2.6.05- Pearl Country Club- Wow what a tournament! Rain delays, soggy conditions, sunny conditions, a hole-in-one, a super star, broken records, soft greens, fast greens, a playoff, par 71, par 72 and so on... The 27th Hawaii Pearl Open had a bit of everything the only thing missing was snow! First props needs to go to the winners, 33-year-old professional Will Yanagisawa (left, former team mate of Tiger Woods at Stanford University) of Long Beach, CA, fired rounds of 65-66-69 for a 54 hole total of 200, 14-under par. The low amateur was 17-year-old Yuki Ito (below right) of Ibaraki, Japan with rounds of 70-67-71--208, 6-under par. I asked Yuki after the round today if it was the first time he played with so many people/media around him, he replied, "no its the second time, the first being paired with Michelle Wie in last year's Hawaii Pearl Open." Yanagisawa was tied with Japan Pro Tetsuji Hiratsuka after regulation play at 14-under par and won on the first playoff hole (par 4 18th) with a par. Hiratsuka started the day at 6-under par and stormed back in today's final round with an 8-under par 64. 19-year-old Japan LPGA star SAKURA (below) made her professional predominately male tournament debut in the 27th HPO and fired rounds of 67-70-71--208, 6-under par. She had huge galleries and countless media from here and Japan following her everyday/every move. Japan professional Ichiya Kawano aced the par 3 16th hole with a 5 iron in the first round. Japan Pro Satoshi Shimouchi fired an official record score of 9-under par in round one. The birdie leaders were Parker McLachlin & Tetsuji Hiratsuka with 18, the field scoring average was 72.52, the most difficult hole was the par 3 13th hole playing to .29 strokes over par while the easiest the par 5 5th at .42 strokes under par and a whopping 34 eagles carded thru 54 holes.

808Golf.com also experienced a new trying situation this year, an exponential increase of visitors to our web site. We broke records too with respect to visitors logging on in a day. Behind the scenes we had a tough time trying to input the data into our scoring & stats section because the site was so busy our connection was timing out frequently. Good thing tough as its nice to know golfers world wide visit us for Hawaii Golf information. We will try to improve that for next year as SAKURA said she would really love to return if Pearl invites her again. Of course I can't do all of this on my own, much thanks needs to be given. First, I would like to thank Pearl Country Club's David Ishii, Mel Nagata and the rest of the crew for all the support/help. Mark Kawashima, Arnold & Elo Hiura, Corrine Toyama & Sue Asao for all their help and patience inputting the data everyday. Kimo and Midge, the Sakura crew Camie Hoshino, Mari Chun, Randy Javar and Tommy Yamashita, all the players who wore 808Golf.com shirts (you know who you are) and all the players who turned in their daily stat cards (you know who you are). Mahalo, mahalo, mahalo!

2005 Prize Money. The total purse for the 2005 Hawaii Pearl Open is $80,000. Professionals will compete for $77,500 in prize money.  Amateurs will compete for $2,500 in merchandise certificates.

1 $12,000

2 $9,000

3 $7,000

4 $6,000

5 $5,000

6 $4,000

7 $3,500

8 $3,000

9 $2,500

10 $2,200

11 $1,900

12 $1,600

13 $1,400

14 $1,300

15 $1,200

16 $1,100

17 $1,000

18 $900

19 $800

20 $750

21 $700

22 $650

23 $600

24 $550

25 $500

26 $450

27 $400

28 $375

29 $350

30 $325

31 $300

32-40 $200

41-50 $100

51-70 $75

71+ $55