Wade Ormsby – photo Paul Lakatos

South Australian, Wade Ormsby, overcame Chonlatit Chuenboonngam on the first hole of a sudden-death play-off to win the International Series Thailand today after a compelling finish at Black Mountain Golf Club in Hua Hin.

Ormsby triumphed after holing a 12-foot birdie putt on the par-five 18^th while Chonlatit missed his birdie attempt from eight feet.

The 42 year old Ormsby had trailed Chonlatit, the clubhouse leader on 20 under, by one shot with three to play but made a birdie on 16 and had a chance to win on the last when he splashed out to 12 feet from a greenside bunker but missed his birdie attempt to set up extra time.

The Australian closed with a seven-under-par 65 while little-known Chonlatit, a graduate from the Asian Development Tour (ADT) last year and playing the tournament of his life, shot a 64.

It’s the fourth Asian Tour victory of Ormsby’s career and the first since his win in the Hong Kong Open in 2020.

The US$2 million event was worth US$360,000 to Ormsby and after missing the cut  in New Zealand last week he was coming to terms with his turnaround.

“I can’t believe I am here,” said Ormsby. “I had a tough week down in New Zealand last week. I was so annoyed with myself as I knew I was playing well. I worked so hard with my coach Grant Field. I am so stoked.”

After playing LIV Golf for most of 2022, Ormsby lost his place in the line-up for 2023 but is keen to get back and knows wins such as this week’s can assist his cause.

“The Asian Tour and International Series are high up on my priority list, I’d love to get back on LIV, I just have to try and manage it all. I just so happy I have won an International Series event especially here at Black Mountain, I love the place.”

Sydney’s Kevin Yuan was the next best of the Australians when he finished in an impressive tie for 5th and earned US$82,000.

The Asian Tour heads to the subcontinent next for The DGC Open presented by Mastercard. The US$750,000 tournament is being played at Delhi Golf Club from March 16-19.

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Min Woo Lee – file photo – Bruce Young

Australians enjoy an impressive record at the Players Championship with five of them winning a total of six championships and two having finished runner-up, and, tomorrow, yet another name just might be added to the list.

The second and third rounds were completed on day three of the event at the TPC Sawgrass today with Min Woo Lee in or near the lead for much of round three after a hole out for eagle at his opening hole.

He was tied for the lead playing the last with the game’s current dominant player, Scottie Scheffler, but after driving it close to the water at the last and then missing the green right he took bogey to the birdie of Scheffler’s and as the event heads into tomorrow’s final day the difference between the pair is two.

Another two shots back is Cameron Davis who birdied his final two holes to move within striking distance.

For Lee, however, who has a start in this prestigious event by being (just) inside the top 50 in the world, the opportunity exists tomorrow to secure his status on the PGA Tour and if he were to win he would jump close to 20^th in the ranking and even a strong finish tomorrow might well earn him special temporary membership of the PGA Tour.

Lee was first asked about the great start he had when holing out at the first.

“Piped my driver down there. I had, I think, 112 in, something like that. It might have been less; actually, that might have been in yards. I had a 55, a little bit on the downslope, and my caddie Stew and I were in between hitting a 50 and 55, and, luckily, I thinned a nice 55 in there and one-hopped and back-spun in the hole. So, it wasn’t a perfect shot but it looked good on TV. I saw it just before. I won’t say I thinned it; keep it between us (laughing).”

“It was amazing, amazing day,” added Lee. “Just coming on 17 and 18 and hearing the crowd chant, and that’s all I’m asking for. Yeah, just had a lot of fun today. Did a lot of the right things, and hopefully I can do it again tomorrow.

“Tomorrow could be the biggest day of my life, but I’m going to go out there and have fun again. It’s been the motto for the last three months. Not taking it too seriously. I like to have fun and interact with the fans when I can. Unlike others, you know, they’re very serious. So, yeah, I’m just out here enjoying my time, and like I said, I just crept into this tournament and making the most of it and soaking it all in.”

Davis is close enough tomorrow to make an impact on those ahead.

“It was a good round,” said the Seattle based Sydneysider. “I felt like I got just about everything I could have out of that round. This whole day actually, I played, what, 25 holes or so and I felt like I did a really good job of getting the most out of what I had. So, yeah, awesome to get some momentum, awesome to see my name up toward the top of the leaderboard. Yeah, I’m really looking forward to keep pushing tomorrow and keep doing what I’ve been doing and hopefully some more birdies drop.

“This course can suit anyone or no one. I mean, it’s not overly long, it forces you to take some shorter lines off the tees because you can’t cut a lot of corners and because the pins are cut in the way they are, good shots get rewarded, some almost great shots don’t.

“Sometimes it can be very hard to make pars even though you’re feeling like you’re playing well. Sometimes it feels like the birdies won’t stop coming. So I’m glad I had the latter on the back nine today.

“You just have to get out of your way and play the golf course as it presents itself to you as you go around and try not to force anything to happen, just keep on, yeah, kind of cruising. It feels like I’ve been cruising even though I haven’t been hitting it super great off the tee. I’ve kept myself in it.”

Jason Day might be too far from the lead to figure in the finish as far as far as winning is concerned but the former champion of this event continues to play well and finds himself in a share of 14^th place and eight shots from the lead.

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Brett Coletta – image Australian Golf Media

Victorian 26 year old, Brett Coletta, survived a four hole playoff against NSW golfer, Lincoln Tighe, to win his second PGA Tour of Australasia event but his first as a professional at the TPS Hunter Valley event at Cypress Lakes in Pokolbin in the Hunter Valley region.

Coletta set out on his final round more than 3 hours ahead of the final group but reeled off a round of 61 to set the clubhouse mark at 11 under and waited as both Tighe and Jack Munro fought out what would ultimately be the right to join Coletta in the playoff.

With a par at his final hole Tighe had outlasted the luckless Munro and so it was to what would ultimately be a four hole playoff.

Coletta turned professional soon after winning the Queensland Open as an amateur in October of 2016, a week after he had suffered a dramatic loss to Curtis Luck at the Asia Pacific Amateur Championship in Korea.

Coletta was gutted by that loss as he had led Luck by seven shots heading into the final round, a win that week providing the victor a ticket to the 2017 Masters. It was not to be and that he bounced back so quickly at the Brisbane Golf Club so soon after told the story of a young man with not only a fine game, but a great constitution.

He managed to get a few starts by invite on the PGA Tour but he was unable to gain full status there and has spent the last few years plying his trade on the Korn Ferry Tour where in 2019 he went so close to gaining his PGA Tour rights. He finished just outside the crucial top 25 and he has been resigned to playing the Korn Ferry Tour and wherever else he could gain starts since.

His form in the current PGA Tour of Australasia season to date has been mixed missing the cut in the bigger events but putting together several top tens in lesser events but now with this victory he has moved to 8^th on the PGA Tour of Australasia’s Order of Merit and the door has opened for Coletta to move further up the Order of Merit and gain access to international exemptions especially given that his victory earns him a start at next week’s New Zealand Open in Queenstown.

It was an agonising loss for Tighe who, like Coletta, was chasing an important win in his career. At this stage he does not have a start in New Zealand which may or may not change by Thursday next but there is clear evidence this powerful golfer’s game is on a huge upward curve having finished runner-up along with Coletta at the Victorian PGA Championship last year.

Tighe’s last and only win came at the 2014 NSW PGA Championship but he has suffered with injuries for much of his career. At his best he is an exciting player to watch and it is hoped he can build on what has been an encouraging start to 2023.

Munro finished alone in third positions and pocketed A$17,500 followed by Queenslander Douglas Klein in 4^th place with Nick Flanagan and last week’s Korn Ferry Tour winner, Rhein Gibson sharing 5^th place, just three shots from the playoff.

The leading female in the mixed gender event was Japan’s Yuna Takagi who tied for 12th.

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Jason Day – encouraging signs for the former world number one – file photo PGA of America

In a wide-ranging virtual interview with Australia’s golfing media today, Jason Day provided further evidence that the form he has shown in returning to the top 50 in the world on Monday was the start of a possible return to the elite of the game.

“It’s been a good start to the season,” said Day. “That West Coast Swing was great for me, getting out to Palm Springs early, getting the work in at the Vintage Club was great and then the last three starts have been awesome. Especially playing great in those elevated events really helped my world ranking, back inside the top-50 now, which is great. I’ve just got to keep pushing that world ranking up.

“The goal is to try and get back to No. 1 and whatever wins come in that, they’re like little steps along the way to get back to No. 1. If it happens sooner, great. If it doesn’t, I’m just going to keep working hard and hopefully it happens somewhere down the road.”

Interestingly, when Day suggested to the world in his very first year on the PGA Tour as an 18 year old that he would like to be the game’s number one, his perceived cockiness at the time, especially in an era when Tiger Woods reigned supreme, was seen by many including an American media, as the cockiness of a green-horn 18 year old from the other side of the world and ‘how dare’ he suggest such a far-fetched goal.

Well things have changed for the then young man who dreamed big at the time and backed his belief in getting to the top of the game. It was achieved nine years later in September of 2015 when just a few weeks after winning his first major title at the PGA Championship he was on the top looking back at those chasing.

Now he can articulate his desire to be the world number one again without any fear of retribution by those who might have thought it brash 17 years ago.

But he knows this will not be an easy task although he has shown previously and now that he is prepared to put in the hard yards to get there.

“You look at Rahm and McIlroy, Scottie Scheffler, add Cantlay into the mix and there’s like a number of other guys like a Morikawa, and I can’t remember who else is inside the top-10 but there’s a number of guys that are very talented out here.

“The fields are so deep these days. Not saying they weren’t deep back when I was No. 1 or before me, but it just feels like these guys are really, really prepared to win and play well.

“And we’ve seen it, like over the last three weeks, three guys have regained No. 1 in the world, so there’s three guys right now that are playing really, really good golf. I’m just trying to keep my head down, stay focused and work on my game and hopefully at some point things will start to really turn and I’ll start to gain a lot more confidence.

“And not so much like can I win again, it’s more confidence in the ability of actually producing shots under the pump. I think that’s more of a thing that I’m trying to work towards because I know that I’ve won and I can win, it’s just something that I’m working towards.”

It might be hard to explain in regards like being there (world Number 1), knowing what I had to do to get there and achieving that was — I don’t know, it’s so addicting to go through that journey and that process. Me being a competitor and knowing that like I definitely have the game to get back there, it’s just a matter of like staying healthy and trying to make these correct changes.”

Day was clear in the fact that he has missed being able to play all the majors as has been the case, other than when injury or recent poor form prevented such, for the last twelve or so years

“I definitely want to get back to Augusta. Obviously missing the majors actually has been really tough for me to kind of sit back and — obviously I get to play the PGA, but missing the other majors, it’s really hard for me to sit back and kind of watch it.

“I feel like, you know, working my way back inside the top-50, I know that like it’s obviously a really great thing. I’ve enjoyed the journey thus far, but like I was saying before, like trying to get back to No. 1, there’s a number of things that need to happen. With the recent form I feel encouraged with the things that I’m working on knowing that like they’re showing a lot of good signs

The incredible amount of work Day has put in over the last few years (since slipping down the rankings to as low as 164^th last year) in order to overcome the injury issues that have plagued much of his career, is again starting to yield results.

Now, after three consecutive top tens in in his last three starts he has clawed his way back inside the top 50 and all of a sudden he is a genuine chance of playing the Masters for the first time in two years.

With the Arnold Palmer Championship, the Players Championship and the Dell Technologies Match Play all on his immediate schedule ahead of Augusta National on April 6th and all of which he has won previously, then there is every reason to believe he will at least retain his standing in the rankings and more than likely improve but if he struggles in that regard he will keep his options open.

“Plan A is to play Bay Hill, PLAYERS, take a week off and then play the Match Play, take a week off going into Augusta. But if I’m slipping outside of that, then I’ll most likely play Valspar. So, even if I’m outside and I need to play Valero, I’ll most likely try to play Valero and see if I can win that one and get in. Right now, the plan is to play Bay Hill, THE PLAYERS and Match Play.”

The inevitable question about those who have gone to LIV and how he would react to them now being able to play all majors was asked and Day was pragmatic in his answer.

“Yeah, I think for some of the guys that voiced their opinions about LIV, it will probably be a little bit more awkward in regards to that.

“Actually, I miss the guys, I miss the guys that left. In regard to some of those guys, like Phil and Dustin, Cammy and all those guys, it’s kind of sad that they left. But I’m OK with them coming back.

“I think the majors should have the best players in the world and I think those guys deserve the right to go in and play the major championships. Will it be awkward for some? Yes. For me it won’t be because I’ll be catching up with some mates, which is going to be great and I’m hoping that I get to see them.”