Fred Couples says he is done with the PGA Tour
This year, Fred Couples won four times in his rookie season on the Champions Tour. And it appears the 51-year-old golfer, one of the most popular in the world, will continue to focus his
efforts on the senior’s circuit.
According to Couples, it was his play at the Wyndham Championship, the PGA Tour stop that takes place in North Carolina in mid-August, that made him realize he was done on the PGA Tour.
In a last-ditch effort to make the Ryder Cup, Couples entered the event. But after finishing T5 at the event in 2009, he missed the cut this time around.
"I did really well at Greensboro last year," Couples said from the Charles Schwab Cup Championship, the season-ending event on the Champions Tour. "I almost won. I thought if I went there
and played well and maybe had a shot at winning, Corey [Pavin] might call me up and say, 'Hey, you might get picked.' That's really why I played.”
But things didn’t turn out well for Couples.
"I didn't play well, and now I know that I am done with the regular tour. Absolutely done. That I know. Absolutely," he said.
The 1992 Masters champion said fans may see him at a few PGA Tour stops next year, including the L.A. Open and the Shell Houston Open. Couples finished T6 at last year’s Masters so you
figure he will make the trip to Augusta National next year. But since the schedule for the 2011 Champions Tour season is yet to be released, Couples doesn’t know for sure.
"No one knows the schedule," he said. "I've never worried about a schedule, and now I want to play a couple times on our tour, and I'm all worried about it. It kind of bothers me.”
Couples said after almost 30 years on the PGA Tour, he developed a familiarity with the courses. Now on the Champions Tour, everything is new.
"Whereas I played 29 years on the regular tour and I knew every tournament, out here I couldn't tell you the names of the courses, the tournaments or anything," he said. "I just go to
'em and show up and play. That's the truth."
His unfamiliarity with the courses makes his four wins on the season, second only to Bernhard Langer’s five titles, that much more impressive. Couples enters this week’s tournament ranked
number-two on the money list, with a real chance to catch the number-one Langer.
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