"Why the darkhorse won the day"

In this week's Golf World I pen a Voices item on why it's a super thing that Gil Hanse got the Olympic design job and how he maneuvered passed the big horses. And now that the magazine has gone digital, I'm pretty sure you can read it here even if you aren't a subscriber (but will be soon after being dazzled by my commentary or this week's dynamite package that includes excellent Jason Day and Michelle Wie profiles)

Meanwhile Brad Faxon stopped in the Newport Beach Country Club's Toshiba Classic press center after a brief rookie visit to Newport Beach Golf Course (rookie!). He was asked about his buddy and TPC Boston sidekick Hanse getting the Rio job.

I enjoyed this...

I don't think that, and you probably would agree with this, that Gil is going to build a course anyway different now, because it's for the Olympics, he's going to build the best course he can on the piece of property. But I'm sure there is certain things that's going to be required that he's going to have to do that he might not normally do for a golf course, maybe spacing out some of the few holes that are going to be televised.

We don't know how holes are going to be televised in the Olympics. That was one of the big stumbling blocks the PGA TOUR had when I was on the policy board about Olympic golf is how is it going to be broadcast? Will they actually show the players in prime time? How will they do this? Will they make it CNBC or however it is done versus on the network?

DAVE SENKO: Golf Channel.

BRAD FAXON: Right. And I think that was the big hurdle for us. For these players that go play and miss three or four weeks, can be a big deal in the middle of the season. From what I heard it's not a team event.

Q. It is not.

BRAD FAXON: That makes no sense to me. They've still got time to change that.

Yes they do!