It is one of British golf’s hoariest clichés, tritely trotted out whenever meteorological conditions veer into something substantially worse than ideal: “The winner this week was the golf course.”

But it is a cliché for a reason. And the reason is Senior Open weeks like this one at cold, wet and windy (gusts up to 40 miles per hour) Royal Porthcawl on the shores of an endlessly choppy Bristol Channel. In short, this wonderful but often wild Welsh links, aided and abetted by mother nature, kicked some experienced butt.

The moment Alex Cejka claimed his 3⃣rd Senior Major Championship title ?#SeniorOpen | #Rolexpic.twitter.com/HnmRE2LRBM

— DP World Tour (@DPWorldTour) July 30, 2023

The winning score is revealing of a tortuous four days. At the end of a final round that began with only one player, Alex Cejka, not already over par, the German eventually emerged as the new champion after closing with a five-over 76 that included a lost ball off the first tee and only three birdies. Cejka’s five-over-par 289 total was matched Padraig Harrington, who somehow got himself around in 75. Four-over after only four holes, the Irishman played the last 14 holes in a remarkable even par.

It took two playoff holes (both the par-5 18th) to separate the pair. The first was halved in birdies before Harrington failed to match Cejka’s second two-putt 4. Ironically, the owner of one of the best short games in golf, no matter the age, ended what had been a brave effort to secure the title by duffing a chip from a “cuppy” lie just behind the putting surface.

It was a sore one for the ever-persistent Harrington, who lost by a shot to Darren Clarke in this event at Gleneagles last year and was bidding to become only the fifth player, after Bob Charles, Gary Player, Tom Watson and Clarke, to win both the Open Championship and the Senior Open.

All of which was no concern for Cejka, who led for most of the final round and now owns three senior majors. It was somehow appropriate — and eminently predictable — that the destination of the title be decided more by a mistake than a decisive thrust. Indeed, the playoff was an appropriate postscript to what was, for all concerned, a test of survival as much as golfing skill.

All but two holes (the downwind sixth a par 5, and the 18th) averaged over par. The average 18-hole score was just over 78.5 and only two men, former PGA champion YE Yang and American Rob LaBritz, matched the par of 71. Yang, tied for 55th place after 54 holes, eventually rose as high as T-11. Another American, Mario Tiziani, had the distinction of making the day’s lone eagle.

Carnage.#SeniorOpen | #Rolex pic.twitter.com/Zd247FX1wR

— DP World Tour (@DPWorldTour) July 30, 2023

It was carnage really. Or at least something not far short of it. Former PGA champion, Rich Beem, needed 84 shots to get around. Eight-time European Order of Merit winner Colin Montgomerie shot 88, six strokes more than former US Senior Open and Senior PGA champion Roger Chapman. Even renowned foul weather expert, former Open champion Paul Lawrie, took 81, as did last year’s Schwab Cup winner, Steven Alker, who played the last six holes in seven-over. In all, 26 members of the 70-strong field failed to break 80, with Swede Patrik Sjoland’s 89 the worst example.

Amid that plethora of sizable statistics, lower numbers were just about possible to achieve, especially during those brief periods when the almost horizontal rain abated and the relentless wind assumed the role of primary hazard.

Cejka, armed with a short game that time and again turned three shots into two, proved to be the best of a bedraggled bunch. That said, Harrington will surely rue, as well as that fluffed chip shot, the short putt he missed on the 16th green. Had that three-footer fallen, the gap between the two protagonists would have shrunk to a single shot.

“What a week,” said Cejka at a prize presentation conducted during yet another heavy downpour. “What a day. I still can’t believe I am here and have beaten Padraig in a playoff. He is such a great player. It’s been a really tough two days. I can’t believe I’m standing with the trophy here. Seeing all those great names on the trophy, coming in here with all the pictures and everything, all the guys who won it before me, now holding it myself, it’s surreal.

“I tried to make good shots, but it was almost impossible in conditions like today,” he continued. “In the end, I lost it a little bit. I didn’t really make good shots coming in, but I made some beautiful par saves. I didn’t want a playoff, especially against Padraig, but I’m glad it’s over and I’m just super happy.”

He should be. For those keeping score, Germany now has 15 senior major wins to its name, 12 of those attributable to Bernhard Langer. Ever consistent, the two-time Masters champion pulled up T-7 this week. But the spoils, of course, always go to the winner.

Congratulations Royal Porthcawl.

The post Sideways rain and 40mph gales: Alex Cejka emerges as Senior Open’s weathered winner appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Ryan Herrington
Two down, three to go?

To think that Alex Cejka would be in line to win the calendar-year Grand Slam on the PGA Tour Champions in 2021 was all sorts of preposterous at the start of May. For starters, the 50-year-old Czech-German hadn’t played in only two Champions event, one in February and one in late April. He had limited status on the tour having won just once during his time on the PGA Tour (and four times on the European Tour). In order to compete in the year’s first senior major, the Regions Tradition in early May, he needed Jay Haas to withdraw from the field and allow him to jump off the alternate list.

Yet Cejka took advantage of the opportunity, shooting a final-round 67 at Greystone G. & C.C. to force a playoff with Steve Stricker then won with birdie on the first hole to take the title in just his third career senior start.

If that victory was from out of nowhere, the encore was only a little more shocking. On Sunday at the KitchenAid Senior PGA Championship, Cejka started the final round one shot back of Stricker only to shoot a closing 67 at Southern Hills Country Club, run away from the field and win by four shots over Tim Petrovic.

“The last couple of weeks have been incredible,” said Cejka, who finished at eight-under 272. “I can’t even describe it in words how I feel right now.”

While all’s well that ends well, it was an up-and-down round on Sunday for Cejka. He started birdie-bogey-bogey but made two more birdies to turn at one under on the round. Then birdies on the 11th and 12th stretched out a lead to as many as four shots as Stricker made six bogeys and a double in his first 13 holes to plummet down the leader board.

Cejka made a bogey on the par-5 13th hole, but offset it with a birdie on the par-4 17th to keep Petrovic, who closed his own Sunday 67, from making things too interesting.

In five PGA Tour Champions starts, Cejka has the two wins and a T-2 at the Chubb Classic. On Sunday, he became the first Champions tour rookie to win two majors since Jack Nicklaus in 1990 and the first player ever on the circuit to win in his first two major starts.

“I’m the same guy, I’m trying to play the same golf. I just seem to get luckier breaks, make more putts, drive it better since I turned 50,” he said.

Cejka goes for major No. 3 the last week of June at Firestone C.C. in Akron, Ohio, in the Bridgestone Senior Players Championship. Two weeks later is the U.S. Senior Open at Omaha Country Club, with the Senior British Open then played at the end of July at Sunningdale GC’s Old Course.

Dylan Buell
Cejka poses with the trophy after winning the Senior PGA Championship.

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By John Strege
Steve Stricker experienced a blowout on what was tantamount to a victory lap in the final round of the Regions Tradition on Sunday, providing Alex Cejka an opening that he took to win for the first time on the PGA Tour Champions.

The defending champion, Stricker carried a three-stroke into the back nine at Greystone Golf and Country Club in Birmingham, Ala., and when the debris of his unlikely retreat was cleared away, the duo went to a playoff that Cejka won by holing a 10-foot birdie putt on the first extra hole.

“I’m so excited,” an emotional Cejka said, wiping away tears. “I have no words right now. It’s a dream come true. It’s just incredible right now. I’m just so happy.”

Even dreams need assists. At the outset of the week, Cejka, a Czech-German, was not in the field. He was the first alternate who got the start only when Jay Haas withdrew. Then chasing Stricker on Sunday, he received two more back-nine assists, these from Stricker, who uncharacteristically squandered his opportunity for a seventh senior victory, a second straight and a third PGA Tour Champions major.

The first of the two assists came when Stricker three-putted the 11th green, made bogey and saw his lead reduced to two. On the 12th hole, Cejka made the first of three consecutive birdies, while Stricker played those holes in one-over par, the result of a bogey when he hit his approach to the green at the par-5 13th into water.

The third of Cejka’s birdie streak gave him a two-stroke lead. Stricker gamely recovered by trickling in a fast, downhill 18-foot birdie putt at 16, then rammed home a 12-foot birdie putt at 18 to send it to overtime.

Returning to the 18th hole for the playoff, Cejka holed a 10-foot birdie putt before Stricker missed a seven-footer to prolong it.

“He’s a great player,” Cejka said. “I know I’m going to have to get lucky, make aggressive shots to give me chances and to make the putts. I did it. I think it turned a little bit when he hit it in the water [on the par-5 13th hole] and I made birdie. That gave me a little bit of momentum.”

Cejka, who was making only his third senior start, entered the final round trailing by one, then shot a five-under 67 to Stricker’s 68 to get to a playoff. Both players completed 72 holes in 18-under par 270. It was a measure of revenge for Cejka, who finished second to Stricker in the Chubb Classic last month.

The win, worth $375,000 and a five-year exemption for Cejka, was his first on major tours since he won the Puerto Rico Open in a playoff in 2015, the only PGA Tour victory of his career. He won twice on Arizona’s Outlaw Tour during the pandemic hiatus last year.

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Cejka won a second consecutive mini-tour event on Sunday, claiming the Outlaw Tour’sParker Open. And while it’s not too surprising to see a guy who has won at the highest level winning at the, well, not highest level, the way he earned this victory was downright spectacular.

The 2015 Puerto Rico Open champ and four-time European Tour winner trailed Eddie Olson by six shots with six holes to play but went six under on his next four holes, including a hole-in-one. Poor Eddie never knew what hit him. Cejka actually needed to hole a 20-footer for par on 18 to get into a playoff before winning in extra holes.

RECAP: #ParkerOpen

Alex Cejka was chasing Ed Olsen by 6 shots thru 12 holes. He finished ….

Birdie on 13,
Hole-in-one on 14
Birdie on 15
Eagle on 16

(-6 thru 4 holes)

….to catch Ed Olson and then won in a playoff.

???? pic.twitter.com/gESAANdzqj

— The Outlaw Tour (@outlawgolftour) April 27, 2020

Wow. We don’t care what tour that’s on, that’s golfing your ball right there.

Olson, by the way, had only been able to practice for the event by hitting golf balls in a park at his umbrella—an umbrella that was nearly stolen. True story.

Eddie Olson who lost in playoff today, had only been able to practice at a park leading up to event. He would place his umbrella at 100 yds to hit at. And while he was filming his swing….someone jumped fence and tried to steal his umbrella and he had to run them down..??? pic.twitter.com/1N57Lz8tRu

— Monday Q Info (@acaseofthegolf1) April 27, 2020

Again, poor Eddie. But you gotta love the Outlaw Tour.

Also according to Ryan French, AKA Monday Q Info on Twitter, Cejka earned a first-place check for $4,200. This after earning $5,000 at the Outlaw Tour’s Arrowhead Classic earlier this month. It’s not exactly the type of prize money a man with $20 million in career earnings is used to, but it pays the bills.

It’s also keeping Cejka’s golf game sharp, either for the PGA Tour’s proposed restart in June. Or the start of his PGA Tour Champions career after he turns 50 in December. You know, whichever comes first.

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