South African Trevor Immelman has won more than $700,000 on the US Tour in the last two weeks - but it could so easily have been more than $1.2million. Immelman finished runner-up for the second Sunday running.
After going in the water on the final hole he lost the Byron Nelson Championship in Irving, Texas, to little-known American Brett Wetterich. It followed his play-off loss in the Wachovia Championship to Jim Furyk after he had three-putted the final green and then bogeyed the first extra hole as well.
"They were two great weeks - I think I'm playing the best golf of my career so far," said the 26-year-old Cape Town golfer, staying as positive as he could. "I think I've got to just keep plugging away and doing what I'm doing and eliminate a few of those errors and hopefully pick up a couple of trophies along the way.
"All day I've just been a little bit late on my tee shots and kind of left them out to the right a little bit, so on the 18th I tried to wait a little longer and hit my best drive of the day for me, but drew it too much against the breeze."
Immelman, one behind at the time after bogeying the 15th, ended up saving a brilliant par with an eight-iron to nine feet, but 32-year-old Wetterich did not buckle and made the four he needed.
"I was really proud of myself for holing that putt," added Immelman. "There was still some pressure there and you would rather finish second on your own than tied second. I'm 26 years old and I'm going to have hundreds of golf tournaments to play still, so I think for me it's just a case of trying to build on these last few achievements and hopefully close one out eventually.
"I wish I could have combined the two Sundays. Last week I hit the ball awful and putted probably the best I've putted under pressure and this week today I felt like I hit the ball easily good enough to do the job, but my putts were just too tentative."
Wetterich took the final place at last December's US Tour qualifying school, but although he was still outside the world's top 200 before his win, it did not come totally out of the blue.
Last month he was sixth in the Houston Open and fourth in the New Orleans Classic. "It's an unbelievable feeling," he said. "I'm a believer in signs - like after putting out yesterday the bagpipes started going off and it gave me the chills.
"I came out this morning and happened to sit in a cart next to Ted Purdy and his caddie and on the side of his bag it says '2005 Champion' and I was just kind of looking at that. A lot of weird things like that happened to me and I just felt like this was going to be my day."
Wetterich cried as he waited to make his tap-in for victory and explained afterwards he was thinking of his brother Mark. "He was killed in a car accident coming home from work three years ago. I put his initials on my golf bag and it kind of reminds me of him," he added.
Luke Donald finished joint sixth after following birdies at the 13th and 14th with an eagle on the long 16th, while Brian Davis' closing 65 lifted him from 39th to eighth.
Donald's performance lifted him back above David Howell into fifth place on the European Ryder Cup table. He and Immelman will be at the BMW Championship at Wentworth next week.
