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PGA CHAMPIONSHIPAugust 10, 2005Jim AwtreyRoger WarrenSPRINGFIELD, NEW JERSEY
JULIUS MASON: Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the PGA of America's annual State of the Association news conference. This is our annual opportunity to share some news of our association with you and for you to have an opportunity to speak with the PGA of America President and CEO.
Sharing this information with you today is Roger Warren, the President of the PGA of America, and Jim Awtrey, the CEO of the PGA of America. There are also some national officers joining us. First, I'd like to introduce the PGA of America vice president, Brian Whitcomb, who I saw out there someplace, and PGA of America secretary Jim Remy, and honorary president, M.G. Orender, I believe I saw on the back row over there as well.
At this time, ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to turn the Mike over to Mr. Roger Warren. ROGER WARREN: Thank you, Julius. It's an honor to be here today. The mission of the PGA of America since 1916 has been to grow the game of golf, grow participation and raise the standards of our profession. We are proud of the efforts of our association as we continue to work in that direction. One of the examples of that mission has been Play Golf America, our grow the game activity and program that we have generated for adults around the country, and we are very proud, and we'll talk later about what that program is doing and the kind of success that it's having. What I'd like to do now is just set up, we have done some new public service announcements relative to Play Golf America, and we'd like to roll those videos right now to see where we're going with our PSAs. (Video played). ROGER WARREN: These PSAs are used to draw attention to the PlayGolfAmerica.com, the Web site location where we can send people who are interested in getting involved in the game, PlayGolfAmerica.com, then they put their zip code in and it allows them to see where a program in their area is that they can register for and get involved in the game. There are almost 600 of these spots that we run this year and they will have about 832 million TV impressions about Play Golf America. This week there will be 94 PSAs that our partners at CBS, TNT, the Golf Channel and ESPN Classic will run at about a $4.3 million value. This year so far we have over 4,800 facilities registered for Play Golf America with 4,400 programs registered in those facilities. We had an extremely successful free lesson month this year in conjunction with Golf Digest, Golf For Women, The Golf Channel and Nike Golf. We had about 6,900 golf professionals that gave ten minute free lessons this year, and that's 32 percent more than the previous years, and those golf professionals gave 122,000 free lessons that averaged 18 minutes a lesson with a golf professional. We also have had 13 Play Golf America days that were held in April, and we had over 9,000 people attend those Play Golf America days in those different locations, and we were very excited to have a Play Golf America day here at Hyatt Hills Golf Complex on Monday, where we had over 500 people participate. We had 30 golf professionals from the New Jersey and Met section there giving free lessons, and it was a great day and a great way to expose this area to Play Golf America and the program and to get more adults playing the game. We also were very fortunate here as we have done in the past to have a Community Relations Program, and our Community Relations Program has, since 2000, we've had 600 charities that have been involved in our Community Relations Program in association with the PGA Championship, and we have generated funds and credentials to those 6,000 charities in excess of $12 million and giving back to the communities where the PGA Championship is. This year we have 240 charities involved with our community relations outreach worth about $750,000 in support. Moving on, this September, we will be initiating our PGA Golf Professional Hall of Fame on September 8, and we will be initiating into that Hall of Fame 122 golf professionals in various categories. It will be done at our historic center down at Port St. Lucie, the area where commemorating the game, our championships and PGA members and this year our special inductees into our Hall of Fame will be our honorary president M.G. Orender and Craig Harmon, our 2004 golf professionals of the year. It's always my pleasure as president tonight to present the Distinguished Award Winner, Wally Uihlein of Acushnet Company. This will be held at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center in Newark, and we are really looking forward to the opportunity to present this award. He embodies all of the characteristics we've established with this award. It will be an exciting evening, and we are expecting 1,200 to 1,400 people to be there tonight and we encourage people to be there. The PGA Championship, as an asset of the PGA of America, one of the items it allows us to generate the funds to drive our programming for the PGA of America, to drive the program for our members for education, for employment, for programs like Play Golf America. Well, we are very proud of the programs like that, and we're certainly proud of the PGA Championship and what it means for the championship golf situation. We are also very proud to be here at Baltusrol and what it represents in the lexicon of championship golf courses. We look forward to a great week and a great championship, and we know that the PGA Championship will produce another great champion. Thank you, Julius. JULIUS MASON: Thank you very much, Roger. JIM AWTREY: Good morning. You know, we looked back at New Jersey and the PGA Championship. First time we had been to New Jersey since 1942 at Seaview Country Club in Atlantic City. It's the first time I've actually felt young since that was the year before I was born. Every one of these other ones, I'm getting to feel like I'm an old timer. Sam Snead won that championship, and that gives us a perspective on the rich history of the Championship and particularly in those years where you're talking about match play. Today, 63 years to be back in New Jersey at Baltusrol and the first PGA Championship to ever be played at Baltusrol; many of you in the room have been around long enough to remember a strategic objective to try to go to the great old golf courses and traditional and mix in a blend of the new generation of golf courses like we did last year at Whistling Straits. Certainly Baltusrol fits the mold of testing the greatest players in the world, the highest percentage of the Top 100 players in the world, it tests those players. The rich history of this club, 100 years, and all of the major championships held are consistent with what we believe the PGA Championship is all about. This year we play the golf course at just under 7,400 yards and a par 70, and we may actually have a par 5 that the players won't reach in two; I said may, the 650 yard par 5, 17th hole. So if you look at the history of Baltusrol, you've added 400 yards to the golf course over the years, but still, some of the players, they have added a lot of yardage to their game through the years. I think it's always interesting to go back to these golf courses who have hosted so many major events and compare the modern day player and the scoring and how they play the holes to the way that the piece of history did when you go back. Certainly when you talk about that history, and as I said before, our goal is to get the highest percentage we can of the Top 100 players of the world. We believe that's 100%. So we strive to get that. This year, we've got 93 world ranked players, including 62 international players representing 21 countries. That's the most ever in a U.S. major, and it certainly sets a record for us. And people often ask me, how do you define the PGA Championship? And I think when you look at that, I think you define it as the world championship of professional golf, with a strong field representing the tremendous growth of golf around the world. The fact that the championship continues to reach out to try to get as many of those players around the world into the championship certainly is what the PGA Championship today is all about. We also maintain that piece of history that goes back to when the game was played by club professionals and touring professionals were one and the same, back in an era where they could not make enough money playing full full time professional golf and needed a job. It's nice today, you can look back. Today we maintain that touch of history and tradition with the club professionals. We have 25 of our finest club professional players participating in the field. They all qualified recently through our Club Professional Championship, our 38th PGA Club Professional Championship, played at Kiawah Island, South Carolina. Mike Small of Savoy, Illinois, won the event with a final round 69, 3 under par, and 72 hole total of 1 over par 289. Those of you who know how well Kerry sets up golf courses, that's what we try to do is have a tough golf course, prepare our players to compete against the best players in the world, and certainly Mike had to win on a tough golf course to get here. One of the unique things about the championship that we started a few years ago I remember was the playoff system. We went away from sudden death to a three hole playoff system, and this year we'll continue that. If there needs to be a playoff, it will be on hole Nos. 4, 5 and 18. So you're starting on the par 3, it's a signature hole, we think that will be an exciting three hole playoff if that becomes necessary. Certainly the PGA Championship and excitement, we talked about the global aspect of the field, but we also have a global aspect of the TV audience. We'll have U.S. viewers watching 27 hours of Championship coverage on CBS and TNT, and millions of viewers in more than 195 countries and territories around the world with a household reach of 550 million. And certainly, we always say, we're bring the world to your doorstep when you have a PGA Championship. We also go into these communities, and particularly you're looking here, Baltusrol never hosted a PGA. It's been 63 years since a PGA has been in New Jersey. We take the traveling display, the gifts of history of the Championship, and we set that into the community to try to point people with what's coming to town. This year the PGA Championship exhibit which is going on now, the history of The Season's Final Major, is on display at the New Jersey Center for Visual Arts in Summit, so that's a part of our ongoing effort to tell the story. The collection gives a sense of history going from match play, all the way through stroke play, Tiger Woods, Vijay Singh, certainly would focus on Jack Nicklaus, honored this morning, who was a five time PGA Champion. When you have to talk about the championship, you look at other significant things. The last major of the year, we talk about Glory's Last Shot, but it also talks about the finals, the Player of the Year, the Vardon Trophy. Certainly if you look at this year, Tiger Woods has a commanding lead in the Player of the Year race and certainly is in control of his own destiny as he looks to the Vardon Trophy. The PGA Championship will also be the final qualifier for the Grand Slam of Golf, where we bring the four major winners together in Hawaii at Poipu Bay later in the year. Tiger Woods, a two time major winner this year, will be participating along with Michael Campbell and an alternate rounded out, which will be a former major winner with the best average in the four majors this year. It's an exciting week, a wonderful golf course, another piece of rich history for the Championship, and we hope you enjoy the week and it's a special week for everyone. JULIUS MASON: Jim, Roger, thank you very much. Ladies and gentlemen, the floor is open to you. Q. Can you just detail the philosophy and process behind deciding to trim the number of club professionals in the PGA Championship from 25 to 15 and just give us a little insight on how that decision was made and why the decision was made? . JIM AWTREY: Well, when you look at trying to get the strongest field, and you look at the international players, what we do is we try to make sure we get as many of the Top 100 players as we can. We also have former champions, we try to get a strong field of the American tour, the PGA TOUR, so we are exempting the Top 70. It's a mathematical formula that says when you're unable to maintain that, then you have to look at the areas to add to the field, and when you look at the competitive aspect of it, we end up at the club professionals. I think Roger can give you a background on the fact that the PGA leadership takes that very seriously and they do a nice job of monitoring that, because obviously it's not something anyone enjoys. Roger? ROGER WARREN: Thanks, Jim. It is such an important tradition to this event to have PGA club professionals there. We have to balance that tradition against what it takes to continue to make this field the most competitive possible, and the board of directors takes it very serious as we evaluate that. The staff brings us that evaluation on a regular basis and we look at it. This particular year, we decided to reduce next year the club of PGA golf professionals in the event from 25 to 20 and we will continue to evaluate it and use those two criteria as we go forward, and we still will continue to say that it is an important part of this event for the tradition of the event to have PGA club professionals in the event, and we intend to continue that. Q. What is the status of the search for Jim's successor and when might we expect an announcement on that? ROGER WARREN: I anticipated that question. We are still in the search process for a CEO. As we have talked about from the beginning, we always intended to try to have a target of our annual meeting this year in November to have that person selected. The search process is ongoing. We would still use that as a target time, and as we get to the point that we are ready to announce our CEO, we will make that announcement. Q. Roger or Jim, could you talk about the thinking that went into the choice of the three playoff holes here? This is a little different than what you normally get, usually 18/10. JIM AWTREY: What we did is you look at the proximity to get the players from 18 to the scoring tent and back out so that you don't delay obviously for television as well as the gallery that's there. Kerry is outstanding at this, so when you look at finishing 18, to go to the scoring tent, you merely go right down the hill, you have a wonderful par 3 that's a signature hole and then you play up, and then come right down 18, so it just flows. What we do is we look for that flow. It's no secret; when you find it, you bring it right back to the clubhouse. So I think it's a little different, but you go out and look at it, it fits. Q. Jim might be the best person to address this. You guys announced 7,500 yards, we hear that everywhere we go for distance of a championship course. When does this end and what does this mean to championship golf, the distances we are seeing? JIM AWTREY: Well, I think going back with the tees ends when the ball quits going so far forwards. What it is we're doing is we're trying to get the relative test of the players, that's both off the tee it's no secret any major championship tests your ability to drive the ball in the fairway, tests your ability to play irons into the green into the right spot, and certainly putting. Now today, my personal belief is what's changing the game as much is the driver is how far players hit the irons. So if you take a player that will take a 5 iron and hits it 220, 225 yards to averaging 280 off the tee, you add those two up and that's a long par 4. So I think you'll see it go back, as long as the golf courses can accept it, because the shot into the green is the same relative shot that it was in years past. So I think that's what's driving this. You don't see the players when you say 7,500 yard par 70, I don't think you see the players panicked over how long the golf course is. They may talk about the rough, they may talk about the fact the doglegs, they say it would be easier for us, if what? If the fairways are soft, it's easier for us. If the fairways are soft, the golf course plays longer, so they are not as worried about the length of it, as having a fast fairway where the ball runs through the fairway into the rough. I think the short answer is whenever the players stop making the ball go so far forward, you'll see a stabilizing of that yardage, or we just flat run out of it, and then we'll just have to accept the result. Q. There's been a lot of talk about the PGA TOUR schedule in 2007 and one of the speculations is that it could impact the date of this tournament. Has the Tour talked to you as far as future schedules for when this tournament will fall in August? Will it move up? What's been the discussion in that regard? JIM AWTREY: Yes, there are always discussions going on about scheduling, particularly when the Tour is doing the television contract. But when you're talking about that, you're talking about days, you're not talking about time of year, you're not talking about going to the spring. We're still in that same time frame adjusting to fit the schedule or what other activities and events come along. Q. Going back to the length of the golf courses, are there courses, old courses that you go to and evaluate and you look at and you say, well, this course is obsolete, we can't have a tournament here because it isn't long enough, because you hear the word obsolete bandied about, about old courses? Do you ever run into that? JIM AWTREY: Yes, we have. There are some great golf courses. I mean, the amateur is being played at Merion, one of the great golf courses. It's no secret, the PGA, the USGA, we'd all like to have a championship at Merion. I know that David has looked at that and evaluated, and years ago Kerry and I flew in and visited the course. It's a wonderful course. But it is difficult when you're looking at the yardage. You look at Jack Nicklaus, what, hitting a 2 iron, or Ben Hogan hitting a 2 iron to 18, from the same tee is probably an 8 iron today. Picking just that course, but there are other courses, but as much as you're talking about yardage, sometimes it's infrastructure. You know I've had many people at the club come up this week and say, wow, it's different than it was the last time we hosted a major. Not only are you looking at the golf course being longer, but the infrastructure and space required is significantly different. So that's a constant part of the review. There are a few places that may not fit today, but by and large, we keep going back to the great old golf courses and I hope that we always do, and they keep moving a tree here or there and keep adding a tee, but more than that, they are small greens, they have movement to them, and it still comes down to your ability to score. I always laugh at some of the old golf courses, players will say, you've taken the driver out of my hand, and the reason it goes out of their hand is because they are driving it 330 and it gets narrow at 330. So that's what the Old Courses provide. I don't think we'll see elimination of what we see currently in the rotation. Q. Jim or Roger, as you reduce the number of spots for club professionals in the PGA Championship, obviously not a popular move among the rank and file, so are there any plans or any moves to try to raise the profile of the CPC or bump the purses up in the CPC and give it a little higher public profile and make it something that's more appealing to your rank and file? ROGER WARREN: The answer is yes. I think looking forward to the CPC, we have a goal of raising the profile of that event for our members and raising the purses and giving them an opportunity to have a better experience than they have now. That's an ongoing evaluation, and the board is committed to doing that in the future. We have made a change next year to the CPC from this year. We had a sectional and regional qualifying and a final championship. Next year it will be a section qualifying moving to the finals. We will have for the first two days a 312 player field for the first two days cut to 70 and ties after that. It gives a lot more players from the sectional level the opportunity to get to the national competition and have that experience, and it allows us also to define the best players coming out for the championship who will qualify not only for the PGA Championship but also for our Cup matches as we do every other year. Q. Would that purse structure change at all? If you get into the final, are you going to make some money? ROGER WARREN: Yes. The intention is to move the purse is about $500,000 and we have committed over the next few years to raise the purse value of the CPC to $1 million, so our goal is to make the event the premiere championship for club professionals in this country. Q. Being in such a large market here with the tournament right near such a large population base, were you surprised that tickets have been available so late in the game? The number of advertisements in local papers over the last few weeks about tickets still being available, does that come as any surprise? JIM AWTREY: No. What you see in different markets, when you get into New York and New Jersey markets, you have a lot of professional sports. You have people used to making those decisions. It's not like the championship or there's no other events or activities, which causes that demand to be a sellout years in advance like it was in Kentucky a few years ago. This is pretty normal to see, but you know, in the end the championship is going to be full of people out there, and certainly everybody is looking for the quality of the field is there and the best players in the world, and two of the best players kind of going head up. And in the end, golf is theatre, it is a stage, and the PGA Championship has had tremendous, tremendous finishes. I don't have any doubt that it will be that way again this year, and you will see a full golf course of fans by the end of the week. Q. Despite the best efforts of Play Golf America and The First Tee and any number of other programs, rounds are flat and golf courses are closing in most markets around the city. Given that, how long do you project this shakeout to be of golf courses, and how do you view the overall health of the game? ROGER WARREN: I think that's one of the primary questions we deal with as we look at the landscape of golf today and why we have Play Golf America. I think it's very difficult to make a judgment on when this turns, but we feel like that it has started to slow down and level out. We think programs like Play Golf America, the efforts of 20/20, the organized efforts of the different associations of golf who have come together and focused on the issue has had a profound impact on turning the tide. We have no way of knowing where we would be if we had not come together to do what we're doing. We see a lot of progress, we see a lot of areas in the country where they are showing growth. We do see an area of the country where we do see a reduction of golf courses and it's hard to know how long that will keep going. As long as the PGA of America and other organizations in golf continue to move forward to stimulate people, the PGA professional is the heart and core that we have, and the professionals in our association that continue to get people excited about this game will help us through this time. And I don't think it's fair for anybody to expect for it to turn around very fast. It's going to be a slow, arduous process, but it will turn around, it will come back. Golf is too much of a natural fiber of this country, it's too much important to the people who play the game, and it will continue to be an important part of the society that we're in because of what it allows people to do. It's a recreational opportunity for a lifetime, and we will continue to create programs, generate excitement, get enthusiasm. And I think that the associations and the industry need to be commended for where we are. I think we have to be very careful that we not look too critical at it right now. We have had positive growth in many areas, and I think that's what we should focus on. JIM AWTREY: I'd like to add a little. What I heard you say, too, golf courses closing, I think when you look at the '90s, which was the tremendous growth, we saw a lot of golf courses built in the '90s. Many of the golf courses built throughout the '90s were built to sell. They sold real estate, they sold other things. So I don't think we're exempt from other industries that have that ebb and flow in their business. Some of those golf courses maybe should not have been built, the concept didn't work, the location already had too much golf, and some of those had turned into housing. That's an evolution that's a part of it. I don't think that reflects as much on the game and where we're going as the fact of what happened in the '90s and the fact that we did overbuild golf courses. We clearly have more interest in the game. We have more viewers watching golf. We have positive economic indicators of those who are operating in the game, so as Roger said, I think we're all addressing this now together, looking at it as the business, having come through the era of growth, the era preceding that is we never worried about marketing. Marketing was not a term that I recall in golf going back to my early years. We were there and everybody came. Then we got introduced to a new concept of marketing. I think as Roger said, we are seeing signs of golf growing in interest and we are working hard to convert that interest to participation, and don't forget, we have been through some major things in our society; 9/11, we have had a lot of things, a lot of challenges to our time and to our lifestyle. I think it shows that golf is positive when you can come through some of those real down times, those things that impacted our life, and golf can continue to move forward. I think that reflects well on golf. Q. Some of the reasons people don't play golf these days is the perception that it takes such a long time, that it's expensive, that it's a difficult family activity for a husband to take his wife and two or three kids out to play golf. It's a long, expensive afternoon. Has the PGA considered maybe in certain markets buying a golf course that is financially strapped and creating a family environment place where you could go play nine holes? Most courses I know don't even have a nine hole rate. In other words, creating golf courses that are family friendly, kid friendly, and see if that grows the game? ROGER WARREN: I would answer that by saying, no, we have not done the specific thing you've asked about, going out and trying to buy golf courses that are in trouble to try to offer those programs. But I think what you are describing is exactly what Play Golf America is about. When we look at the landscape of golf now, the operators of public golf courses know that they have a lot of inventory of tee times that are available that are not being used. Play Golf America and best practices opportunities that we present on our Website offer opportunities for those operators to do exactly what you're talking about, to put together programs in the evening for families, to put together nine hole leagues in the afternoon and in the morning. Clearly, everyone involved in this industry who is on the operator side understands that we have the challenges to overcome the barriers that keep people from coming into the game, and the barriers that you described are those that are being attacked right now in terms of programming. Play Golf America, there are any number of programs that provide family golf opportunity and nine hole opportunities, so I think that the industry recognizes the challenge that you represented, and the solutions are coming from the individual operators who have the vested interest in bringing those players to their golf courses at that available inventory, and that's where the programming is going and where the direction of these aligned programs is continuing to. You're going to see growth in that because we have identified that very problem. JIM AWTREY: I would encourage you to also go on the Website, Play Golf America and look at the programs, because many, many of the programs fit exactly what you're saying. You hit it right on the head. But if you go to the Website, you'll see that people are doing that out there right now. Q. In terms of coming to the big cities, going to Chicago next year and then going to Oklahoma the following year, can you talk about how you balance going to the bigger urban areas in America versus going to some places that are a little more off the beaten bath? JIM AWTREY: Coming from Oklahoma, I kind of resent Tulsa, Oklahoma, being off the beaten path. Clearly, what we do in the PGA Championship's history was to move that championship around the country and expose major championship golf to as many people in America as we possibly can. There are four majors, and in the U.S., two of those majors move, the U.S. Open and the PGA, and we have looked to those markets. So has the USGA; Southern Hills has been on their rotation, as well. Certainly you're referring to our Senior PGA Championship next year being played at Oak Tree, site of previous major championships, Oklahoma being an area that supported golf; Oklahoma City used to have a Tour event and has hosted other major activities and been very successful. Whistling Straits in Wisconsin, an attempt to get out into the middle of America, and we try to work to the northeast, to the south, to the west. Many of you said why can't you move your championship to spring. If you were to go to the spring, any time before June, you're restricting where you can go in the United States. Generally you end up in winter grass. So by playing in August, there are some down sides; we occasionally get a little heat, but we play in places with bermudagrass and they are able to host a championship. So that creates a little bit of stress sometimes on grasses but agronomically they are getting better. There's a reason we go to different sites across America and pick those different golf courses, and I think something very important, occasionally, look to the next generation of new golf course that may turn out in 25 years, 40 years, to have been turned into a major championship site. So you've seen some of those. Q. Vijay was talking this morning and other players have talked about the difference between the way the PGA sets up their course for this tournament and the way the Open sets its course up. What do you try to avoid doing when you set up a golf course to be as difficult as possible and yet still fair? JIM AWTREY: Well, years ago, when I started in this and we were looking at changing the venues and going back, the PGA leadership established a policy that we would set the golf courses up difficult, which we felt we always had, depending upon the strength of each golf course, but if we erred, we would err on the side of the player. Par is that number that we tend to focus on when we're writing stories, red numbers. So what you've seen through the years, the USGA and us to some extent is you take a par 72 golf course, you convert to a par 70, and the only reason you do it is to resist scoring. There are three elements of setting up a major championship. One is driving the ball in the fairway, obviously playing a shot into the green, and the speed of the greens. The greens are the one thing that impacts scoring more than anything. You try to set up a golf course firm and fast, as firm and fast is harder for the player. One of the difficulties that we experience, and all of the majors have been experiencing recently, is weather. In August it tends to be hot and sometimes you can put a little more water on it, and you have thunderstorm activities, and when you do get wet, you see the golf course playing a little bit softer, when softer equates to easier for the players. So the challenge is to set the width of the fairways to challenge the players, then make sure that you can challenge the second shot and ultimately the putting. So width of fairways tends to be lower. We've always been in the 27 to 32 range, occasionally it will drop down on certain holes. The modern day player is hitting it well, you pick a number at the end of that range, but 280 average, 300. So sometimes now you're not able to drive the ball 330 and be in play. So we are trying to get the drive zone back where it used to be, so that sometimes requires renovation, and renovation could include changing bunkers and it could refer to moving the tees back and obviously does. The modern day golf tournaments when you look at Baltusrol and the other ones, the grasses and the condition of the greens is the biggest single change. In my opinion, we used to have you look at the old videos, you see the players, how hard they were hitting the ball on the putting green, and the greens were probably seven and a half and they have run analysis to that. Today we talk in numbers that weren't even considered back then; 12, 12 and a half or so far, you don't even talk about it. What that does is require you to pay attention to the speed of the green to match it to the contour of the green so that you don't end up with hole locations that do not provide a fair opportunity for the player, not only to make a putt, but in some cases, to finish a hole. So we are not afraid of putting a tough hole location, but we want it to be accessible to a good shot, and if you do, to be able to make a birdie so that it's not just about just try to make a par on every hole. Q. For either one, it might be a little early to ask this question, but we are a little more than a year out from the Ryder Cup and we tweaked the points systems for that. So far, have you noticed, have they made any change and is that going to be open to a little more tweaking in the future after next year? ROGER WARREN: I think it's too early to tell on that. If you look at the point accumulation this year it pretty much reflects the way the players have played obviously. With the change in the point allocation for next year, for the major championships, for the individual wins, next year will be the year that you see the most movement on the Ryder Cup list. So I think that it's too soon to make that analysis, and we will after the next Ryder Cup look at the process and what the result was and determine past that, as we do after every Ryder Cup, whether or not there should be further changes in that qualifying process for the United States Team.
JULIUS MASON: Questions? Questions twice? Thank you very much for joining us today, ladies and gentlemen.
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