Golf: Lee learning fast as latest test awaits

Danny Lee has worked hard since missing the cut at the Moonah Classic last week. Photo / Getty Images

A day after missing the cut at the Moonah Classic outside of Melbourne last week, amateur golfer Danny Lee rushed home to Rotorua to chill out with his family.

He was quietly thankful for a break in his tournament schedule and appreciated having time to himself.

Of course, while he treasures the company of his family he also headed out the door to spend five hours working on his blossoming game.

That, more than anything else, helps explain the 18-year-old's extraordinary rise to 156th in the world rankings, with still at least six weeks to pass before he turns professional after the Masters in the United States.

Lee's rush to prominence enters another phase tomorrow when he becomes the first amateur to contest the US$600,000 ($1.8 million) New Zealand PGA Championship here at Clearwater Resort since the tournament was revived in 2004 after a 16-year hiatus.

It will be his eighth appearance in a professional tournament since last August, the same month he created history by becoming the youngest US Amateur champion in history.

Already, he has fashioned for himself the sort of record than many of his elders envy. Five cuts made from seven events and a victory to boot - in the tri-sanctioned Johnnie Walker Classic in Perth no less.

It is heady progress for a young man destined for financially lucrative endorsement deals which will help ease his transition to the pro ranks.

Not that he is thinking that far ahead. For now, Lee wants only to do himself proud around the 6513m Clearwater layout on the outskirts of Christchurch in the Nationwide Tour and Australasian Tour co-sanctioned event.

He was battered by the strong winds which swept over the Moonah course last week, rounds of 75 and 74 confirming his pre-tournament suggestion that his high ball flight was unsuited to both links-style courses and wind.

The latter should not be in short supply this week, with nor'easterlies forecast for tomorrow and Friday ahead of a nor'westerly on Saturday and a southerly change for the final round.

Lee's ferocious work ethic has again been to the fore this week. He arrived in Christchurch on Monday, played a full practice round that day and repeated it yesterday before participating in today's pro-am.

He knows his game is very much a work in progress, even if his coach Steve Jessup has declared his long iron play already to be of world class standard.

He said winning one week in Perth and missing the cut the very next week had been an experience which he would put to use.

"I learned quite a lot of things in the past few weeks. I won in Perth but then played a totally different course in totally different conditions," he said today.

"I didn't play well that week in Melbourne and I did get quite upset about it."

He likes what he's seen of Clearwater but knows he will need to be accurate off the tee on a course principally protected by wind and water.

"Hopefully I hit it straight enough to keep it on the fairway."

Lee is not at all fazed by the prospect of attracting large galleries this week, and again next week near Queenstown where he will play his last tournament as an amateur in New Zealand at the New Zealand Open.

"I'm really looking forward to these two events, hopefully I will play well and make New Zealand people proud.

"It was pretty crazy with all the people at the Johnnie Walker Classic but that experience is going to help me. I don't know how many people will come out to watch me here."

While Lee has very much been given top billing at Clearwater, the championship has attracted a quality field, including 10 players who have won PGA Tour titles in the US.

Two of them are New Zealanders in Phil Tataurangi and Grant Waite, while this country's highest ranked player, world No 91 David Smail, is eager to go one better than his second placing here last year when the tournament was reduced to a two-round contest due to torrential rain.

Regular Australian visitors such as Peter Senior, Peter O'Malley and Craig Parry are also back, all of them in their 40s and battling to keep the next generation at bay.

NZ PGA CHAMPIONSHIP FACTBOX

Venue: Clearwater Resort. Par 72. 6513m
Course record: 63 - Steven Bowditch (Australia) 2005, Ryan Palmer (US) 2003.
Status: Co-sanctioned by the Nationwide Tour in the United States and the Australasian PGA Tour.
Purse: US$600,000 ($1,227,495). First place: US$108,000. Second: $61,200. Third: US$40,500.
2008 champion: Darron Stiles (US).

History: First contested in 1920. Played under matchplay format when held in conjunction with the New Zealand Open and national amateur championship until 1963. From 1965 on it has been played over 72 holes of strokeplay. Not played in 1940-45, 1964, 1986, 1988-2003.

Most titles: 7 - Andy Shaw (NZ) 1928-29, 1931-32-33-34, 1946
7 - Kel Nagle (Australia) 1957-58, 1960, 1970, 1973-74-75

Nostable winners: Peter Thomson (Australia) 1953, Bruce Crampton (Australia) 1954, Bob Charles (NZ) 1961, 1979-80, Tony Jacklin (England) 1967, John Lister (NZ) 1971, 1976-77, Jumbo Ozaki (Japan) 1972, Greg Turner (NZ) 1984, Frank Nobilo (NZ) 1986, 1987.

- NZPA