Golf:

One of the best golf tournaments golf fans in Southern California have the opportunity to see is the one that is hosted by part-time Corona del Mar resident Tiger Woods.

The Chevron World Challenge at Sherwood Country Club in Thousand Oaks begins with a pro-am on Wednesday and continues with competitive rounds through Sunday.

The field this year is the best the tournament has had in years and includes all four of this year’s major championship winners. The golfers that will be there are: Woods, Paul Casey, Stewart Cink, Jim Furyk, Lucas Glover, Padraig Harrington, Zach Johnson, Martin Kaymer, Anthony Kim, Sean O’Hair, Kenny Perry, Ian Poulter, Vijay Singh, Steve Stricker, Camilo Villegas, Mike Weir, Lee Westwood and Y.E. Yang

Though it is a little more than an hour away from his home in Corona del Mar, this is an event that Woods wanted to host in Southern California .

“We’ve always wanted to be a part of Southern California because obviously that’s where I was born and raised,” Woods said. “Over the years as we’ve kind of basically grown and matured in the event, you’ve seen a lot of these players come and have supported the event. I know they have busy schedules. A lot of the European players and foreign born players who don’t live here in the United States have made the trek over here to play.”

One of the reasons golf fans down in the Newport Beach/Costa Mesa area should make the 75-mile trek to the event is not only the quality of golf, but the intimacy of the event. Though there are only 18 players in the field, if there are one or two professionals that interest you — besides Woods, of course — the opportunity to watch them up close is invaluable.

The amount of people following Woods is still substantial, but it is not a mob scene, especially at the pro-am. Besides this is the only place in either Los Angeles or Orange County where Woods plays. He is still non-committal about playing at Riviera Country Club next year.

Pick any of the other golfers that aren’t in the group with Woods and chances are you can follow that player around fairly unencumbered for most of his round.

But don’t think that it is an exhibition match, even if it is going on during the Silly Season. This is the only limited-field event that has World Ranking points and that is another reason players have made the trip.

“Well, when you step up and you get on that practice range and you see the field, your juices start going,” Woods said. “I’ve played in several challenge events post-tour Championship or post Cups. This event is different. The quality of field and the venue, it just adds to it, and the guys really get pretty jacked up to play.

“It’s amazing how a lot of talking goes on early in the week,” Woods said. “Come game time, it gets a little more quiet, very similar to how you’d find at a bigger tour event.”

The venue is another reason people should come up to the event. Sherwood Country Club was designed by Jack Nicklaus and is an impressive golf course. Woods tries to make the course as difficult as possible.

“Yeah, I’ve always wanted to have it fast and have the fairways going, that’s how I think it’s best played,” Woods said. “We just need to have the weather cooperate with us. Being that late in the year, generally that’s when the storms start rolling in off the Pacific as we all know. So that’s one of the tricky things that we have to try and balance. If the weather cooperates, and some years we’ve had some Santa Anas blow in and it’s been dry and the ball has been rolly, it’s a tremendous test. But if it’s soft, then the guys can take dead aim at a lot of these holes and you see high teens, even low 20s under par win the golf tournament.”

This is the last professional event of the year in the United States and it is definitely a tournament worth seeing in person, especially when tickets – which are available at Roger Dunn’s at Newport Beach Golf Course – are $30 today through Friday and $40 Saturday and Sunday and parking is free.

JOHN REGER’S golf column appears Thursdays. He may be reached by e-mail at [email protected].