Doug LaBelle II ends six-year winning drought on the Web.com Tour, wins Utah Championship
Doug LaBelle II won his second title on the Web.com Tour with a nerve-jangling victory over four fellow Americans at the Utah Championship in Sandy, Utah, on Sunday, July 15, 2012.
As the late afternoon shadows lengthened on the Willow Creek Country Club, LaBelle sealed the victory with a 15-under par tournament score.
James Hahn, Scott Gutschewski, Sam Saunders and Michael Putnam posted a 14-under par each to secure the shared second place.
He got off to a brilliant start and recorded two back-to-back birdies on the first two holes. However, he failed to maintain consistency and suffered two bogeys. This dragged him back to even-par score for the round.
Afterwards, he did something that he spoke of the whole week — his putting and ball control on the greens.
He remained patient and earned three birdies on the back nine to secure the top spot on the leaderboard.
The most interesting shot of the day was his five-footer for a par on the 18th hole. He looked a little nervous when he stood beside the ball with putter in his hand.
Yet, he held his nerves and turned in the ball successfully, which, otherwise, would have forced the game to enter the five-man sudden death playoffs.
"Not very comfortable," he said when asked about how he felt standing over that par putt. "I missed about 10 of those this week. I wanted to get [the chip] below the hole. I'd rather have 15 feet below the hole than five feet straight above I wasn't able
to get it past the hole, but I got it down there not too far".
With this win, he also ended the six-year winning drought on the Web.com Tour, as his maiden victory came in the Price Cutter Charity Championship in 2006. Since then, he has played 94 Web.com Tour events so far.
In the meantime, he also made 57 PGA Tour starts but recorded only two top-10 finishes. He himself admitted that he was surprised with his win in the event.
"I'm very surprised to be sitting here," LaBelle said after accepting the winner's trophy and the check for $99,000. "My goal was to make as many birdies as I could. I was conservative-aggressive. I was trying to go at some flags but not be stupid about
it".
Tags: