Only 15 months after being crushed by the very presence of Tiger Woods, Canadian left-hander Mike Weir captured top prize of $1 million in the $5 million American Express Championship in ideal conditions here yesterday. And a measure of his maturity was that he could afford to take an eight at the notorious 17th on his way to victory, just as the world number one did last year.
Granted, Weir did it in the second round last Friday whereas when Woods had his problems, it was the 71st hole. And on this occasion, the 536-yard par-five was absolutely pivotal in deciding the overall shape of the leaderboard.
"Dig it up," demanded Nick Price on Friday. "I wouldn't be against that," said Woods a day later. Yesterday, the Zimbabwean destroyed his chance of victory by taking an eight there when within a stroke of the lead with two to play.
In the next two-ball, Woods took a seven, as did his playing partner Mark Calcavecchia. And when the final pair tackled this most unwelcome of penultimate hurdles, overnight leader Hidemichi Tanaka also found a watery grave. Tournament professionals are happy to claim they would play on airport runways if the money were right: after events here, one is tempted to think that the appeal lies in the absence of water.
Against that background, it wasn't difficult to understand why Padraig Harrington, with a handsome cheque beckoning, decided to lay up, even after hitting a fine drive down the middle of the fairway. "I had 215 yards to carry the water and without a three iron in my bag, the shot didn't appeal to me, especially off a downhill lie," he said.
Harrington had reason to be immensely proud of a performance in which he got right in among some of the world's leading players, despite an ongoing battle with his swing. Indeed a closing 70 in the company of Lee Westwood was an emphatic endorsement of the impressive progress he has made this year.
Starting the day in a share of sixth place on five under par, he had the set-back of an initial bogey when his eight-iron approach to the first green, clipped a branch to up short of the target. But with the grit of a consummate competitor, Harrington quickly recovered the stroke by sinking a 15-foot birdie putt at the short third.
From there, he covered the remaining holes in two under, following a bogey at the long fourth, where he three-putted from the back fringe, with two steady pars before carding a birdie at the long seventh. After reaching the turn in level par for the round, he improved his position to six under overall, by sinking a 20-footer at the 13th, and he carded another birdie at the 422-yard 16th, which he reduced to a four-wood, eight-iron and 15-foot putt.
Off the tee down the last, he managed to hold the right side of the fairway and eventually secured a solid par, with an outstanding two-putt from as much as 30 yards from the pin. Despite a luke-warm tournament with the blade, he managed not to three-putt from the putting surface throughout and covered the treacherous, final two holes in one under par over the four days.
Paul McGinley, who started the day in a share of 24th place, finished with a 73 for a share of 35th place and a cheque for £27,271. The 18th continued to be costly for him when he had a closing bogey to add to a sequence of par, double-bogey, bogey over the previous three rounds.
Darren Clarke's problem was that he failed to extract sufficient birdies from the vulnerable front nine where most of the hot scoring was done. While most of the better players produced at least one effort of 32 or 33 there over the weekend, Clarke's outward journeys were 38, 36, 35, 36 - a cumulative one over par.
On the homeward journey for the last time, he birdied the 13th with a nine-iron approach to nine feet and the long 17th, which he reached with a four-iron second shot. And he was unlucky to see a 10-foot birdie attempt slip past the hole at the last. Overall, however, his play lacked conviction.
When Weir was paired with Woods in the final round of the USPGA Championship at Medinah in August of last year, he crumbled in the spotlight. Frittering shots away like a novice, he eventually slipped to an embarrassing 80 which dropped him from the top of the leaderboard to a share of 10th place.
This time, he did things in reverse. Nine stroke off the lead at the halfway stage here, the lefthander covered the closing two rounds in 65, 69, which was easily the best scoring from the leading contenders. "Though it is obviously great to beat a field that includes Tiger Woods, the way I came back over the weekend, pleased me most," said the winner of last year's Air Canada Championship afterwards.
Tied second with Calcavecchia going into the last round, Weir scorched to the turn in 32 yesterday to reach 12 under par and be leading the championship by two strokes at that stage. And the key to his eventual triumph was that a bogey at the short 15th, where he missed the green, was the first stroke he conceded to par since the 17th on Friday.
"The way we were all packed together on the leaderboard on this course, I knew there would be a lot of swings," he added. "So my intention was to take each hole as it came and not get ahead of himself." In the event, he and Tanaka stood waiting on the 17th fairway, while Woods and Calcavecchia both took penalty drops after being in the water.
Weir steadied himself. This wasn't a time to gamble. After laying up in two, he had 77 yards to the flag and was taken-aback to see his L-wedge, which has a normal range of 80 yards, fly through the green. "I must have been pumped up," he grinned. But he made a fine up and down to establish a three-shot cushion, which allowed him the luxury of a bogey on the last.
