Hiroyuki Fujita wins the 2008 Pine Valley Open title.
Hiroyuki Fujita of Japan is the 2008 Pine Valley Open Champion. As in the previous two tournaments, the leading player going into the final day threw the gauntlet down to his adversaries, and none was able to rise to the test.
Cold, wind, and rain made the final day a lot less pleasant than a stroll in the park, but in fact Fujita won the tournament over the first two days with sparkling rounds of 67 and 65. He was 12-under by the end of Friday, and simply stuck there. Par in round 3, and par again in round 4, was good enough to give him the title.
All day the chasing pack tried to mount a challenge. Like jackals snapping at the haunches of a feeding lion, one after another they clawed their way to within two or three strokes of the lead. Like salmon leaping at a waterfall that is just one step too high, one after another they all fell back.
Below the name of Fujita, the leaderboard rattled like an airport departures board. Over the course of the final day, no fewer than seven of the trailing players found themselves in second place, reaching 8 under or better.
Chapchai Nirat was the first to make a move. The burly Thai went eagle-birdie in the first four holes – his second consecutive eagle on the par-5 2nd - but that was as good as he got. He finished joint 7th at 6 under.
Up ahead Aussie Tony Carolan, who had started the day in joint 14th at 3 under, was next to move to second. He made five birdies in the first ten holes to get to 8 under, but promptly bogeyed 11. He finished joint 4th on 7 under.
Japan's Nobuhiro Masuda was next to take his turn. By the 16th he had made four birdies and no bogeys, but he blotted his card on the last to join Carolan in 4th place.
Fujita's playing partner Shinichi Yokota played par golf all the way to 10. Birdies there and at 13 gave him a brief glimpse of Fujita's heels, but he gave one back on 14, and finished 4th alongside Carolan and Masuda.
Fijian Dinesh Chand's card was sprinkled with birdies and bogeys. He finally dragged his way to -8 with a birdie at the short 17th and that is where he finished, on his own for 3rd place – his best finish of the year.
Two players got as far as 9 under, within two strokes of the lead. Shintaro Kai, another of the strong Japanese contingent was one, and Thailand's Chinnarat Phadungsil was the other.
Kai finished strongly with birdies on 16 and 18, but he had run out of holes and could only wait and hope that Fujita might make a slip. He would finish at 9 under in second place on his own, with the additional compensation of victory in the Red Bull Final 5 and a cheque of $30,000. It was a deserved award – although the first two didn't count, Kai managed the extraordinary feat of birdie on the monster 613 yard 16th in every single round.
Three times Phadungsil dragged himself to 9 under – on the 5th, the 8th and the 13th. But he fell away in the last five holes and could finish no better than –6 and joint 7th.
Behind them all Fujita was grinding his way on with stubborn determination. He would have known at the start of play that a 72 from him would be hard to beat. The Pine Valley course is not the hardest test the payers will face, but the pins had been pushed against the fringes to make them really work for their birdies. Vast expanses of green were left empty, and it was going to take an extraordinary performance to match some of the low scores of the first two days.
Fujita started with a nervy bogey at the par-4 1st. Was he opening the door? Not if he could help it.
He won back the dropped stroke on the difficult par-3 6th. Many of the players would have classed this as the toughest par on the course – it was like hitting the ball onto the tip of a domed pyramid. It put up a lot more bogeys than birdies.
Fujita dropped a stroke again on the 9th, but again he won it back with a 4 on the par-5 13th – downwind and at 518 yards probably the easiest hole of the day. For much of the field it was a short iron into the green.
And by then it was clear that as long as he could hold it together over the Red Bull final 5, nobody was going to be able to catch him. He duly parred out, raised his arms and the trophy, and pocketed a cheque for $158,500.
"After the birdie on the 13th hole, I knew that I was that much closer to the title", said the winner. "It was a difficult tournament to win. I had a six strokes lead coming in today but I felt the pressure. I told myself that if I want to win it, I have to be relaxed out there so it's a great result,"
The $1 million event was sanctioned for the first time by the Japan Golf Tour alongside the Asian Tour and China Golf Association. Many of the players have made positive comments about this, appreciating the chance to compete against each other, and conscious that it's a sign of growing strength and confidence in Eastern Hemisphere Golf.
"I would like to thank the Japan Golf Tour, Asian Tour and the China Golf Association for this opportunity. It's been fun for all the players and we look forward to more events like this in the future," said the champion.
Shot of the Day:
On Saturday the 613-yard par-5 16th had been a horror story, playing into a force-10 gale. On Sunday it was downwind, and Thailand's Prayad Marksaeng hit his drive so far that he lost his ball. It was a long way back to the tee, but Prayad still managed to escape with bogey.
(China.org.cn by David Ferguson, May 12, 2008)