Golf, by TourMiss

While David Drysdale gets used to walking with crutches he’s quietly hopeful of contesting next week’s lucrative Alfred Dunhill Links Championship. The popular Scot sustained a three centimetre tear in the calf muscle of his right leg when walking up the slope of a bunker at the first hole to start his third round in last week’s 72nd Italian Open at Monza. The 40-year old said at the time the pain was so intense he felt he had been shot in the leg. Drysdale underwent an MRI on his leg in Edinburgh on Monday and yesterday (TUES) visited leading Scottish physiotherapist, Stuart Barton who spent a dozen years as physio for the Scotland rugby lead. Under Barton’s guidance, Drysdale underwent the first of a series of intensive physio sessions ...

Sweden’s Rikard Karlberg is the European Tour’s newest champion in capturing last week’s 72nd Italian Open. However the Swede is also the Tour’s equal top-ranked ‘Tortoise’ after being fined £2,000 for slow play last week at Monza. It means Karlberg who won £181,054 in defeating Martin Kaymer in a play-off has had to hand back £2,000 to the Tour. Karlberg was fined for slow play during the first round at Monza and now joins Paul Peterson and Danny Willett atop ...

Australia’s Jason Day admitted his status as golf’s new world number one had not yet sunk in after he clinched top spot by winning the BMW Championship in Chicago on Sunday. The US PGA Championship winner succeeded Rory McIlroy at the top of the rankings after a final round of 69 earned him a six-shot victory at Conway Farms. It was Day’s fourth success in five events since the disappointment of missing out in a play-off in The Open at St. Andrews as well as capturing a fifth victory ...

Peter Lawrie now faces five weeks of uncertainty with a goal in wrapping-up his card for next season falling short at the Italian Open in Monza. Lawrie needed a top-five finish to move from his current 121st Race to Dubai standing and inside the top-110 but he had to settle for a share of 14th in posting a final round 68 for a 15-under par tally. The Dubliner’s goal of securing an entry into this week’s European Open at Bad Griesbach, and to the east of Munich, fell four shots shy of qualifying top-10. And ...

David Drysdale will learn tomorrow (Monday) if his season will continue or if he’ll be on the sidelined for the the remainder of the year. The Borders golfing ace is set to undergo an MRI in Edinburgh on his injured right leg. Drysdale sustained the injury at the very first hole in Saturday’s Italian Open third round at Monza. He had played a bunker shot and was climbing out of the bunker when he felt his calf muscle ‘pop’. “The pain was so bad it felt like I had been shot in the leg,” ...

Bizarrely, the nostalgia of recent weeks jumped up to surprise me at this week’s 72nd Italian Open in Monza. It was the first return of the championship to the Milan Golf Club since 1990 when England’s Richard Boxall captured the event wearing a plain yellow shirt and admitting when I caught up with him on Tuesday, he had simply ran out of shirts. The 1990 Italian Open had been my first but then I got a real surprise on Tuesday in asking the clubhouse if they had a shot of ‘Boxie’. ...

And they say golf is boring! Well today I had one of the most thrilling experiences for some time and it was not on the golf course. No, as the leaders made their way to the first tee for the final round of the 72nd Italian Open, I made my way to very nearby Monza Grand Prix circuit. With a very special thank you to Mercedes I was invited to first sit behind the wheel of a gleaming 503 bhp 4-litre V8 GTS coupe for a lap of the circuit that a fortnight ago saw Lewis Hamilton capture a second straight ...