Singh wins after taking month off
THOUSAND OAKS, Calif. — Vijay Singh rarely shows up at a golf tournament not knowing what to expect.
Then again, he has never gone an entire month without so much as lifting a club.
In his first conventional tournament since capturing the FedEx Cup on Sept. 28, even the 45-year-old Singh was surprised by what transpired over the weekend at the Chevron World Challenge.
He kept the ball in play with a new driver. He piled up birdies on the par 5s. He moved up the leaderboard with three straight birdies early on the back nine Sunday. And he finished the most lucrative season of his career with a 10-foot birdie on the final hole for a 5-under 67 and a one-shot victory over Steve Stricker.
"I didn't know what to expect," he said. "Once you get into the middle of things, you kind of know where you stand. I felt very comfortable in the middle of the heat."
Singh didn't make a bogey over the final 14 holes as everyone around him fell apart — first Anthony Kim with consecutive double bogeys, then Jim Furyk, who dropped five shots over the final five holes.
Stricker tried to keep pace, hitting a wedge to a foot on the 16th and holing a 10-foot putt on the 17th, two birdies he desperately needed to have a chance. But he came up short of the green on the 18th playing with Singh, and couldn't give himself a shot at birdie.
He finished with a 68 for second place alone, worth $840,000.
Singh, who finished at 11-under 277, won $1.35 million and pushed his earnings for the year to over $18 million. That includes the $10 million bonus from the FedEx Cup, along with $6.6 million on the PGA Tour to win the money title for the third time in six years.
Get used to him taking some time off.
Singh's body is starting to feel the affects of age, playing the final month with his left arm wrapped because of tendinitis. He still works out, but doesn't spend nearly as much time on the practice range — when he does go to the range.
"I took a month off to rest my arm and I literally didn't hit a ball," Singh said. "And I haven't done that in forever. I just tried to repair my body a little bit."
He figures he needs a strong body to keep up with an emerging group of young players, and he showed this week he was up to the task. Against a world-class field, Singh looked as good as new.
"When I show up and I know I can't win the golf tournament, I'm going to quit," said Singh, who won for the first time at Tiger Woods' charity event. "But as long as I show up and know that I can win, I'm going to keep playing."
Kim, the 54-hole leader, and Furyk did their own charity work on a splendid afternoon of sunshine.
Kim was one shot out of the lead until making consecutive double bogeys, driving into the bushes on the 14th and hitting his 7-iron short and into the water on the par-3 15th. He birdied the next two holes, but by then it was over. Kim closed with a 73 and tied for third with Hunter Mahan, who shot 68.
Furyk, playing for the first time since the PGA Grand Slam of Golf in Bermuda on Oct. 15, built a two-shot lead on the front nine until a pair of three-putt bogeys. He was tied with Singh after a 6-foot birdie on the 13th, and still was only one shot behind from the middle of the fairway on the par-5 16th when it all came undone.
He twice went into the rough and made bogey on the 16th, missing the par-3 17th green to drop another shot, and with the tournament already decided, found the water on the 18th hole for the second straight day to make double bogey. Furyk shot a 74 and tied for fifth with Camilo Villegas (73).
"There's a lot of places on this golf course where you can make birdies or you can make triple bogeys," Furyk said. "And I found some big numbers on the way in."
