Sergio Garcia chipped in for birdie at the 16th hole Sunday in his 3-under 68 to win the European Masters by one stroke.
The 25-year-old Spaniard's 14-under total of 270 held off Sweden's Peter Gustafsson, who closed strongly with a 7-under 64 to take second.
Paul Casey hit a 66 to finish third, with defending champion Luke Donald and Garry Houston sharing fourth. Donald shot 69 and Houston 70.
PHOTO: EPA
Garcia later dedicated the title to a close friend who died Friday from lung cancer.
"That was a big hit on my head," Garcia said. "She was a lovely person, very caring."
It was a fine start to the Ryder Cup qualifying year for three of the European players from 2004: Garcia, Casey and Donald.
The fourth playing here, Miguel Angel Jimenez, tied for 13th.
Garcia, who whose only other win this year was in the Booz-Allen Classic on the US Tour, hit four birdies in five holes.
But it was the No.6-ranked Spaniard's 22-yard chip-in on the 16th that saw off Gustafsson, who holed five putts of between 10 and 20 feet.
"I found my putting stroke on the practice green yesterday," said Gustafsson. "Everything got better as the week went on."
Casey, gradually pulling out of a prolonged slump, was content.
"I made a lot of birdies, which is good. That was my goal," said Casey, who missed seven cuts starting with the Masters in April.
The 433rd-ranked Houston loved the final round with Garcia and Donald.
"True gentlemen. I've had a very special time," Houston said.
Pat Hurst, in a big boost for next weekend's Solheim Cup, won the LPGA tournament with a three-shot victory over defending champion Cristie Kerr.
Hurst ran off birdies on her first five holes, then overcame a shaky back nine on her way to a 2-under-par 70 to finish at 17 under. It was the fourth career victory for the 1995 US LPGA Tour rookie of the year.
Hurst was five shots up after 11 holes, but dropped three strokes on her next two holes with a double bogey and bogey. A par saved her from another bogey on No. 15 after she hit her second shot in a greenside pond.
Hurst, who will be playing in her third Solheim Cup, will be joined by Kerr as the Americans try to avenge their loss to the Europeans. The US holds a 5-3 edge in the series, but lost by the widest margin two years ago.
"I've got a lot of confidence going into next week and nothing is better than representing my country," Hurst said.
Hurst earned US$195,000 for her first win since 2000.
John Rollins holed out from a bunker for an eagle on the 18th hole, finishing a back-nine course record 28 and matching his career-best round of 63 for a share of the lead with four others after three rounds of the championship.
The round held up on a sunny, breezy afternoon on the TPC of Boston, leaving Rollins at 10-under 203, and tied with Billy Andrade, Jason Bohn, Carl Petterson and Olin Browne.
Hometown favorite Andrade started and finished with birdies and made 16 pars in between for a 69. Bohn, energized by a peanut butter and jelly sandwich he ate on the 14th hole, birdied his final four holes for a 67.
Petterson plodded along to a 68, and Olin Browne recovered from a tough start for a 70. The five-way tie for the lead going into the final round involved the most players on the PGA Tour since a five-way tie in 1983 at the Colonial.
Denmark's Iben Tinning shot a 7-under-par 65 to win the inaugural Nykredit Masters on home soil by two strokes.
Tinning, who is heading to the US to play for defending champion Europe in next weekend's Solheim Cup, finished with a 72-hole total of 273, 15 under par on the Kokkedal course near Copenhagen.
England's Laura Fairclough closed with a 66 to finish second. Cecilia Ekelundh of Sweden, who led overnight, slipped to a 70 and took third a further shot back.
It was Tinning's third Ladies European Tour win of the season.
"Obviously winning in your own country is an amazing feeling and the crowd was fantastic," said Tinning, who leaves Monday for Crooked Stick at Carmel, Indiana, site of the Solheim Cup.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier