With his T3 finish at the Charles Schwab Cup
Championship, Bernhard Langer completed his run
to the points title and earned the $1 million annuity
that goes with it.
The race for the title had become a two-man affair between Langer and Fred Couples. Langer led
by 582 points as the weekend began. For Couples to
have overtaken the German, he would have needed
to win the tournament and then still hope for a
Langer finish of worse than a two-way tie for fourth.
The 53-year-old capped his third full season on
the Champions Tour as the top money winner, just
as he has finished in the previous two. He claimed
two of the Tour’s five majors this season, winning
the Senior Open Championship at Carnoustie and
the U.S. Senior Open at Sahalee Country Club in
Washington.
It is only the fifth time in the Cup’s 10 years that
the player in the points lead after the last major
wound up winning the title.
The 61 that Michael Allen shot on Saturday at TPC
Harding Park was the best round the course ever
surrendered, and the best in the history of the tournament.
Ken Venturi and Colin Montgomerie each had
carded 64s to tie the previous record at the 85-year-
old course. And the event’s record had been held by
John Cook, who had a 62 in the second round of last
year’s championship at Sonoma Golf Club.
The round also marked the best 18-hole score
in a 72-hole tournament in Champions Tour history. Allen, who grew up just south of the tournament venue in San Mateo, Calif., had 10 birdies
and no bogeys.
“I got off to a good start ... and I just kind of kept
going,” he said. “I had some nice shots and I finally
read a couple of putts right and got them to go in. I
was feeling pretty good with the putter.”
The 2010 Champions Tour season now has seen
four scores of 61 posted in competition. It occurred
in the final round of an event in the three previ-
ous times, by Tommy Armour III at The ACE Group
Classic, David Frost at the 3M Championship and
Gary Hallberg at the Ensure Classic.
Tom Kite’s appearance in the tournament was
his 11th in a row, a run that tied Jim Dent and Gil
Morgan for the second longest in the event’s history. Hale Irwin holds the record with 13 appearances in a row ... Wet conditions were a factor all
weekend at Harding Park, with the “lift, clean and
place” rule in effect for the entire week. l
Three times in 2010, John Cook had played
the role of runner-up. But on the last day of the
Champions Tour season on Sunday, he made a
quick move to the top and stayed there.
Cook held off Michael Allen by two strokes
to win the Charles Schwab Cup Championship. Starting the soggy day at San Francisco’s
TPC Harding Park in second place by a stroke,
he swapped places with Allen early and was
steady enough the rest of the day to get to
17-under 267 and finally earn his first victory of
the season.
In grabbing the $442,000 winner’s check, he
continued a streak of having at least one Champions Tour victory in a season that dates to 2007.
It was a successful defense of his 2009
Schwab Cup title. Cook won the season-ending
event last year at Sonoma Golf Club, using a
record-breaking score of 22-under par to finish
five strokes ahead of Russ Cochran.
This time his 67 was one of the day’s best
rounds, just when he needed it most.
Playing in the final pairing, he and Allen
both birdied No. 1 to start the day. Cook tied for
the lead with another birdie at No. 3, then momentarily held the top spot alone a hole later
after an Allen bogey.
Cook’s lone bogey of the day on No. 5
dropped him back into a tie again. But on the
pivotal sixth, a 473-yard par 4, Cook birdied and
Allen gave another stroke back. The advantage
was two, and Cook never trailed again.
An Allen birdie on No. 9 tightened things for
a while, but Cook’s birdie on the short par- 4
16th essentially clinched things.
Bernhard Langer, who won the overall
season-long Charles Schwab Cup, tied David
Frost for third at 12 under, and a quartet of
players – Cochran, Fred Funk, Tom Pernice Jr.
and Tom Lehman – were another stroke back.
