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Wow, I missed this completely .. Thanks Doc for updates.

Wow! C'mon Daniel! 
Get your second title of the year!!!!!!!!

Daniel have played good all three days and scored lot of birdies. But first two days he had few bogeys along with birdies that prevented him from going to top. In first round he had 6 birdies and 3 bogeys, while Allenby led the first round with -5. In the second round Allenby continued to lead as he he scored -4 to go to -9, while Daniel could climb up to T3 as he had 5 birdies along with 3 bogeys to go to -5. With 4 strokes behind the leader Allenby, and three strokes behind another Australian Aaron Baddeley(-8), Daniel had to somehow stop those bogeys to challenge the two locals. In the third round Daniel did much better as he scored 8 birdies and gave away only one bogey to go to -12, while Allenby stumbled with one over par round. However, the other Aussie Aaron along with Barnes is still playing well and remains a threat at second spot, just one stroke behind the Dan. Here is the scorecard of the players who will fight it out on Sunday. Hopefully Dan will prevail.

1. CHOPRA, Daniel  -12    69 70 65   
2. BARNES, Kurt    -11    69 71 65   
  BADDELEY, Aaron  -11    70 66 69   
4. PAMPLING, Rod    -9    69 71 67   
5. FINCH, Richard    -8    70 71 67   
  APPLEBY, Stuart  -8    69 71 68   
  ALLENBY, Robert  -8    67 68 73   
8. LONARD, Peter    -7    70 71 68   
  McILROY, Rory    -7    70 69 70   

In the above list, there are 6 Australian who will be the crowd favorite. Note that Daniel also has strong Australian connection as his wife Sam is Australian. Good Luck Dan!

Daniel scored his 2nd pgatour victory in the 2008 season opener Mercedes-Benz Championship at Kapaula, Hawaii.  See the PGAtour thread for more details.
As expected, with this win Daniel for the first time cracked the top 100 in world ranking. Daniel, who was 120 in WR before the tournament, jumps to his all time high at 61.

Yes and he also climbs to 2nd in the European Ryder Cup World Points List.

Daniel's victory at Mercedes Championship also lofted him into the top 64 ranking in the world and that means an invitation to play at the World Golf Championships-Accenture Match Play Championship.  This tournament pits golfers against each other in a match-play format - somewhat simlar to a tennis tournament - where the number 1 ranked player goes head-to-head with the #64, #2 plays #63 and so on, and the winners advance to round of 16, QF, SF and final.  Currently Dan is ranked #60 in the world and is on the bubble because there are a few tournaments left to be played before the World Golf Championships-Accenture Match Play Championship is held from February 20 to 24, 2008.  Dan has done well at AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am and a top 3 finish could keep him in the top 64. 

  56    Peter Lonard,  Aus   
  57    Brendan Jones,  Aus   
  58    Camilo Villegas,  Col   
  59    John Senden,  Aus   
  60    Daniel Chopra,  Swe     
  61    Colin Montgomerie,  Sco   
  62    Pat Perez,  USA   
  63    Carl Pettersson,  Swe   
  64    Mikko Ilonen,  Fin     
  65    Jonathan Byrd,  USA     
  66    Sean O'Hair,  USA   
  67    Heath Slocum,  USA   
  68    Simon Dyson,  Eng     
  69    John Rollins,  USA     
  70    Davis Love-III,  USA 

Last year, Jeev Milkha Singh played in this tournament and lost to Stewart Cink in the first round.

Check out this news at Golf Channel.

“A couple of years ago at Westchester my wife, Sam, went shopping in downtown Chappaqua,” he (Daniel Chopra) explained to me. Chappaqua is the New York home for the Clintons, and Bill happened to be out for a stroll when Sam, a striking brunette, made her bold move.

“So she went up to Mr. Clinton and said, ‘Excuse me Mr. President but my husband is Daniel Chopra, a professional golfer, and he’s a big fan of yours and he’s always wanted to play golf with you.’”

I don’t know what they call that where Clinton’s from in Arkansas or where Sam’s from in Australia or where Daniel’s from in India. Where I’m from that’s called chutzpah. That’s Yiddish for gumption.

No doubt you’re wondering how Clinton responded. Well, he’s since played twice with Daniel in South Florida. You never know unless you ask, right?

Chopra, Clinton and the Red Eye

Thanks Doc for sharing this interesting info ... Dan and Sam r interesting couple ..

World Golf Championships-Accenture Match Play Championship

Daniel Chopra is at 61st place in world ranking and the top 64 golfers get invited to the World Golf Championships-Accenture Match Play Championship.  Martin Kaymer, a 23 year-old golfer, won the Abu Dhabi Championship and jumped 42 places to be ranked 34th this week.  Dan missed the cut last week and it did not help his cause and he is not playing this week. 

Daniel Chopra has made the field of this month's World Golf Championship.  The seeding will occur once the golfers have informed the tournament organizers of their intention to play by next Monday.  It appears that Daniel will meet the third seed in the first round, but our Dan - da man - had defeated him in a playoff at Mercedes Championship. 

Dan will be playing Masters for the first time next week. He is in the line for Ryder Cup team, but he needs one more good performance to seal his spot. Here is an article on Dan in the Player Watch column

Some members know a lot about Daniel Chopra and some may know very little about him.  He won the season's first PGA tournament in 2008 - The Mercedes Championship - and learned to play golf in Delhi.  I did not know that his grandfather, Mr Dev Chopra, helped found the Delhi Golf Club.

Here are some more trivia and see how many you can answer:

- Now that he lives in Orlando, Florida fulltime while playing on the US PGA Tour, is he a pro-Democrat or a pro- Republican?

- The US President many American pro-golfers dislike, but is Dan's favorite President?

- Obama or McCain?

- With what sport does he want to tie golf in India?

For answers, check World of Dan

Indeed interesting ... Thanks Doc for sharing this with us.

Thanks a lot Doc.  I didn't know that his grandfather helped found the Delhi Golf Club.

Thanks Bhushan. That was a nice article on Dan.

With Indian golf star on the wane, it was good to read in my local newspaper (but, surprisingly, not here) that Daniel flirted with a 59 over the weekend. He had a one shot lead yesterday with that great round and after the cancellation of today's round, he won. This is in the Nationwide tour.