Westwood secures third Sun City win in brilliant display

It took Lee Westwood over four years to chalk up his 43^rd tournament victory, and when he won the Nedbank Golf Challenge hosted by Gray Player by three strokes on Sunday, the relief was palpable.

The popular Englishman fired a superlative bogey-free round of eight-under-par 64 around the demanding Gary Player Country Club – the longest course on this season’s European Tour schedule – to shut out strong finishes by Sergio Garcia of Spain and local favourite Louis Oosthuizen.

“I’m a bit emotional to be honest,” said Westwood as he emerged from score recording. “You’re never sure whether you’re going to be able to do it again. Until now, my emotions have felt really under control all day, which is what I’ve been working on.”

He played as if he had iced-water in his veins as he turned the screws on overnight leader Garcia, who bogeyed the first, and on Oosthuizen who looked as if he might emerge victorious with three birdies in his first seven holes.

Westwood, the 2010 and 2011 champion at Sun City, eagled the second hole to move into a share of the lead, and then, after missing good birdie opportunities around the turn on nine and 10, birdied five of the last eight holes to pull clear.

Garcia shot a closing 70, and Oosthuizen, after making bogey on 15 to fall back into Westwood’s clutches, made double-bogey six on 18 to slip four shots behind Westwood in third place.

Westwood slammed the door shot on Oosthuizen with his birdie on 17, where a birdie putt found the bottom of the cup in full view of the South African and Garcia who were on the 17^th tee was it happened.

“That seven-iron into 17 is probably one of the best shots I’ve ever hit,” he said. “I came off it a little bit off the 17^th tee and slid it out to the right. But it gave me a good number in with a seven-iron, and the wind managed to stay in the right direction for long enough. Just turned it in off the TV tower to 10 feet and rolled the putt in.”

Oosthuizen knew the game was up when he saw that, but tried valiantly – and came close – to make a birdie of his own on 17. “The birdie he made on 17, I knew I had to finish birdie-birdie. I had a 15 -foot putt for birdie, and probably the best putt I had today and right at the end it decided to turn the other way. That hurt, because that was the one I needed. Then I could have a little bit more focus on 18. But that sort of knocked all the energy out of me. Knowing I needed to make a two down the last and I probably tried a bit too much.”

Garcia was full of praise for Westwood’s performance. “You have to give credit to Lee. To shoot 64 in the last round is not easy,” he said. “I’m thrilled for him. He had a bad Ryder Cup at Hazeltine and he struggled a little bit, and he’s been playing much better this year. He’s been knocking on the door for a while.”

For Westwood, the victory will take him back inside the top 100 in the world, after two periods at world number one which ended in May 2011. “Still got it, I guess. Just nice to do it again under pressure and win against a couple of quality players at the end there,” he said. “To hit the shots I hit down the stretch, it was just nice to prove it to myself again.”

Scores:

273 - Lee Westwood 71 69 69 64

276 - Sergio Garcia 64 71 71 70

277 - Louis Oosthuizen 69 67 72 69

280 - Ross Fisher 71 72 67 70

281 - Haotong Li 71 70 75 65, Matt Wallace 69 72 73 67

282 - Thomas Detry 75 66 68 73

283 - Aaron Rai 72 68 75 68

284 - Chris Paisley 72 75 70 67, Darren Fichardt 74 67 71 72

285 - Andrea Pavan 71 70 75 69, Lucas Bjerregaard 75 70 75 65, Branden Grace 70 71 74 70, Mike Lorenzo-Vera 68 73 72 72, Dean Burmester 72 71 70 72

286 - Wade Ormsby 73 74 72 67, Adrian Otaegui 74 72 71 69, Ashun Wu 69 73 74 70, Jason Scrivener 69 76 70 71, Mikko Korhonen 68 70 71 77

287 - Robert Rock 75 73 71 68, Rory McIlroy 72 71 73 71, Martin Kaymer 76 69 71 71, Jordan Smith 79 69 72 67, Richard Sterne 77 69 70 71, Dylan Frittelli 73 67 75 72

288 - Renato Paratore 72 71 75 70, Trevor Immelman 74 73 71 70, Pablo Larrazabal 74 70 74 70, Joost Luiten 72 75 70 71, Joakim Lagergren 72 74 71 71, Shubhankar Sharma 74 75 71 68, Andrew Johnston 73 69 73 73, Matthew Fitzpatrick 71 71 73 73

289 - Paul Waring 72 76 72 69, Padraig Harrington 73 73 74 69, Lucas Herbert 76 69 75 69, Shane Lowry 71 69 74 75, Nicolas Colsaerts 75 69 70 75, Benjamin Hebert 69 75 69 76

290 - Julien Guerrier 74 68 77 71, Andy Sullivan 69 74 74 73, Matthias Schwab 72 71 76 71, George Coetzee 73 79 68 70, Charl Schwartzel 68 78 70 74

291 - Jens Dantorp 77 73 69 72, Sam Horsfield 73 72 74 72, Jorge Campillo 71 78 71 71, Kiradech Aphibarnrat 75 74 73 69

292 - Ryan Fox 70 73 74 75, Oliver Fisher 75 70 71 76, Danny Willett 78 71 72 71, Tapio Pulkkanen 71 76 77 68

293 - Nacho Elvira 74 73 75 71

294 - Hideto Tanihara 74 79 69 72, Thomas Aiken 76 77 69 72

295 - Alexander Bjork 75 75 73 72, Gavin Green 75 70 78 72

296 - Paul Dunne 78 71 72 75

297 - Erik van Rooyen 77 69 73 78, Brandon Stone 74 71 75 77, Stephen Gallacher 77 75 70 75, Maximilian Kieffer 75 71 76 75, Matthieu Pavon 78 73 72 74, Richard Mcevoy 72 76 75 74

299 - Lee Slattery 74 73 74 78

300 - Tom Lewis 75 71 78 76, Ashley Chesters 78 73 78 71

302 - Matthew Southgate 80 73 71 78, Thomas Bjorn 76 73 75 78

303 - Marcus Kinhult 74 74 83 72

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