Golf / Scott Howard-Cooper : Sheff Tries to Repeat as Qualifying Begins in 88th SCGA Amateur

Defending champion Dave Sheff of San Marino heads a list of nearly 1,200 golfers who will compete in the 88th Southern California Golf Assn. Amateur Championship, the nation’s oldest continuous amateur golf championship in the country. Qualifying begins July 13 in four flights at 10 locations, and the finals will be held July 17-19 at Braemar Country Club in Tarzana.

Sheff and 19 others are exempt from qualifying in the championship flight (those with handicaps of 0-4). They will begin play with 64 others in the championship division for 36 holes of stroke play on July 17.

The championship flight will be conducted at scratch, but the three other flights--president’s, vice president’s and secretary’s--will use net scores. Golfers in the president’s flight have handicaps from 5-8, vice president’s from 9-12 and secretary’s from 13-18.

Former winners of the SCGA Amateur include Al Geiberger (1956 and ‘59), Barry Jaeckel (‘68), Mark Pfeil (‘72), Tony Sills (‘76), Greg Twiggs (‘81), David Hobby (‘83) and Brad Greer (’84 and ‘85), all current or former members of the PGA tour. Sheff is also a former touring pro but regained his amateur status last year and won the title at Hillcrest Country Club.

Hello, Ripley’s?: There was a time when getting two holes in one the same round would be a rarity. But a couple weeks ago, it seemed like a normal occurrence.

On June 24, 17-year-old Greg Snyder recorded a hole in one on the par-3, 243-yard fourth hole and then again on the par-3, 178-yard eighth in a junior tournament at East Aurora (N.Y.) Country Club. He used a 1-iron on the former and a 4-iron on the latter.

The next day in North Vernon, Ind., 41-year-old Don Miller came through with a double-ace round at the Country Club of Indianapolis, with a 6-iron on the 160-yard fourth hole and an 8-iron on the 145-yard 16th. He’s a 10-handicap player.

Miller’s reward was a new set of clubs and a new golf bag.

Gary Player’s win in the Mazda Senior Tournament Players Championship, held June 11-14 at Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla., snapped a couple of streaks.

It marked the first victory for the South African in more than a year and also denied Chi Chi Rodriguez, the defending champion and leading money winner in 1987, a fifth consecutive tour win. The title and $60,000 prize in the second-richest event of the season also jumped Player from ninth to fifth on the money list.

Additionally, Bruce Crampton, who tied with Rodriguez for second, pushed his career earnings from the regular and senior tours past $2 million. Bob Charles, who won three straight tournaments this year, broke $1 million in all-time winnings.

Golf Notes Michael Turner, a former member of the Cal State Northridge golf team, won the two-weekend Los Angeles City title June 14 at Rancho Park by two strokes over Brian Carson. The two were tied going into the 17th hole of the final round when Turner sank a 15-foot putt for a birdie and Carson bogeyed. . . . The 16th annual Southern California Women’s Masters Tournament, for club champions from private and public courses, will be held July 13 at Montebello GC, July 14 at Brookside No. 2 and July 15 at Brookside No. 1. . . . The first Gardena Valley YWCA championship will be held July 25 at the Chester Washington GC. Entry fee is $45, with all proceeds going to the YWCA. For more information: (213) 327-5356. . . . The fifth annual National Football Foundation Tournament, with proceeds providing scholarships for Pasadena and San Gabriel Valley high school scholar-athletes, will be held Aug. 7, the morning of the San Gabriel Valley all-star football game, at Brookside GC in Pasadena. Entry fee is $65. For more information: (818) 441-3986. . . . The U.S. Golf Assn. museum in Far Hills, N.J., has re-opened after an eight-month, $1.25-million renovation and expansion project. The new Golf House was laid out by John Russell Pope, who also designed the Jefferson Memorial, the National Archives Building and the National Gallery of Art, all in Washington. . . . The J. Wylie Carlyle Invitational, sponsored by the Orange County Chamber of Commerce to raise funds for a scholarship to a student graduating from Rancho Santiago College, has been set for Aug. 31 at Los Coyotes CC in Buena Park. Entry fee is $110 . For more information: (714) 634-2900. . . . One UCLA assistant women’s coach, Cindy Scholefield, beat another, Kay Cockerill, last Monday in the semifinals of the Broadmoor Ladies Invitational at Colorado Springs, Colo. The next day, Scholefield defeated Robin Weiss of Long Beach, Fla., for the title.

The 1988 Spalding Invitational Pro-Am will be played Jan. 7-10, the latest start ever for the $250,000 competition. Carmel Valley Golf & Country Club at Quail Lodge, Carmel Valley Ranch and Pebble Beach will again be the three courses used, with the final round of the 72-hole tournament scheduled for Quail Lodge. . . . Five people, including Greg Norman and NBC’s Bryant Gumbel, will attempt to set a world record by playing five golf courses on five continents in five days. Named “The Shark Trek” in honor of Norman, the expedition for charity will begin Monday, Dec. 7, at the Olympic Club in San Francisco, cross the international date line to play Royal Melbourne in Australia Wednesday, then continue to Kasumigaseki near Tokyo, Royal Dar Es Salaam near Rabat, Morocco, and finally Wentworth outside London. The fivesome, which will also include Golf magazine editor George Peper, golf photographer Lawrence Levy and International Management Group Senior VP Hughes Norton, will collect money for the Ronald McDonald Children’s Charities. Gumbel will file daily reports for “Today.” . . . The Tam O’Shanter Invitational at Seacliff CC in Huntington Beach will be held July 23-25. . . . When PGA rookie John Horne recorded back-to-back eagles at the recent Manufacturer’s Hanover Westchester Tournament, he was the first to accomplish the feat on the tour since Rex Caldwell at Pebble Beach in 1985. . . . Fred Sherman’s North San Diego County women’s tournament will be contested Aug. 3-4 at Escondido CC. Entry forms are available at all pro shops in San Diego County. . . . The 57th annual Trans National Women’s Championship will be held July 13-18 at Wichita, Kan.