -- Peter Senior explains his passion for the game of golf.

• "The older you get the more you treasure them (victories)." -- Peter Senior, 51-year-old winner of the Australian PGA Championship last week.

• "That was phenomenal. That seven holes was as good a quality as you'll ever see. It was all just pure golf and really fun to watch." -- Fred Funk, referring to Kenny Perry's seven-hole stretch to begin the second round of last week's Shark Shootout. Perry birdied the first six holes before missing a four-foot putt for birdie at the seventh hole.