However staid and predictable it may seem, golf is never short of odd little curios that conveniently help us learn a little more about life in general. This week alone, Iestyn George realises that even men of enormous ego have honour, that you're only as good as your last tour win and that he already needs another holiday - preferably in Wisconsin...

 

Oh, what a beauty! ... The US Golf Association, more than 100 years old now, is starting to show some sense. Here's the latest announcement from USGA HQ: The practically brand-spanking-new Chambers Bay (above pic) on Puget Sound, Washington state, a daily-fee stunner which has only been open since last June, will be the site of the 2015 US Open. The course will also host the 2010 US Amateur.

The links course, designed by Robert Trent Jones Jr with its old-school Scottish feel in the hopes of attracting a major championship, is the latest in a line of courses accessible to the public which have found their way onto the US Open rota, following Bethpage Black (New York) and Torrey Pines South (California). It's also rated the best new course of 2007 by Golfweek and Travel & Leisure Golf Magazine.

But what a honey this is. The former sand and gravel quarry costs anywhere from $75-171 to play 18 holes, but Chambers Bay will have no problem attracting spectators or players ... the seaside links is only 20 minutes from Tacoma, Washington, and only an hour's drive from grunge-capital Seattle. The course only has one mature tree, but when the tree looks like Chambers Bay's does, who cares?

Which leaves us only one question: When can we go, boss? When can we go? (OK, that's the same question twice, but the point remains the same).

Don't tell him we told you, because we don't want to jinx the big fellow ... but our favourite Swede Henrik Stenson could be on the verge of one of those wacky golfing feats that we love so much at IGWT.

Not long ago we told you about how big Henrik had flown some 45,000 miles in search of the bucks and golfing trophies. Air Warrior Supreme. Then, we told you about Henrik's hush-hush scouting mission to daily-fee Torrey Pines, where he paid his own greens fees and teed it up with the plebs. Municipal Golf Warrior Supreme.

Now, Henrik is in Abu Dhabi, gunning it out in the star-studded field at the Abu Dhabi Golf Championship. So far, so good: Stenson, one of the early starters, fired a 5-under 67 Thursday and was one shot off the lead after the first round. Big deal you say? Think about it: If Stenson can win in Abu Dhabi, he would be the first man to complete the trifecta of victories in all the major championships of the United Arab Emirates (Stenson won the Qatar Masters in 2006 and last year added the prestigious Dubai Desert Classic trophy to his collection).

Some people collect the colourful stamps from the UAE: Henrik Stenson collects golf trophies. And more power to him, because we love nicknames at IGWT ... Go Henrik of Arabia!