Loren Roberts ends 21-month winning drought with a victory in Toshiba Classic – Golf News
Loren Roberts carded a two-under par in the final round of the Champions Tour’s Toshiba Classic to earn his 13th victory on the tour that featured players of 50 years or above.
Roberts, who has an average of 1.639 putts per Green in Regulation and ranked second accordingly, started the round with a two-stroke deficit against the overnight leader, Mark Calcavecchia.
However, Calcavecchia failed to hold on to his lead and faltered in the final round to score a two-over par 73.
His final score was a six-under par 207 for the tournament. As a result, he shared the second spot with Tom Kite and Bernhard Langer.
Langer, who scored a one-under par in the final round, missed the par putt on the 17th and the ball trickled into the green-side bunker.
As a result of this, he had to suffer a double, which moved his score from seven-under par to five-under par for the tournament.
"I didn't think I hit that bad a putt," Langer said. "Actually when I hit the putt I thought it was pretty good. It was accelerating instead of slowing down. But after it got 3 yards past the hole there was no stopping it. That pin was pretty brutal".
Joey Sindelar, Mark McNulty and David Eger were further one stroke behind at the score of five-under par to tie for the fifth position.
Meanwhile, Roberts took advantage of the situation and surged to the top of the leaderboard with the help of six birdies and four bogeys in his final round.
The highlights of the day include Roberts’ three bogeys in between the 14th and the 17th hole. That was a time when it looked as if the bogeys might cost him the title in the end.
However, he made a comfortable five-foot birdie-putt on the par-five 18th hole to end his 21-month winless drought on the Champions Tour.
"We did make it interesting, didn't we," he said with a smile. "We got off to the start you dream of doing, but then hit a snag on the back. I kind of let in everybody in the game".
Roberts added, "I got out of rhythm. I didn't hit bad putts. The only bad putt I hit was on 12". With this win, Roberts earned a total of $262,500 as prize money.
Tags: