Stuart Appleby survived a late charge from Vijay Singh in Hawaii on Sunday to win the United States PGA Tour’s season-opening Mercedes Championships.
Appleby led throughout the final round but was made to sweat down the stretch before recording a one-stroke victory in strong winds on Maui’s Kapalua Plantation course.
The 32-year-old Australian shot a steady 71 to finish at 22-under-par 270.
”I realised Vijay was never going to go away. Eventually, he just ran out of holes, to the benefit of me,” Appleby said.
Singh carded a 70 to get to 271, four shots better than Northern Ireland’s Darren Clarke (70).
Tiger Woods tied for fourth with South Africa’s Retief Goosen at 277, then declared he will have a long break before starting his 2004 season in earnest.
Appleby picked up $1 060 000 dollars for the biggest payday of his career, his fifth PGA Tour win and second in less than four months.
He earned a spot in this winners-only event with a victory last October in the Las Vegas Invitational.
The 32-year-old Australian started the day two shots ahead of Singh, a lead that never dwindled until the final hole. He picked up four birdies and a bogey on the front nine to open a six-shot lead, but bogeyed the 12th before deciding to play conservatively down the stretch.
Singh responded to the challenge, finally finding his putting touch to reel off three straight birdies, starting at the 14th, and cut the gap to two shots with two to play.
He had a chance to further reduce the margin at the par-four 17th but frittered away a golden birdie opportunity from 15 feet.
That left Appleby two up with one hole left, and even though Singh birdied the last, it was too little, too late as Appleby made a tap-in par for victory.
”Stuart did not play too many bad shots coming in,” Singh said.
”He was very safe. He hit the greens and two-putted. He never missed [a putt] from inside four or five feet and on these greens. That’s really good, especially with the wind today.
”I’m not disappointed to finish second, I’m just disappointed I didn’t win. I just left it too late.”
Appleby said he left it to Singh to catch him.
”I wasn’t going to let him have anything. I just had to play smart in pretty trying conditions,” Appleby said. ”I didn’t need to make birdies. The way the pins were located, it was very difficult to get the ball under the hole.”
Appleby will tee it up again on Thursday at the Sony Open in Hawaii while Woods will put away the clubs, probably skipping four tournaments before his expected return at the Buick Invitational. — Sapa-AFP