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Mahan Triumphs in Travelers Playoff
Hunter Mahan achieved his first PGA Tour victory at the Travelers Championship after beating Jay Williamson in a one hole playoff that thrilled spectators and viewers with quality shot making.
The final pairing at the final round of the Travelers Championship featured two men with a lot to play for. Jay Williamson, a former PGA Tour player who lost his playing privileges, was one round away from earning back his playing rights and a two year exemption on the PGA Tour. Hunter Mahan, the young man from Orange, California who was a junior and amateur standout, was looking to prove that he could capitalize the golfing potential so many had dubbed him with.
With so much pressure and so much to play for, odds were good that either Mahan or Williamson would succumb to the nerves inherent in obtaining an elusive tour victory. However, the opposite seemed to happen – both players seemed to thrive under the pressure. Williamson began the day with a one shot lead, and from the beginning both players made it clear they were playing to win. Throughout the day, the two traded birdies like heavyweight fighters trying hard to knock their opponent out, only to have them charge back.
Both players played near perfect front nines, with Mahan making the turn one shot ahead of Williamson. However, Williamson quickly caught fire on the back with birdies on 11, 13, and 15. Mahan matched him with consecutive birdies at 11, 12, and 13. However, bogies at 16 and 17 gave Williamson a one shot lead. Both players arrived at 18 and found the fairway with their tee shots. Williamson was away and hit a fantastic approach to twelve feet. After a brief conversation with his caddie John Wood who reassured him of their strategy, Mahan did not hesitate and put his 9 iron approach to six feet inside of Williamson’s ball, on the exact same line. Mahan said, "We had a good yardage and just went with it. I went right at it. I mean, there’s no reason not to. I figured he was going to make birdie. He just kind of had that putt. So was just going to be aggressive with it and luckily made a great swing." Williamson pushed his putt just slightly to the right and Mahan went to school on the putt and payed close attention. Mahan’s putt was center cut and after 72 holes the two players were tied.
If the first time through the 18th hole wasn’t dramatic enough, the players found a way to improve on their performance. After finding the fairway, Williamson managed to put his approach to six feet. However, Mahan again managed to get inside Williamson putting his approach to three feet for a tap-in birdie. Williamson missed his putt again, and Mahan converted for his first PGA Tour victory. For Mahan, this victory is especially important, since his very first victory on Tour changes his career and season from this point on. However, Mahan said just knowing he can win was the biggest benefit, "Just you know the fact that — the fact that I know I won out here means a lot. I mean, it’s just knowing that you can win and actually winning is two different things. And to win it the way I did is just amazing to me. To have to birdie in a playoff especially after he hit that shot in there is mind-boggling."
For Williamson, who pulled out many resilient par saves on the back nine to stay in contention, the victory was surely bitter-sweet. Although he wasn’t able to find his first victory, his $648,000 runner up check dwarfs the $150,000 he has earned thus far on the Nationwide Tour. However, more importantly, his prize money this week gives him special temporary member status on the PGA Tour for the rest of the year – meaning he won’t need to tee it up on the Nationwide Tour next week, and he will be in the field at next week’s Buick Open. "hopefully my performance today will help me maybe get some exemptions down the road. Hopefully I handled myself well and did the types of things that tournaments would want me in their events for, so we’ll see," Williamson said.
Pos | Player | R1 | R2 | R3 | R4 | Tot |
1 | Hunter Mahan | 62 | 71 | 67 | 65 | -15 |
2 | Jay Williamson | 66 | 66 | 67 | 66 | -15 |
3 | Nick O’Hern | 67 | 70 | 66 | 66 | -11 |
4 | Vijay Singh | 68 | 71 | 66 | 65 | -10 |
5 | Fred Funk | 70 | 65 | 67 | 69 | -9 |
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SuperStroke acquires Lamkin Grips
SuperStroke announced today its purchase of 100-year-old grip maker Lamkin Grips, citing the company’s “heritage of innovation and quality.”
“It is with pride and great gratitude that we announce Lamkin, a golf club grip brand with a 100-year history of breakthrough design and trusted products, is now a part of the SuperStroke brand,” says SuperStroke CEO Dean Dingman. “We have always had the utmost respect for how the Lamkin family has put the needs and benefits of the golfer first in their grip designs. If there is a grip company that is most aligned with SuperStroke’s commitment to uncompromised research, design, and development to put the most useful performance tools in the hands of golfers, Lamkin has been that brand. It is an honor to bring Lamkin’s wealth of product innovation into the SuperStroke family.”
Elver B. Lamkin founded the company in 1925 and produced golf’s first leather grips. The company had been family-owned and operated since that point, producing a wide array of styles, such as the iconic Crossline.
According to a press release, “The acquisition of Lamkin grows and diversifies SuperStroke’s proven and popular array of grip offerings with technology grounded in providing golfers optimal feel and performance through cutting-edge design and use of materials, surface texture and shape.”
CEO Bob Lamkin will stay on as a board member and will continue to be involved with the company.
“SuperStroke has become one of the most proven, well-operated, and pioneering brands in golf grips and we could not be more confident that the Lamkin legacy, brand, and technology is in the best of hands to continue to innovate and lead under the guidance of Dean Dingman and his remarkably capable team,” Lamkin said.
Related: Check out our 2014 conversation with Bob Lamkin, here: Bob Lamkin on the wrap grip reborn, 90 years of history
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Tour Rundown: Pendrith, Otaegui, Longbella, and Dunlap soar
Take it from a fellow who coaches high school golf in metro Toronto: there’s plenty of great golf played in the land of the maple leaf. All the greats have designed courses over the USA border: Colt, Whitman, Ross, Coore, Mackenzie, Doak, as well as the greatest of the land, Stanley Thompson. I’m partial to him, because he wore my middle name with grandeur. Enough about the architecture, because this week’s Tour Rundown begins with a newly-minted, Canadian champion on the PGA Tour. Something else that the great white north is known for, is weather. It impacted play on three of the world’s tours, forcing final-round cancellations on two of them.
It was an odd week in the golf world. The LPGA and the Korn Ferry were on a break, and only 13/15 of the rounds slated, were played. In the end, we have four champions to recognize, so let’s not delay any longer with minutiae about the game that we love. Let’s run it all down with this week’s Tour Rundown.
PGA Tour: TP takes TS at Byron’s place
The 1980s was a decade when a Canadian emergence was anticipated on the PGA Tour. It failed to materialize, but a path was carved for the next generation. Mike Weir captured the Masters in 2003, but no other countrymen joined him in his quest for PGA Tour conquest. 2024 may herald the long-awaited arrival of a Canadian squad of tour winners. Over the past few years, we’ve seen Nick Taylor break the fifty-plus year dearth of homebred champions at the Canadian Open, and players like Adam Hadwin, Corey Conners, Adam Svennson, and Mackenzie Hughes have etched their names into the PGA Tour’s annals of winners.
This week, Taylor Pendrith joined his mates with a one-shot win at TPC Craig Ranch, the home of the Byron Nelson Classic. Pendrith took a lead into the final round and, while the USA’s Jake Knapp faltered, held on for the slimmest of victories. Sweden’s Alex Noren posted six-under 65 on Sunday to move into third position, at 21-under par. Ben Kohles, a Texan, looked to break through for his first win in his home state. He took the lead from Pendrith at the 71st hole, on the strength of a second-consecutive birdie.
With victory in site, Kohles found a way to make bogey at the last, without submerging in the fronting water. His second shot was greenside, but he could not move his third to the putting surface. His fourth was five feet from par and a playoff, but his fifth failed to drop. Meanwhile, Pendrith was on the froghair in two, and calmly took two putts from 40 feet, for birdie. When Kohles missed for par, Pendrith had, at last, a PGA Tour title.
360° and in!
A nervy par save by @TaylorPendrith to remain one back as he seeks his first PGA TOUR victory @CJByronNelson. pic.twitter.com/LVFXUSidSg
— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) May 5, 2024
DP World Tour: China Open in Otaegui’s hands after canceled day four
It wasn’t the fourth round that was canceled in Shenzhen, but the third. Rains came on Saturday to Hidden Grace Golf Club, ensuring that momentum would cease. Sunday would instead be akin to a motorsports restart, with no sense of who might claim victory. Sebastian Soderberg, the hottest golfer on the Asian Swing, held the lead, but he would slip to a 72 on Sunday, and tie for third with Paul Waring and Joel Girrbach. Italy’s Guido Migliozzi completed play in 67 strokes on day three, moving one shot past the triumvirate, to 17-under par.
It was Spain’s Adrian Otaegui who persevered the best and played the purest. Otaegui was clean on the day, with seven birdies for 65. Even when Migliozzi ceased the lead at the 10th, Otaegui remained calm. With everything on the line, Migliozzi made bogey at the par-five 17th, as his principal competitor finished in birdie. To the Italian’s credit, he bounced back with birdie at the last, to claim solo second. The victory was Otaegui’s fifth on the DP World Tour, and first since October of 2022.
.@adrianotaegui birdies the 16th to tie the lead at -17 ?#VolvoChinaOpen pic.twitter.com/p4tfE5DRJa
— DP World Tour (@DPWorldTour) May 5, 2024
PGA Tour Americas: Quito’s rains gift title to Longbella
Across the world, superintendents and their staffs will do anything to prepare a course for play. Even after fierce, nightime rains, the Quito TG Club greeted the first four groups on Sunday. The rains worsened after 7 am, however, and the tour was forced to abort the final round of play. With scores reverting to Saturday’s numbers, Thomas Longbella’s one-shot advantage over Gunn Yang turned into a Tour Americas victory.
64 held the opening-day lead, and Longbella was not far off, with 66. Yang jumped to the top on day two, following a67 with 66. He posted 68 on day three, and anticipated a fierce, final-round duel for the title. As for Longbella, he fought off a ninth-hole bogey on Saturday with six birdies and a 17th-hole eagle. That rare bird proved to be the winning stroke, allowing Longbella to edge past Yang, and secure ultimate victory.
.@TBalla21 eagles 17, shoots 65 on Saturday to take a one-shot lead into the final round of the KIA Open. pic.twitter.com/TTOL2LxSdh
— PGA TOUR Americas (@PGATOURAmericas) May 4, 2024
PGA Tour Champions: Dunlap survives Saturday stumble for win
Scott Dunlap did not finish Saturday as well as he might have liked. After beginning play near Houston with 65, Dunlap made two bogeys in his final found holes on day two, to finish at nine-under par. Hot on his heels was Joe Durant, owner of a March 2024 win on PGA Tour Champions. Just behind Durant was Stuart Appleby, perhaps vibing from his Sunday 59 at Greenbrier on this day in 2010. Neither would have a chance to track Dunlap down.
The rains that have forced emergency responders into action, to save hundreds of lives in the metro Houston area, ended hopes for a third day of play at The Woodlands. Dunlap had won once previously on Tour Champions, in 2014 in Washington state. Ten years later, Dunlap was the fortunate recipient of a canceled final round, and his two days of play were enough to earn him TC victory number two.
Off the green? No worries for @ScottDu12500063
8-under solo leader @InsperityInvtnl pic.twitter.com/hoj5OujL5C
— PGA TOUR Champions (@ChampionsTour) May 4, 2024
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Morning 9: Pendrith’s maiden Tour win | Morikawa back with former coach | Brooks victorious
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