PGA

• Lessons from the British Opens

  By Gerard Gallagher, Golf Editor (Sports Network) - One thing's for sure about the 2010 British Opens: They were three of the most exciting tournaments of the year.

  I'm kidding, of course. We got two borderline snoozers and one mildly dramatic finish in the lot.

  There was more wind and rain than storylines in these championships, when everybody knows the best British Opens have an equal dose of all three.

  Our winners, of course, were Louis Oosthuizen, Bernhard Langer and Yani Tseng. Or: Who?, That Guy and Her Again.

  Oosthuizen's win was a can't-believe-what-I'm-seeing rout, Langer captured his first senior major and Tseng got past a case of the yips for a tight win on Sunday, moving three-quarters of the way to the career grand slam at the age of 21.

  About the best thing that happened for golf was that, clearly, the best player won all three championships. As good as Oosthuizen, Langer and Tseng were, that can't be argued.

  We did learn several other things:LOUIS WHO? Oosthuizen treated the media to champagne following his win, perhaps as a reward for the journalists who tried so hard to learn the correct pronunciation of his name.

  We learned that it's WUHST-hy-zen and not OOS-thu-zen as I'd always pronounced it. (His full name, Lodewicus Theodorus Oosthuizen, is worthy of a Harry Potter book.) We also learned that the 27-year-old South African has ice water in his veins.

  I mean, for the love of Biltong, the guy didn't blink on the way to winning by seven shots over Lee Westwood, who's only been in contention in each of the last 127 majors.

  Oosthuizen then traveled to Sweden for the Scandinavian Masters, where he earned a share of the 18-hole lead four days after his win at St. Andrews -- the fourth round in a row that he was atop the leaderboard in Europe.

  The best thing about being back on the course so soon after earning his first major championship? "It's nice being inside the ropes knowing my cell phone is switched off and no one can contact me," Oosthuizen said.

  Louis Who? Not anymore. Now it's Louis You-Know-Who.

  BETTER, LANGER & UNCHALLENGED Langer was a Hall of Famer five years before he was eligible to play on the 50-and-over Champions Tour, having achieved worldwide success as the greatest German golfer of all time.

  He won two Masters titles and dozens of international events, then arrived with a bang on the elder circuit, collecting 10 victories before his third anniversary on the Champions Tour.

  But a senior major eluded him until he went wire-to-wire at prickly Carnoustie for a one-shot win over Corey Pavin.

  What we learned is that, as great as Langer had been since turning 50 in 2007, his Champions Tour resume was incomplete until he landed that first major.

  "I was Player of the Year two years running [on the Champions Tour], won the money list and all sorts of stuff, but I had not won a major yet," Langer said afterward. "So this is certainly again something I have not done in my career before as a senior, and it's something I've always wanted.

  "Well, always is the wrong word; for the last two years I've wanted to win a major, and hopefully there's more to come." He didn't have to wait long. Langer beat Fred Couples by three shots to win the U.S. Senior Open on Sunday at Sahalee, becoming the first player since Tom Watson in 2003 to capture back-to-back majors on the Champions Tour.

  YANI LIVE AT ROYAL BIRKDALE Tseng also went wire-to-wire, picking up her victory this past Sunday at Royal Birkdale to end three consecutive weeks of British Opens.

  She overcame a back-nine case of the yips and holed a gutsy five-foot par putt at No. 18 to beat Katherine Hull by a shot, weeping openly on the shoulders of her caddie at the end of a tense day.

  Amazingly, the 21-year-old from Taiwan became the youngest golfer in the modern era -- male or female -- with three major championships. Tseng also captured the 2008 LPGA Championship and this year's Kraft Nabisco.

  What did we learn? That the LPGA Tour is even more wide-open than we thought in the wake of Lorena Ochoa's retirement.

  Despite the fact that Tseng's victory on Sunday marked her second major championship of the season, she has by no means dominated the women's game this season.

  She entered the week ranked No. 5 in the world behind four players from four different countries. Three of those players -- Jiyai Shin, Ai Miyazato and Cristie Kerr -- have played ping pong with the No. 1 ranking since Ochoa stepped away from the game in May.

  And just when we thought we had the elite of the women's game nailed down -- Shin, Miyazato, Kerr and perhaps U.S. Women's Open champion Paula Creamer, when she's finally all the way healthy again -- Tseng came forward with a machine-like masterpiece to throw her name into the ring.

  I don't know who will end this season as the women's No. 1. But I know that whoever earns that distinction will have something this side of a cake walk to get there.

  LESS THAN 'WOODSIAN' "Woodsian" is a name that one of my readers came up with a few years ago to describe the type of performances that had, at the time, become commonplace for Tiger Woods.

  It was coined right around the time of Woods' dismantling of the field at the 2007 PGA Championship, if I remember correctly, and I've used it to describe more than a couple of victories since.

  We are, however, living in a different world at the moment.

  Woods tied for 23rd at the British Open after sharing fourth at both the Masters and the U.S. Open. Good finishes for a guy whose personal life is in more pieces than a golf ball that has just been run over by a mower? Sure.

  But what we have learned about Woods -- a lesson hammered home by a week spent out of contention at St. Andrews -- is that he is a different golfer right now, plain and simple.

  Two years ago, after Woods won the '08 U.S. Open on a broken leg for his 14th major championship, I was asked in a radio interview when Woods would match Jack Nicklaus' record of 18 majors.

  My reply was quick: "At the 2010 British Open." This was a season, after all, that was littered with major championship venues where Woods had dominated before. Augusta, Pebble Beach and St. Andrews are among his favorite places to play, giving him three very good chances to win.

  Instead, Woods remains stuck on 14 majors, having been bested by Phil Mickelson, Graeme McDowell and Oosthuizen on those three courses.

  If I was asked the same question today, I think my response would come just as quickly: "I can't say for sure that he ever will."

  08/01 20:40:01 ET