Codswallop

Aussie Stuart Appleby has a share of the lead with K.J. Choi after the second at the AT&T National being played at the Congressional Country Club. Both players have shot rounds of 66 & 67 to be at -7, three shots ahead of the next best. Stuart Appleby was a multiple winner on the tour last year, taking out the opening event the Mercedes Championship for the third straight year and the Shell Houston Open. Stuart has yet to win this year, his best finish was his defence of the Shell Houston Open where he finished second to fellow Australian Adam Scott.

Meanwhile over on the Nationwide Tour, another Aussie Scott Gardiner has the half way lead. Jason Day is also doing well at two stokes behind on -8. I wouldn't be surprised to see both of these players on the main tour next year. They currently sit at 43 and 33 respectively on the money list, the top 25 qualify for the main tour.

Cristie Kerr has won a rain affected the 2007 US Womens Open ahead of the world's current number one play Lorena Ochoa and Angela Park.

The best finishing Aussie was Katherine Hull who finished a tie for 25th. Australia's highest ranked player and world number two Karrie Webb missed the cut after a 12 over par opening round.

Recently Titleist launched a couple equipment related blogs which make for a very interesting read. The Tour blog covers the day to day activities of the tour van such as custom fittings for touring pros. For example Titleist's resident wedge guru Bob Vokey has posted on the various wedge grinds requested by players for varying conditions, such as the current Masters champion Zach Johnson.

The latest posting shows Aussie golfers Stephen Leaney and Michael Sim during a practice round while preparing for a recent tournament on the PGA Tour.

The second blog is by putter guru Scotty Cameron. Scotty covers more than just putters for the pros. There is quite a large community of putter enthusiasts and collectors of Scotty Cameron putters. Scotty blogs about this community and talks about some of his other areas of interest such as his art

Of course Titleist aren't the first golf equipment manufacturer to dip their toe into the blogging world. TaylorMade started a similar tour van blog at least a year ago. However it seems to be down. Does anyone know what happened? Actually it looks like their main site is down at the moment too.

Thanks to a friend's recent trip to Fukuoka, Japan I now have my hands on the latest offering from Tourstage, the X01-R4 and X01-G4 golf balls. For those who may not be aware Tourstage is Bridgestone's premium golf arm in Japan. Unfortunately Bridgestone do not distribute Tourstage equipment to the west along with many other cool Japanese golf equipment companies.

As illustrated the balls are a four piece construction, the core, two mantels and the cover. Each layer plays a different roll coming in to effect on different shots. The inner mantel should help reduce the spin off longer irons and the driver while the outer mantel kicks in on mid and short irons providing more spin and feel. The thin cover should help spin the ball on the shorter shots.

I've been playing the Bridgestone B330-S for a year or so now and suspect I will have a leaning for the X01-G4 as that is the softer of the two models. I can't wait to get out on the course to try them both out. Hopefully the weather will be kind this weekend.

Congratulations to the big Argentinian Angel Cabrera for taking out the 2007 US Open at Oakmont. I've enjoyed watching him play over the last four days and was very glad to see him hold off Tiger. Even though the scores were high I thought this years US Open was very entertaining.

Not only are the last four winners foreigners but all from the southern hemisphere. Retief Goosen - South Africa, Michael Campbell - New Zealand, Geoff Ogilvy - Australia and of course Angel Cabrera - Argentina.

Aaron Baddeley's performance was disappointing. I predicted he would have a disaster hole but a triple bogey on the opening hole was not a good way to start the final round. Badd's did hit some good shots in his final round but his putting which is usually his strength really let him down in a big way. However as they say it's a learning experience and I'm sure he will feature in more majors over the next few years.

Badd's performance wasn't good but the worst shot has to go to Jim Furyk on the 17th hole. What was Furyk thinking?! Tied for the lead with a couple of holes remaining and he tries to drive the hole - simply crazy! Perhaps a play you might have tried if you needed a couple birdies over the last two holes, but when you're tied with the lead at Oakmont? I would have thought he would have been more than happy to par the final two holes and set the club house lead at plus 5.

So how did the Aussies finish?

• +12 Aaron Baddeley
• +15 Nick O'Hern
• +16 Stuart Appleby
• +18 Mathew Goggin
• +19 Geoff Ogilvy
• +20 Marcus Fraser