Hot Lee to make PGA Tour debut

Danny Lee will be getting a taste of the star-studded USPGA Tour this week.
The Rotorua 18-year-old, who completed the Western Amateur double this month and is now ranked the No1 amateur in the world by a United States source and No2 by one in Britain, has accepted an invitation to play alongside some of the world's best golfers in the US$5.1 million ($7.3 million) Wynham Championship which starts on Friday.
``I'm very excited ... it is going to be a great experience to play with those great golfers out here,' the +5.2 handicapper said of the world class field which includes players like Vijay Singh.
``It's been my dream to play on the PGA Tour since as long as I can remember.'
Lee has already played in professional events in New Zealand, Australia and Korea.
The four-round tournament, which will be at the Sedgefield Country Club, used to be known as the Greater Greensboro Open and golfing legends such as Sam Snead, Ben Hogan and New Zealand's Sir Bob Charles (1974) and Frank Nobilo (1997) are previous winners.
The defending champion is American Brandt Snedeker. It is the last of the regular events on the USPGA Tour this season and comes after the final major of 2008, the PGA Championship.
Lee is now hot golfing property and judging by how Tiger Woods views the Western Amateur event, where Lee won the strokeplay and matchplay titles, it's easy to see why the South Korean-born Kiwi's popularity is rising.
Woods won the 1994 Western for his first major amateur championship, three weeks before he claimed the US Amateur title. Woods played in four Western Amateurs and labelled the tournament ``the Masters of amateur golf'.
Lee has been reflecting quietly on a pretty busy period, which included heading his qualifier for the 2008 US Amateur Championships, with a record-setting 11-under-par total days after his Western Amateur double success.
``I'm playing pretty good,' was his modest assessment of his effort.
When Lee tees up with the likes of Singh this week, he'll still have his biggest challenge of the American summer to come _ the US Amateur, starting August 18.
That will be played at Pinehurst, North Carolina, the scene of Michael Campbell's 2005 US Open win.