Victor Perez became the first French winner of the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship after one of the most exciting finishes in the history of the event, winning by one shot from England’s Matthew Southgate at St Andrews. Whilst, at the same time, Rory McIlroy, finishing tied for 26th place complains to the BBC that the European Tour is too easy.
The Sanderson Farms Championship from the Country Club of Jackson delivered another first-time winner when Sebastian Munoz saw off 2019 Rookie of the Year, Sungjae Im, on the first hole of a playoff. It was the Columbian’s first tour victory and follows the win by Joaquin Niemann of Chile at last week’s win at the A Military Tribute at the Greenbrier.
The Tour Championship is looking like it will provide a thrilling finale to the men’s season on Sunday as at the halfway point as Brooks Koepke leads Rory McIlroy and Justin Thomas by one stroke, with Xander Schauffele and Paul Casey still very much in contention.
It’s Manic Monday, so here is a very quick round up of all the results and stories from the weekend on the PGA Tour, European Tour, LPGA and Women’s European Tour.
The GolfPunk team love the game of golf and are big supporters of the idea of improving the etiquette on the course and in general. However, this week the big news running around social media was about the US amateur golfer that carded an impressively poor 194 for 18 holes and things got worse when the Florida State Golf Association confirmed it was actually a 131 over par 202!
Hughie's is the 416 yards, par 4 first hole on the Royal Portrush course. There is out of bounds on both sides of the hole with most golfers most concerned with that on the right. However, as there are bunkers on the right and left of the fairway at 262 yards and 291 yards respectively, most pros will go with an iron.
Congratulations to Gary Woodland who stood firm under the pressure of a charging Brooks Koepka, the world number one and winner of four of the last eight majors he had played in. Others launched a challenge, most notably England’s Justin Rose, but all faded away as Woodland stuck to his task.
I just placed a bet on the US Open. I got odds of just shy of 6/1 on one Mr Brooks Koepka. My heart is with Justin Rose and, if his amazing short game continues, he may well win but my head says that Koepka will come through to make history.
Justin Rose shot a third round 68 to close the gap on leader Gary Woodland to just one shot, with the field a further three shots back. Looming ominously in the pair’s rear-view mirror is one Brooks Koepka who shot a bogey free round of 68 to continue his slow, but continuous, move up the leaderboard.
Tom Watson, a five time major winner, had often struggled at the US Open and coming in to the 1982 event he was not in great form. The US Open was the one he really wanted and to get it he was going to have to beat arguably the best ever golfer, Jack Nicklaus. He did it and will forever be remembered for ‘the shot’ on the par three 17th of the final day.
You have to go back a long time to remember a Masters when so many players, at some point, were arguably in contention to grab that fabled Green Jacket. We know who ultimately prevailed but what happened to other runners who came up short when the chips were down? Here is GP's rundown of the how the main contenders finished.
Tiger Woods. The incredible story so far...
