Cink'ed Up & Ko takes home the W!
What a week of record-breaking dominance on both the PGA and LPGA Tours!
Stewart Cink shattered both the 36-hole and 54-hole records at the PGA Tour RBC Heritage in Harbour Town and Lydia Ko set the 54-hole scoring record for the Lotte Championship in Hawaii.
Stewart Cink enjoys a resurgence in his career with his son by his side.
Stewart Cink, at the seasoned age of 47, shot a 16-under 126 in the first two rounds of the RBC Heritage- shattering the lowest 36-hole score at Harbour Town of 13-under 129 shared by Jack Nicklaus and Phil Mickelson. He carded a 69 on Saturday to reach 18 under, another record for the event. He finished at 19-under to win the event for the third time in his career.
Cink has had his 23-year-old son, Reagan, carrying his bag since the Safeway Open, his father’s first start of the PGA Tour season. They won the event. Before that, he hadn't won since 2009. A few weeks later, Stewart dismissed his full-time caddie.
With this second win of the season, Cink earned an exemption into the U.S. Open at Torrey Pines in June. It will be his first U.S. Open since 2017.
In addition to the win at the Safeway, the father-son team has posted four other top 20s, including a T4 at the Bermuda Championship and a T12 at last week’s Masters. In addition to Reagan, Cink’s wife Lisa and their other son, Connor, were on hand to celebrate the victory.
According to reports, Reagan’s caddying job is short-term. Stewart and Reagan agreed that they’d keep playing together until the summer when Reagan is scheduled to get married. However, there is speculation that he may continue for a little longer. The FedEx Cup Playoffs start in August, and Cink currently ranks No. 3 in those standings. He’s also moved inside the top 50 in the world, and he’s being included in conversations about the American Ryder Cup team. We may be seeing more of this father-son team this year. What do you think? Leave a comment below.
Lydia Ko is back in the winner’s circle!
Lydia Ko shot a final-round 65 Saturday to put her at a 28-under 260 and seven shots ahead of everybody at the Lotte Championship. Lydia lapped the field!
Ko entered the final round in Hawaii with a one-shot lead over Nelly Korda after setting the 54-hole scoring record for the Lotte Championship with a 21-under 195.
Ko, who as a teenager won more than any other teenager in the history of the LPGA, winning 14 times in her first 81 starts, stalled a little over the past several years. Before this week, she had only won once since 2016, and that was three years ago.
Ko has said that she has, at times, wondered if she’d ever get back to the winner’s circle. The win ended a 1,084-day victory drought for Ko who said she took inspiration from recent drought-ending victories by Jordan Spieth (1,351 days) and Hideki Matsuyama (1,344 days).
Congratulations Lydia!
Juli Inkster, 60, is not ready to give up competitive golf.
Juli Inkster has signed up to compete in a 36-hole qualifier at Half Moon Bay Golf Links, April 26, in hopes of advancing to the U.S. Women’s Open at The Olympic Club in June. She has played in the USGA’s signature women’s championship 35 times during her Hall of Fame career, the last time in 2014.
Inkster finished 15th in her last U.S. Women’s Open start at Pinehurst No. 2 in 2014. If she gets through qualifying, it would be the sixth different decade in which she will have played the Women’s Open, her debut coming as an amateur in 1978 at the Country Club of Indianapolis.
With a professional career spanning 29 years to date, Inkster's 31 wins rank her second in wins among all active players on the LPGA Tour. She also has more wins in Solheim Cup matches than any other American and is a member of the World Golf Hall of Fame. Inkster is the only golfer in LPGA Tour history to win two majors in a decade for three consecutive decades by winning three in the 1980s, two in the 1990s, and two in the 2000s.
The seven-time major champion played in the LPGA Tour’s Kia Classic last month, where she missed the cut. She is also in the field at the Hugel-Air Premia L.A. Open, which ends two days before the qualifier.
"I'm probably an idiot for trying, but I think I would be disappointed in myself if I didn't because it's so close to home," Inkster said.
The LPGA Hall of Famer lives near the course and has played it approximately 50 times.
We’ll be cheering you on Juli!
You don’t see this every day (or ever) on the golf course!
How often have you seen punches thrown on the golf course? Hopefully never, which is probably why a video of a fight between two men at a children's school fundraiser golf tournament has gone viral online.
The brawl happened Friday at the Maccauvlei Golf Club in Vereeniging, South Africa. The two men were part of a sponsor group for seventh-grade students at the Laerskool Vryheidsmonument school.
A clip of the video was posted to Twitter and has since received more than 880,000 views. In the video, two men are seen throwing punches before one pulls the other's shirt off. The shirtless man grabs a flagstick and hits the other, causing it to snap in half. A few last punches are thrown before bystanders step in to end the fight.
According to a news report by news24 in South Africa, a lost phone appears to be behind the altercation. There were two groups, one behind the other, on the course. Someone in the first group lost their phone and had been looking for it throughout the day. A caddy had found the phone, but one of the men had allegedly hidden it from the owner. When they asked the second group if they had seen the phone, they denied having it, which is when things got out of hand. The phone was eventually returned.
It should come as no surprise that alcohol was involved.
Altercation: https://bit.ly/3n3vxkA