Taking his game to the highest level

The concept hasn't changed since the modern version of golf started developing in Scotland hundreds of years ago.

If you want to play well, hit the fairways, hit the greens and get the ball into the hole.

That will be Jeff Sorenson's credo this week at Atlanta Athletic Club when he tees off in the PGA Championship as one of 20 to advance out of the PGA Professional National Championship in June.

"I'll keep it like any other tournament," Sorenson, the director of instruction at Columbia Golf Course in Minneapolis, said of playing in his first PGA Championship -- or any major. "I've been telling everybody, 'It's just golf. It's nothing too special and not an exact science.' I can't change my approach to it."

True, 18 holes is 18 holes to start off any tournament. But in this one, his 9:10 a.m. Eastern tee time in Round 1 on Thursday comes 35 minutes after the threesome of Tiger Woods, Davis Love III and Padraig Harrington.

Not exactly just another group of guys sticking a peg into the ground.

"I feel like I'm supposed to be there," Sorenson said. "I have enough game to play at the next level."

A former Evans Scholar at the University of Minnesota -- though he never played for the Gophers -- Sorenson, 32, turned professional in 2000. He had a pair of Minnesota PGA Assistant Player of the Year titles under his belt by 2005 and has been the Minnesota Section Player of the Year three years running.

"He's one of our better if not the best player in the Minnesota Section," President Paul Kelley said. "I know at some point he'd like to be out there with those [PGA Tour] guys week in and week out."

Sorenson almost got his first chance a year ago. But a 7-over-par 79 in the final round of the Professional National Championship at French Lick Resort in Indiana left him in 21st place.

"This was kind of a little redemption," Sorenson said of finishing in a tie for eighth at Pennsylvania's Hershey Country Club after holding the first-round lead. "I didn't win, so I wasn't satisfied. But I'm going to the PGA. If I can play well there, things would change quite a bit."

Atlanta Athletic Club, a par-70 course, is set up this week to play 7,467 yards. That's welcome news to Sorenson, who said he would be in the top 30 percent on the PGA Tour off the tee -- "long, but not Bubba Watson long," he said -- and considers one of his strengths to be his iron play.

Sorenson has lofty goals this week. His main focus is on making the 36-hole cut in the 156-man field, and if that happens, he's aiming for a top-10 position for the weekend.

And -- oh, what the heck -- from there he hopes to be the one hoisting the Wanamaker Trophy on Sunday.

No player from the PGA Professional qualifier has finished better than Tommy Bolt's third-place result in 1971. Last year at Whistling Straits, only one made the 71-player cut, and Rob Labritz shot 74-77 (7 over) on the weekend to finish in a tie for 68th place. Martin Kaymer defeated Watson in a playoff after both finished at 11 under for the championship.

Still, Sorenson packed six outfits -- two for practice, four for play -- before flying to Atlanta this week.