Shark Attack! Greg Norman's Recent Finishes

To my surprise, Greg Norman has made a quite splash back into the tournament golf world. True 3 of the 4 events were off season tournaments that did not mean much, but for a huge Norman fan growing up, simply seeing him hit the ball again is a huge deal!

Starting with the Father Son Challenge last month, Greg Norman and his son Gregory finished an impressive 6th place. It was rumored that Norman Sr. had only played a couple rounds in the past several months before playing! This is his second appearance in the event with his son and their finish equaled last years performance. It appears that Gregory has some of the Norman golfing genes that made his farther the number one player in the world during the late 80's to mid 90's.

The next event the Shark entered was his own. The Merrill Lynch Shootout. (Formally The Shark Shootout.) He and his partner, the long hitting Bubba Watson finished second to Mark Calcavecchia and Woody Austin when Austin drained a 35 foot putt on the final hole Sunday while Watson and Normans 25 foot bids to force a play-off ran just by the hole. While the rust was starting to come off, Norman began hitting some great shots during the week and it really brought myself and I'm sure millions of others back to the time when Norman dominated the golfing world with his long accurate driving and his high pin-point iron play.

I figured this would be the last event I would see Norman in this season, heck, maybe ever! His schedule as far as the game of golf has been growing smaller and smaller each season as he has been working to expand his business: Great White Shark Enterprises which works with everything from wine, golf course design, to beef! Imagine my surprise when I turned on The Golf Channel to see Greg Norman playing in the South African Airways Open!

I was almost in shock! I did not even know he was playing. I saw no mention of it on his website and was thrilled! I was more thrilled when he finish 7th for the week against all the young kids on the European Tour! Norman made several birdies during the week, but a few doubles and untimely bogie's through the week held him from a run at the title.

He has also played in a ADT Skills challenge in November which he was paired with Roger Clemmons finishing 3rd. This strewth of 4 events in under 2 moths was a great surprise for Norman fans as his last round of competition was in early February at the Dubai Desert Classic where he finished 64th. The fact that he has played so well only goes to show that with a little time to knock the rust off , Norman can still compete at a very high level. Lets hope this peaks his interest to play a few more events in 2008!