Devon’s James Roth made defending his English PGA Championship title this week look easy after leading from start to finish to claim back-to-back wins at Bowood.
The Wiltshire venue proves to be Roth’s favourite, after an absolutely dominant week, which saw the Plymouth-born professional break the course record.
Tuesday’s impressive 61 (-11) was followed up by 71 yesterday, giving 38-year-old Ruth a healthy five-shot lead over her nearest challenger, 2018 winner Matthew Court, heading into the final round.
Any signs Ruth may have felt bed-pressed early when he scored back-to-back birdies on the third and fourth holes to go within two pars.
His nearest opponent Dave Copeland was determined to close the gap and raced three-under-par through the first six holes. However, Kurt struggled to make up the ground and had to wait until the ninth hole to catch his birdie of the day. Ruth also chased nine but his lead was cut to four, his shortest lead all week, when Copeland birdied 10 each. Both players missed 12, and with Copeland breathing down his neck waiting to pounce on any more fouls, Ruth kept his composure to win by four shots with a final score of 14-under-par.
“It’s always tough when you come back to defend your title,” said Ruth. “Not an easy thing to do but with my Tour on Tuesday people say you can’t win a championship in the first round, well I definitely think I did this week. That was the best Tour of my life and the last few days I’ve been hanging on to it a little bit.
“I was really struggling with my drivers today so I hit a lot of iron and ran the game really well. I’m really proud of shooting two sub-par goals. I was more proud of today’s Tour than I was on Tuesday because it’s easy to score well when you’re playing well, but to hit the level play as I was, I was really happy with that.”
When asked if he ever felt under pressure from a determined Coupland at second, Ruth continued: “Today I was less than second after four, and from there it was just a case of keeping it strong. I kept the ball in play and just turned my game over – I didn’t really feel pressure at all there.
“Winning this tournament means a lot. It is one of the biggest events we play as PGA professionals so I am really proud to have won it and hope they keep it here at Bowood every year because it seems to be a tournament I really love.”
“It’s not a course I’ve ever played on away from the English PGA Championship. It’s a really good layout, there are some great holes and Citation tests your game a lot. It’s probably one of the toughest courses in the South West. It’s a great place.”
Copeland made a valiant effort in his quest to catch Ruth, shooting four-under-par to finish second at -10, while Kurt was forced to settle for third for two shots again at -8. Ashton Turner hit the round today to secure a fourth-place finish of five five less than par.
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