Overbrook Golf Club’s Oscar Mestre has been playing at a
high level all season.
The 59-year-old Golf Association of Philadelphia vice
president will take his 2019 roll all the way to the U.S. Senior Amateur
Championship. Mestre fired a sparkling 3-under-par 68 to claim medalist honors
in a GAP-administered qualifier at LuLu Country Club last Monday to earn a trip
to the U.S. Senior Amateur Championship, which tees off Aug. 24 at the Old
Chatham Golf Club in Durham, N.C.
Also punching their tickets to the U.S. Senior Amateur at
Old Chatham were 61-year-old John Robinson, playing on his home course at LuLu,
and 56-year-old Chris Fieger of Foxchase Golf Club, each of whom carded a solid
2-under 69.
Mestre won the Francis B. Warner Cup (Gross) at Burlington
Country Club in May to open his 2019 campaign and had solid showings in two
other GAP majors for the senior players, earning runnerup honors in the Frank
H. Chapman Memorial Cup (Gross) at Moselem Springs Golf Club and reaching the
semifinals of the Brewer Cup, presented by Callaway Golf, at Fieldstone Golf
Club.
“I’ve been playing well, so I was hoping the run wouldn’t
end too soon, to be quite honest,” Mestre told the GAP website. “My only blip
on the radar this year was the GAP Open Championship, where I really got heat
fatigue at Huntingdon Valley. Other than that, I’ve been in control of my game.
I was hopeful.”
It will be Mestre’s first appearance on the national stage
since he qualified for the 2000 U.S. Mid-Amateur Championship. That came on the
heels of a trip to the 1999 U.S. Amateur.
Mestre admitted he was fighting his game early and, after
starting on the 11th tee, he made an early bogey with a three-putt
at the 12th hole. A par save at the 14th hole kept his
head in the game.
At the 366-yard, par-4 16th hole, Mestre knocked
a wedge from 98 yards away to 15 feet and converted the birdie try to get back
to even-par for the round.
When he reached the green in two at the 475-yard, par-5
first hole with a 5-iron and dropped his eagle putt from 15 feet, Mestre was
2-under and suddenly had a little wind at this back.
His drive at the 443-yard, par-4 fifth hole found a bunker
and led to a bogey, but he was able to attack two par-5s and make birdies to
finish at 3-under.
Mestre drilled a wedge from 119 yards away to seven feet at
the 475-yard, par-5 eighth hole and made the putt and finished with a flourish
at the 525-yard, par-5 10th hole where he wedged his approach from
107 yards to 20 feet and got one more putt to drop.
Robinson took full advantage of his local knowledge at the
6,471-yard, par-71 layout at LuLu, which he joined in 2015. The U.S. Senior
Amateur at Old Chatham will be his first appearance in a USGA championship.
It will also be the USGA debut for Fieger, who said he
couldn’t recall even trying to qualify for a national event since his days as a
scholastic standout at Strath Haven.
Fieger’s older brother Gene Fieger has been a standout on
the senior circuit for club professionals. An instructor at Club Pelican Bay in
Naples, Fla., Gene Fieger won the Senior PGA Professional Championship in 2013.
Gene Fieger finished in a tie for ninth in last year’s Senior Club Pro, which
enabled him to tee it up in the KitchenAid Senior PGA Championship at Oak Hill
Country Club’s East Course in Pittsford, N.Y. in the spring.
The first alternate is David West of Oxford, who matched par with a 71. West qualified for last year's U.S. Senior Amateur Championship at Eugene Country Club and earned a berth in the match-play bracket.
Gary Daniels of Berwyn is the second alternate as he carded a 1-over 72.
The first alternate is David West of Oxford, who matched par with a 71. West qualified for last year's U.S. Senior Amateur Championship at Eugene Country Club and earned a berth in the match-play bracket.
Gary Daniels of Berwyn is the second alternate as he carded a 1-over 72.
The GAP contingent at the U.S. Senior Amateur is usually led
by nine-time reigning GAP Senior Player of the Year Chip Lutz, winner of the
2015 U.S. Senior Amateur at Hidden Creek Golf Club at the Jersey Shore.
It looks like the 64-year-old Lutz has his game in pretty good
shape as he finished in a tie for seventh at 8-under 210 in The Seniors Amateur
Championship, which concluded Saturday at North Berwick Golf Club in Scotland.
Lutz has three victories in The Seniors Amateur Championship on his remarkable
senior resume.
Lutz reached the semifinals in last year’s U.S. Senior
Amateur at Eugene Country Club before falling to eventual champion Jeff Wilson
of Fairfield, Calif.
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