[Yoda]

Congrats to LBG students Trevor Dodds (71-70=141 / T-22), Scott Dunlap (71-73=144 / E / T-57 and John Kimbell (75-69=144 / E / T-57) on making the Nationwide Tour's second cut of the year. John Riegger missed on rounds of 76-71=147.

The event is being contested at Moonah Links in Fingal, Victoria, Australia, the first in a three-tournament swing 'down under'. The Tour will be in New Zealand the next two weeks before teeing it up in the U.S. the last week in March. For U.S. players, that's a long (and expensive) haul, but a good showing gets the year jump-started.

John Kimbell is a new name to these pages. Now in his third year on the Nationwide, he lives just up the road in Lafayette, Georgia, but had never heard of 'ol Yoda. Imagine that! He had spent much of the past two years struggling off the tee and had just shot 75-75=150 (+10) in Panama to miss the cut by seven. At the suggestion of John Riegger, he called on February 10th looking for answers. Happily, on February 11th, after two hours in The Swamp the week before he left for Australia, we believe he found them (new Flying Wedge alignments and a thorough understanding of the Inclined Plane and how to stay on it).

Mr. Kimbell has quite a story. He started playing golf at age 22 while working at UPS. He quit his job at age 28 and headed for the mini-tours -- the Hooters, Gulf Coast and Developmental Players Tours -- where he toiled for ten years before gaining 2007 Nationwide status by finishing 64th at the December 2006 Q-School finals. Once there, he didn't waste any time, winning the South Georgia Classic in April at the ripe young age of 38. http://www.pgatour.com/2007/tourname...607/index.html.

Since then, however, it's been a pretty rough ride. John is a 'natural', and he told me he had never had a formal lesson . . . until me. Well, as they say, you always remember your 'first'.

So far, so good!