There were a bunch of our Aussie players still right up there when it comes to the lead over the weekend for the Australian Open Golf at Melbourne’s Kingston Heath Golf Club aka the Sandbelt. But at the end of the day, an overseas player has won them over for yet another year & also loves our country – this time it’s Ryggs Johnston from Libby, Montana in the USA.
Ryggs thought he has lost it yesterday at times but that’s golf for you when playing in poor weather conditions, and he managed to recover that brilliantly before he kept that lead clear right through the very end – enjoy your Stonehaven Cup trophy along with the $290,000 bonus.
You gotta feel for Lucas Herbert who started off well & also kept the lead for the majority where he went into Day 4 with a small lead over Johnston. However, his series of mistakes including on the putting green made him wanting to pull his hair out, which was quite frustrating to hear.
It’s a shame that proved extremely costly after he fell down the pecking order from 1st-2nd to around shared 5th over the course of the final day’s afternoon.
Meanwhile, oh so close from Curtis Luck with his resurgence from just inside the shared Top 10 pack. It may not be enough to cut down Ryggs Johnston’s lead on time but good to see him finish 2nd by a three strokes gap though. So does Marc Leishman who also had a great weekend out alongside the improved Jasper Stubbs, even though it was a bit of a long shot following their shared third-placed finish by just four strokes behind at -14.
Also, shoutout to Kiradech Aphilbarnrat from Thailand off the back of his impressive day shift over in shared 5th alongside last weekend’s Australian PGA Championship winner Elvis Smylie, Harrison Crowe & last year’s Australian Open winner in Sydney Joaquin Niemann.
And last but not least, also great to see two Koreans take home both the women’s and the all abilities contest. This is the second time since 2013 that Jiyai Shin has won it that ended a two year feat from South Africa’s Ashleigh Buhai, with amateur Hyojin Yang in 3rd. They also couldn’t get enough of Simon Seungmin Lee, who has autism, also too good with the All Abilities category title over Wayne Perske (scoliosis & also a former player) by 12 after the best of three yesterday.
So the two big weeks PGA Tour of Australia’s major tournaments are now over for another year. We continue to see more of our Aussies dominating the Australian PGA Championship where we always continue to see this coming but not so much when it comes to the Australian Open since the event was organised in an all-in-one package since 2022. For now, best of luck to all both here and overseas going into season 2025.
