A year ago, Jason Gore was preparing to play on the A.G. Spanos mini-tour in Southern California. You get unlimited range balls, pay a $950 entry fee each week and the 16 events pay out a combined $2.3 million.

Today, he tees off with the rest of last year's PGA Tour champions in the $5.4 million Mercedes Championships at Kapalua's Plantation Course. He is put up at the Ritz-Carlton, drives a Benz for the week and, still, gets unlimited range balls.

Gore, 31, is the latest chapter in the endless reality series Golf is a Goofy Game.

He burst into our consciousness at last year's U.S. Open. It was a few days after most of the little he owned was stolen from his car while he and his wife, Megan, drove to Pinehurst, and a month after he wondered whether he could cover the cost of formula for their baby.

The burglary became a feel-good story when Gore, with his size-40 neck and relentless good humor, surged into a tie for the U.S. Open lead after two rounds. His larger-than-life upbeat presence continued through a final-round 84 and was rewarded when he went back to the Nationwide Tour and won a record three straight events.

His next reward was to get kicked off the tour or, more accurately, kicked up to the PGA Tour. He won the fourth time he teed it up to earn a ticket to paradise. During a practice round early this week, Gore saw the big blue Mercedes sign and caught his breath.

"All of a sudden you get a flashback of everything that's happened and everything you've dreamed about for so many years," Gore said. "It's kind of right here and right now. That pretty much sums it up. Just shows you what a great game golf is, how fast things can happen, how it's blind, how it could happen to anybody."

Gore is the 2005 Nationwide Player of the Year. He finished second on the money list with more than $350,000 in just 12 events before his promotion sent him into the lucrative world of the PGA Tour, where he picked up another $870,000 to keep 15-month old Jaxon in formula.

The guy who helped Pepperdine to the 1997 NCAA title started last year No. 668 in the World Golf Ranking and finished No. 88, jokingly blaming it on "a little perseverance and grit and maybe a little ignorance."

He marvels at people telling him he was their inspiration to start golfing. Gore's standard reply is, "I'm sorry," with a smile. He thanks Tiger Woods for making golf cool and admits without him "my story might have just been a blip in the comics section." He calls Woods "a physical specimen" and joked that his own 6-foot-2, 235-pound body should be "donated to science fiction."

The day after he won his first tour event (84 Lumber Classic), Gore drove to Idaho to play in Nationwide's Boise Open because organizers had given him an exemption back in 1997 — the week his father died.

He doesn't forget — favors, or his past. He admitted to a strange sensation New Year's Eve — that maybe all his spectacular success the past six months would leave with 2005 and the struggles that followed his father's death would return. He shrugged it off.

"I was a little worried when the clock struck midnight, going into a new year," Gore said. "But that's what makes golf a great game. You're only as good as the last shot you hit. You move on from there, and hopefully get off to a good start this week, and see what happens."

ISHII GETS EXEMPTION FOR CHAMPIONS EVENT

Turtle Bay has given Hawai'i's David Ishii an exemption to play in the Turtle Bay Championship at its Palmer Course. It is the first full-field event of the Champions Tour season and will be Ishii's first start on the U.S. senior tour.

The tournament is Jan. 27 to 29, following the winners-only MasterCard Championship at Hualalai. Ishii, 50, qualified to play in next week's Sony Open in Hawai'i. He won the 1990 Hawaiian Open and has also won 14 Japan PGA events. Ishii also started the David S. Ishii Foundation, which sponsors the state high school championships here and provides financial and instructional aid for juniors.

"With David getting ready to start his senior career we thought it would be very fitting," Turtle Bay Director of Golf Matt Hall said. "He has been a driving force — what he's done professionally as a player but even more so what he's done for golf in Hawai'i. Anyone involved in the game in this state respects him as a player and a person."

Ishii failed to qualify for the Champions Tour last year, playing less than a month after suffering from mumps. He did play in Japan's three major senior events, finishing a stroke out of first in his debut.

"If I play good in the seniors I have a better chance of placing," Ishii said. "I just feel more at home with the older guys. It's a different feeling. Playing with the younger guys, you think you can do it, but somehow it's not the same. Five or six years makes a big difference."

He plans to play in eight senior events later this year in Japan and then possibly try to qualify for the Champions Tour again. Ishii also could return to the Japan tour's regular qualifying, which he started last year. The fourth round was snowed out and is being rescheduled.

NOTES

A team headed by PGA pro Heath Slocum shot a 52 yesterday to win the pro-am tournament. Slocum's teammates were Ryokichi Tamaki, John Luby, Jon Fogg and Javier Cano. K.J. Choi's team (56) finished second, followed by teams headed by John Cook (57), Ted Purdy (57) and Ryan Moore (57).

TODAY'S TEE TIMES

FIRST ROUND

1ST TEE

11:10 a.m.—Carl Pettersson, Raleigh, N.C.; Heath Slocum, Pensacola, Fla.; 11:20 a.m.—Wes Short, Jr., Austin, Texas; Lucas Glover, Greenville, S.C. 11:30 a.m.—Robert Gamez, Celebration, Fla.; K.J. Choi, Woodlands, Texas. 11:40 a.m.—Mark Calcavecchia, West Palm Beach, Fla.; Jason Gore, Valencia, Calif. 11:50 a.m.—Brad Faxon, Barrington, R.I.; Olin Browne, Hobe Sound, Fla.

Noon—Ben Crane, Westlake, Texas; Vaughn Taylor, Augusta, Ga. 12:10 p.m.—Sean O'Hair, Boothwyn, Pa,; Jason Bohn, Cartersville, Ga. 12:20 p.m.—Michael Campbell, Wellington, New Zealand; Jim Furyk, Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla. 12:30 p.m.—Bart Bryant, Ocoee, Fla.; Sergio Garcia, Castellon, Spain. 12:40 p.m.—Tim Petrovic, Dade City, Fla.; Ted Purdy, Phoenix, Ariz. 12:50 p.m.—Fred Funk, Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla.; Peter Lonard, Sydney, Australia.

1 p.m.—Geoff Ogilvy, Scottsdale, Ariz.; Kenny Perry, Franklin, Ky. 1:10 p.m.—Justin Leonard, Dallas; David Toms, Shreveport, La. 1:20 p.m.—Stuart Appleby, Orlando, Fla.; Vijay Singh, Fiji Islands.

Reach Ann Miller at amiller@honoluluadvertiser.com.