The pro shop at Overbrook Golf Club was the home for two of
the Philadelphia Section PGA’s best players in the 1990s.
Gene Fieger, the 1979 District One champion at Nether
Providence and an assistant pro at Overbrook, was the Section’s Player of the
Year five times in a stretch from 1992 to 1998. Stu Ingraham was the head pro
who was regularly making it to the PGA Championship out of the Professional
National Championship.
So it’s probably not a huge surprise to see Fieger, the
Director of Golf at The Hideout Golf Club in Naples, Fla., and Ingraham, an
instructor at the M Golf Range in Newtown Square, land on the same number when
the PGA Senior Professional National Championship presented by Mercedes-Benz
USA completed play Sunday at the Bayonet Course on the Monterrey Peninsula
in Seaside, Calif.
Ingraham opened up with a 73 at the Bayonet Course and fired
a second-round 69 at the Black Horse Course. Weekend rounds of 69 and 73 at the
Bayonet left him a 4-under 284. Fieger opened with a 67 at the Black Horse and
added a second-round 72 at the Bayonet. Steady weekend rounds of 71 and 74 left
him at 4-under 284.
Fieger and Ingraham, both 55, finished in a tie for 11th
and easily qualified for the Senior PGA Championship presented by KitchenAid in
May at Harbor Shores in Benton Harbor, Mich.
When Ingraham finished in a tie for second in the
Pennsylvania Open at Rolling Green G.C. in August he said he was starting to
play well at just the right time. Since then he won the Philadelphia PGA Senior
championship, which earned him the trip to Seaside, finished tied for seventh
in the Philadelphia PGA Section championship, which earned him a spot in next
summer’s PNC, and the solid showing in California that sends him to Harbor
Shores.
And what would a Senior PNC be without Radnor Valley Country
Club head pro George Forster, who was in the field for the 10th
straight year. Maybe to celebrate that 10th anniversary, Forster
threw an ace into the mix when his 7-iron shot at the 214-yard 17th
hole at the Bayonet Course found the hole.
“The pin was back right and I had 173 to the pin, downhill,
cross-wind right to left,” Forster told the PGA of America website. “I hit a
7-iron and we could not see it because of the glare. I wasn’t sure it cleared
the hump or it came back 30 feet. So, we did not see it. Then we got down there
and it was in the hole.”
The ace propelled him to a 71 at the Bayonet Course. He had
opened with a 73 at the Black Horse and then fired a 68 at the Bayonet in the second round. He then added a final-round
74 for a 2-under 286 total that left him in a tie for 17th.
The 59-year-old Forster easily qualified for the Senior PGA
Championship for the ninth time. Counting two U.S. Senior Open appearances, it will be the 11th
Champions Tour major he will tee it up in.
John DalCorobbo, a pro at the Brickyard Crossing Golf Course
in Indianapolis captured the title and the top prize of $20,000 with an
11-under 277 total.
Yang birdies the back nine
It happened in the middle of the night our time and she
didn’t win the tournament, so it wasn’t the lead when Lexi Thompson’s victory
in the KEB Hana Bank Championship in Incheon, South Korea was reported, but Amy
Yang birdied the back nine in Sunday’s final round. As in every hole on the
back nine.
Yang, the South Korean who dominated the U.S. Women’s Open
at Lancaster Country Club last summer for three rounds before falling short in
the final round, finished her final round with nine straight birdies. Her 62
left her in a tie for fourth at 13-under 275.
The nine straight birdies tied the LPGA record that belonged
to Hall of Famer Beth Daniel.
Rohanna earns her LPGA Tour card
I mentioned last week that the last non-District One girl to
win the big-school PIAA title was Rachel Rohanna of Waynesburg Central in 2007.
Sunday, Rohanna, who starred collegiately at Ohio St.,
earned her LPGA Tour card by holding on to her spot in 10th place
for 2015 at the Symetra Tour
Championship.
The top 10 finishers throughout 2015 on the Symetra Tour
earned full exemptions on the LPGA Tour. Rohanna entered this weekend’s Tour
Championship in the 10th spot and her tie for 24th at
5-under was good enough for her to hold onto to that precious 10th
spot.
So look for a PIAA champion when you tune in to an LPGA
event in 2016.
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