This Week at TravelGolf.com: August 3, 2004

Most every golf instructor I've ever met knows the game. Most are even passionate about the game. But only a select few are truly great instructors. Fortunately, we recently added one of the best to our roster at GolfInstruction.com when Kellie Stenzel agreed to become a regular contributor.

Stenzel, who spends her winters at Palm Beach Gardens in Florida and her summers at Atlantic Golf Club on Long Island, has been a PGA class-A teaching professional for the past 14 years. Associate editor Kiel Christianson believes readers will benefit from Stenzel's simplistic philosophy, which focuses on three words: grip, posture, and momentum. Interestingly, Stenzel relies very little on video analysis, especially when working with women: "[They] get so stuck on what their clothes or their [figures] look like on film," she says, "it just distracts them."

While we welcome Stenzel aboard, be sure to check out our usual full roster of reviews and travel features, plus a new profile of ESPN golf analyst Charlie Rymer, who discusses his course design business, his legendary appetite, and much more in this visit with staff writer Joel Zuckerman. As always, your comments are welcome on any topic. Have a great week.

They're golfing here in Allentown!

While many of the factories in Allentown and Bethlehem have been shutdown, the Lehigh Valley is flourishing with a more high tech economy and population boom. As staff writer Darryl Berger reports, there's also been a golf boom that's provided a wide range of options for residents of and visitors to Pennsylvania's Lehigh Valley, with the most heralded trio of courses belonging to the Saucon Valley Country Club.

Full story | Pennsylvania Golf Courses

Golf 's problems include
money, time, and difficulty

In Part II of his series on the state of golf, national golf editor Tim McDonald looks into the reasons why golf is losing millions of players each year, including five hour rounds of golf and high equipment prices. But industry analysts are split on whether golf participation in the United States is either slowly starting to climb back up after a few lean years or declining altogether.

Full story | Part one: Who can you believe?

Golf born in France, not
Scotland? If so, that changes everything

Are you a golfer who is still not eating french fries because of how France responded to our military action in Iraq? Well, then you're going to love this: Tim McDonald writes that a new book on the history of golf says France, not Scotland, was the birthplace of the royal and ancient game. As McDonald puts it, naturally, they're pissed in Scotland.

Full story | Commentary: USGA President should resign