England’s Matthew Fitzpatrick on Sunday boosted his Ryder Cup qualifying hopes with a three-shot victory at the Nordea Masters in Stockholm.
The 21-year-old had led by five shots overnight, but dropped to two in front around the turn on the final day before he closed out with a one-under-par 71 to finish on 16-under and become the youngest winner of the event.
Denmark’s Lasse Jensen carded a 68 to finish runner-up on 13-under for his best result on the European Tour. Belgium’s Nicolas Colsaerts was in third place a further shot behind after a final round of 70.
Fitzpatrick’s second European Tour title, after last year’s British Masters, consolidated his fourth place standing in the Ryder Cup European points list.
The top four European golfers qualify for the Sept. 30 competition against the US in Hazeltine, Minnesota.
“It was a great final day for me and I managed to hold on to my lead fairly well and get the win. I felt like today was the round where I would be under the most pressure,” said Fitzpatrick, who bogeyed the final hole.
“I’m a million miles ahead of schedule. It’s been a tough past few weeks and all of a sudden you turn up and pick up a win. That’s golf, and I’ve seen it a lot this year,” Fitzpatrick said.
Sweden’s Henrik Stenson had the lowest round of the day at the Bro Hof Slott Golf Club with a closing 66 to finish in a tie for fourth with local favorite Bjorn Hellgren (67) at 10-under.
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