Australia’s John Wade powered through the field at the Ireland Ryder Cup Challenge with a fantastic final round of seven under par 63 to take his first Challenge Tour title at the Ireland Ryder Cup Challenge. Wade posted the clubhouse lead of 19 under par 261 that proved too good for the rest of field as the final group of Sebastian Fernandez of Argentina, Ireland’s Michael McGeady and Juan Parron of Spain all failed to catch the surprise winner.
No-one at the Killarney Golf and Fishing Club was more surprised than the man himself as he picked up the first prize of €20,800 and secured a potentially priceless one year exemption to the Challenge Tour, where he will now play out the rest of the season in the hope of breaking into the all important top 20 on the final Rankings which would win him the ultimate prize of a place on The European Tour.
Starting the day on 12 under – six shots behind Parron – Wade got going with a birdie on the fourth hole which he quickly followed up with a further three to go to the turn in 31 and move into the lead, as Parron, Fernandez and McGeady made poor starts in the drizzling rain at the Mahoney’s Point course.
By the time Wade knocked in his seventh birdie of the day on the 16th, he was in the lead on 19 under and he managed to par the last two holes of his final round, making a crucial 15 foot putt on the 18th to post the clubhouse lead.
All Wade could do now was wait on the last match to see if he had done enough, and that proved to be the case as McGeady bogeyed the last and Fernandez missed his birdie chance to finish on 18 under.
“I’m more surprise than anything else,” said Wade as he pondered his first Challenge Tour success. “I started the day hoping that the conditions would be tougher than they were but I managed to get the score going and when I got to the turn I looked up and saw that I was up there on the leaderboard.
“Then I tried to get that out of my head because I had to keep going and trying to get more birdies and you often change your mentality when you are in the lead. But I managed to get a couple more after that and made a good par at the last after a bad tee shot and a bad chip.
“I didn’t know if 19 under would be good enough but I suppose the guys in the last group would have seen that that was their target and it can be difficult when you know you have to pass a certain score to win.
“I’m delighted to have won. This is definitely the biggest win of my career. I have won three times on the Europro Tour, but without any disrespect I think the fact that you play four and not three rounds on the Challenge Tour and also the field is a lot stronger on the Challenge Tour.”
