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The move of The Players Championship from May back to its original date in March meant a challenging change of conditions in the final round. It was very entertaining to watch for all sorts of reasons. Jim Furyk bidding to become the oldest winner eventually missed a 6 footer and was leader in the clubhouse for some time. Jon Rahm and his caddie appeared to have a disagreement, Dustin Johnson couldnt make a putt under 10 feet, Jason Day played messilyand Tommy Fleetwood who played with some brilliance made an eagle on 16 after hitting his approach to 3 feet and the  hit his ball in the water on 17.

And then there was Rory who was doing his best not to let the frustration of constant runners up finishes get to him. All year he had not been outside the top 6 in every tournament he had competed in. He revealed that he had been figuring the mental side of the game out for himself. It showed. He looked serene and competed with imperious driving and thought his way round the course well. He had four birdies in the final 8 holes and on 16 took the lead playing a 6 iron out of the sand from 180 yards to 14 feet and made the putt. He won by one shot. (3 said

“I needed to show a lot of character out there,” he said. “I think all the experiences I’ve had over the last few weeks in terms of trying to win and not getting over the line definitely helped me today.”

A blistering final round of 64 allowed Francesco Molinari to storm from behind to win the Bay Hill invitational finishing two hours before the final group came into the clubhouse. The final leaderboard had international players taking the top five places with Matthew Fitzpatrick runner up and three players tied on -9 – Tommy Fleetwood, Sun Jae Im and Rafa Cabrera Bello.

It’s Molinari’s fourth worldwide win in 10 months and first since becoming Open Champion. He started the final round five shots back with four birdies on the front nine to be out in 32. Back to back birdies at 12 and 13 were followed with an adventurous 16th hole whee he nearly holed his secind shot for albatross. He ended up making 7 birdies in his bogey free round of -8.

Molinari said: “This is incredible. It’s up there with the best wins I’ve had. Arnold Palmer was a special player but most of all a special person and a global icon for the game. To win here is really, truly special”.

During the first round of the Honda Classic yesterday Rickie Fowler was granted a drop by a rules official and decided to do it a little bit differently, but still under the new knee high version of the Rules of Golf.

Keith Mitchell sealed his first win on the PGA Tour with a birdie on 18 at the Honda Classic in Palm Beach Gardens Florida beating Rickie Fowler and Brooks Koepka by a stroke. Fowler had a late charge to -8 with 3 birdies in the last 4 holes including a 45ft putt which he holed out on the 17th. Mitchell found himself in the upslope of a fairway bunker on 18, laid up with his second then hit a wedge to 15 feet below the hole and holed his putt for a win which had looked unlikely when he began his final round with two bogeys.

To add to the entertainment Vijay Singh was in with a chance to become the oldest man ever to win a PGA Tour title at 56 when had a birdie out for a share of the lead on 15 which he missed, and he fell back to place 6th. Sam Snead still holds the record of oldest man winning the Greater Greensboro Open when he was 52.

Dustin Johnson said he was “really happy” with his 20th tour victory this weekend at the WGC-Mexico Championship. His final round of 66 beat Rory McIlroy by 5 strokes, who was in the top 5 for the 4th consecutive start.

That’s about as excited as he ever gets. He was more interested in the implications of this win. It grants lifetime exemption on the PGA Tour, in particular from a rule which protects sponsor’s interests. The “strength of field” requirement requires players to add an event which they haven’t played in for the previous four years if they havent played in 25 events the previous season. “I was definitely thinking of that, it was my biggest concern, because I couldnt find somewhere I was going to add a tournament this year”.

All well and good until he was told that he can’t take advantage of this until 2022, because the second part of the exemption states that it must be 20 victories and 15 active years on Tour. Dustin has only been playing on the PGA Tour for 12 years and he has won every year.

Has a new website petecowen.com.

Most James Bond afficionardos will mention Goldfinger and the scenes shot at Stoke Park, but I prefer this scene from Dr No as it is a female playing, even if she is daftly wearing gold high heels.

I met Sean Connery once, not on a golf course. He came into my work to talk to the Minister I was working for at the time. The messengers were too overawed to ask him if he would like refreshment, but young Ned, who never made anyone a cup of tea in his life before, asked him if he would like one. And to make sure that Ned did that nicely I followed behind him and asked Mr Connery how his golf was. He said he had been too busy to play. But we did start up a lovely conversation about the tournament at Sun City and he agreed that Mickelson had played awful. But we both oohed over the swing of Ernie Els. I enjoyed that a lot. He was quite a bit older then than he was in this film but still devastatingly handsome.