American Mark Calcavecchia limped to a three-stroke victory over England's Lee Westwood at the $2 million Sarazen World Open yesterday. Calcavecchia nearly blew a huge lead, but a one-underpar 71 was good enough on the Chateau Elan course. He finished with a tournament record low score of 17-under 271.

Calcavecchia birdied four of his first six holes to take a seemingly insurmountable 10-stroke lead, but he struggled on the back nine to hold off Westwood's charge.

The American clinched victory with a 30-foot birdie putt on the last green, after Westwood had moved to within two strokes following Calcavecchia's fourth bogey on the final nine holes on the 17th.

Calcavecchia, who led all four rounds after a tournament-record 62 the first day, had a 39 on the back nine to wind up with a oneunder-par 71.

The two Irish competitors, Padraig Harrington and Paul McGinley had contrasting final rounds but both ended in disappointment. Harrington plunged down the field after a 76 for a four round total of 290 - 19 shots behind the winner.

Meanwhile, Paul McGinley wound up a miserable weekend in bitter style, forced to accept a twostroke penalty for playing a wrong ball.

It happened at the par five 10th, when McGinley played the ball of partner Andrew Bonhomme of Australia. The Dubliner had to call the penalty on himself for the indicretion and eventually took a tripple-bogey eight.

"Both Andrew and I hit our tee shots down the middle but we were both playing Titleist 4s," said McGinley. "He was playing a red 4 and I was playing a black 4 with red dots, and when I got to what I thought was my ball, I saw the red 4 and played it.

"I'm totally responsible, and it was sickening when I realised what I had done. It's twice now I've done that because I recall doing the same thing at the Swiss Open about four years ago, so I'm going to have to change the markings on my golf ball."