Richard Green – file photo 

Richard Green has added another US$211,000 to his season’s earnings on the PGA Tour Champions with a runner-up finish at the Rogers Charity Classic in Alberta this morning but the elusive win is still to come.

It was Green’s third runner-up finish of the 2024 season to go with four other top tens and with US$1.584 million for the season he stands in 4^th place in the Charl Schwab earnings behind Ernie Els, Stephen Ames and Steve Alker.

Green actually appeared to control the event with five holes to play but two late bogeys and a strong finish by the eventual winner Ken Tanigawa saw him finish two behind Tanigawa who won his second PGA Tour Champions event but his first in five years.

Green had begun the final round one ahead of Steve Alker and Boo Weekly and despite a bogey at the first, he recorded five birdies in six holes through the middle of the round to lead by two before the frustrating finish.

“It’s nice to be competing and contending to do what I want to do, said Green. “It’s just a shame that things at the end there didn’t really fall my way.

“I thought they were going my way there a little bit through the middle of the round, and probably my start today didn’t really help me very much.

“It’s nice to be competing and contending for golf tournaments. It’s fun. I enjoy being out there contending week in, week out, and I’ll keep rattling the cage.

“Everybody wants to win. We all want to do it. I think that’s probably what is the hardest thing to not let that get in your way.

“I probably am battling that at times, you know, just thinking about trying to get it done instead of actually letting myself go.

“Look, at the end of the day you’re playing on the Champions Tour and doing very well, competing in the Schwab Cup for one of the top positions, and I’ll just keep pressing on.

“Hopefully the gods fall for me in the right order someplace soon. We’ll see.”

Darren Clarke and Jason Caron finished one shot behind Green in a share of 3^rd place.

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Gabi Ruffels – a final round of 68 results in 6th place finish – file photo PGA of America 

Australia’s Gabi Ruffels has produced one of best rounds of the day (68) in today’s final round of the ISPS Handa Women’s Scottish Open to finish in a share of 6^th and earn a cheque for US$54,000.

For the 24-year-old Ruffels, who is in her first season on the LPGA Tour, the finish takes her earnings for the 2024 season to US$708,000 and further emphasises the path she is on to a hugely successful career. It was her fourth top ten of the season to go with three 3rd place finishes earlier in the season.

Ruffels finished eight shots behind the winner, American Lauren Coughlin, who won her second event of the season after winning in Canada earlier.

Ruffels a former winner and runner-up in the Women’s US Amateur Championship, the only Australian to do so, spent a season on the secondary Epson Tour in 2023 after mistakenly failing to enter LPGA Tour qualifying in late 2022 but that season has clearly assisted her cause in building the confidence needed to have competed so well in what is now her rookie season in the big time.

The finish will ensure Ruffels, currently in second place, moves even closer to the current Rookie of the Year leader, Mao Saigo of Japan who finished 57^th this week.

While the news was good for Ruffels, both Lydia Ko and Minjee Lee struggled in the heavy winds that buffeted the Dundonald Links and finished 9^th and 12^th respectively.

Ko’s round of 74 and Lee’s 78 cost them dearly although Loughlin’s four-shot victory ensured that everyone was facing an almost impossible task in round four.

“It’s unbelievable,” said Coughlin. “Two wins in three events is pretty crazy, but I just stuck in there, tried to stay as present as I could, and got some putts to drop at the end. If you would have told me, let alone beginning of this year, but beginning of last year, I wouldn’t believe this is what I’ve done and it’s incredible. It’s just how hard I’ve worked to get here, and it’s amazing.”

The LPGA and Ladies European Tours now head for St Andrews for the final major of the year in world golf, the AIG Open Championship at the Old Course.

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Minjee Lee during her first round – image Ladies European Tour 

Just a few players were still to complete their opening rounds of the ISPS Women’s Scottish Open at the Dundonald Links in Ayrshire in Scotland. But when rain then eventually darkness stopped play at 9.00pm Minjee Lee led the way with an opening round of 5 under 67.

“Yeah, I mean, I feel like I played pretty solid today,” said Lee perhaps stating the obvious.

“No bogeys today. So always a happy girl after a bogey-free round. So yeah, I feel like I played smart golf, I’d say. I gave myself a lot of opportunities for birdie, but you know some putts went in, some putts didn’t.

“I feel like when I was in trouble, I kind of missed it in the right spots and could get up-and-down, so that was good.

“I think I kind of got a little lucky with not playing in the morning with the rain but it was pretty windy out there. So I guess we just didn’t have the rain. But yeah, I thoroughly enjoyed my day out there today.

“I like the creativity of links golf. You know, obviously there was a lot of wind today so it was playing like a true links kind of golf course. Sometimes we don’t get as much wind but today was blowing a gale and I feel like just picturing the shots and just having to execute those shots, I think I find it fun to play.

“Just when you execute it correctly, you get rewarded. So I like that aspect of playing in the wind and obviously there’s a lot of things like if you’re off the green, you can putt or chip or you can hit a hybrid. There’s so many options. I also think that’s kind of fun as well.”

Amongst the chasers and just two off the lead is last week’s Gold Medallist in Paris, Lydia Ko. Ko recorded as many birdies as Lee but two bogeys saw her finish with 69 and in a share of 5^th place.

“I think it was crucial to make a few up-and-downs, especially on my front nine because there weren’t many greens that I hit I would say in the first few holes,” said ko referring to the demanding conditions.

“I’ve played in sunny but I’ve played in a bit of bad weather. I was trying to go through some of the worst British Opens I’ve ever played. Hoylake was really horrible in 2012. Even when we were at Troon just down the road here a few years ago, that was really bad, where I had to play with my hat backwards.

So yeah, I think when you come here, obviously like at the British Open last year, we had beautiful weather at Walton Heath. So we could potentially expect that but we could expect the weather that we had this morning and that’s just part of the experience of coming over. If you don’t like it, you’re probably not going to play that good, anyway.

“But luckily since the wind was so strong the two par 5s on the front nine were reachable and I could take advantage of that. But it was almost so hectic that I think I was having more like fun out there rather than getting so stressed.”

This week’s event comes ahead of next week’s AIG Women’s Open at the Old Course at St Andrews.

Gabi Ruffels and Stephanie Kyriacou also managed to finish their rounds, both with one under par 71’s.

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An emotional Lydia Ko stands atop the Olympic dais following her stunning victory- image PGA Tour / IGF

New Zealand’s Lydia Ko has established herself amongst the legends of golf with victory at the Olympic Women’s Golf Competition in Paris, holding off a brilliant final-round burst by Germany’s  Esther Henseleit to win by two and not only complete her collection of Olympic medals but in doing so she now joins the immortals of the LPGA Tour by qualifying for its Hall of Fame.

Beginning the final round sharing the lead with Switzerland’s Morganne Metraux, Ko quickly established a substantial lead when Metraux dropped five shots in her first five holes and although she too ,would also drop a shot at the first, she recovered to make the turn in 2 under 34 and through 12 holes her lead was five.

Then came a hole that threatened her lead. At the par 4 13th Ko found the water with her second and eventually took a double bogey six and with Henseleit recording birdies at five of her first ten holes and then going on to birdie the 17th and 18th the gap was just one.

Henseleit finished her round 45 minutes ahead of Ko and waited to see if her great final round might have been good enough to force a playoff or win outright.

Ko, however, would steady the ship with four straight pars before one last birdie at the 18th to claim Gold.

“Going into the final round with a two-shot lead with Morgane, I think when I was younger, I would have been, oh, man, everyone trying to catch me and get almost more pressure from that,” said Ko.

“I think it’s one of the things I’m most proud of is I stuck to my game plan and stuck to being aggressive off the tee, and that’s been something that I’ve been struggling with and been working really hard with on with my coaches. And for to progressively get better these past couple months and for it to hits peak here at the Olympics, it doesn’t get better than this. To be holding and wearing this Gold Medal, it’s pretty crazy right now.

“Going into this week, everyone was saying, Oh, what if you finish and collect all the Gold on top of the Silver and Bronze you have the complete set. Of course I want to do that, complete it, too, but it’s much easier said than done.

“I wanted to focus on my golf and nothing else. And that’s why I deleted my Instagram because I just didn’t want to be fazed by what other people were saying and just enjoy this opportunity because this experience has been unbelievable and the fans have been great.

“The French fans have been awesome, kind of taking me in as one of their own. And it’s definitely a life peak for me here. I don’t think I’ve experienced this kind of adrenaline before, and to do it here, it really can’t get any better.”

Ko was asked if the emotions she displayed on the victory dais were the most she had ever shown on the golf course?

“I cried a lot winning the CME TOUR Championship in 2022 because that was actually the first win with my fiancée at the time, now husband, there with me. Seeing him, I was getting very emotional and my mom and my sister was there, as well.

“So I think those moments are what makes it extra special. Like because I know that because of them, I’m here today, and you know, my husband may be in America right now but I felt like he was with me. I had a marker that had his name on it.

“So you know, thanks to them, I’m a Gold Medallist now, and you know, I think all of those emotions combined was why I was crying.

“I definitely don’t have our National Anthem on repeat on Spotify. Listening to my National Anthem, I can understand why Scottie Scheffler was so emotional last Sunday. It’s a feeling that you can really not repeat unless you are in that position again. I know that it’s probably never coming again.”

Henseleit plays the LPGA Tour but has yet to win there and is currently ranked 54th in the world so her performance to finish second was outstanding.

China’s Xiyu Lin finished third, one shot behind Henseleit.

Hannah Green’s effort to finish in a share of 4th as the leading Australian was made even more impressive given her horror start on Wednesday when she opened with a round of 77.

She would eventually finish just one shot out of the medals after playing her last 54 holes in 11 under.

Minjee Lee finished 22nd.

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