Tournament Recap: The 2013 Humana Challenge

Photo courtesy of @pga_tour

The 2013 Humana Challenge at La Quinta was a showdown of the rookies and no-namers at La Quinta that commenced with an exciting final-round playoff finish between Brian Gay, Charles Howell and Swedish rookie David Lingmerth.  Lingmerth fell out after the first playoff hole leaving Gay and Howell to battle it out for one more hole.  Gay sunk his birdie on the 10th hole and walked away victorious for his 4^th win on TOUR, propelling him to the number one spot on the FedEx Cup leader board.  Final scores were just as low as we predicted in Wednesday’s Tournament Preview, with Gay, Howell, and Lingmerth all finishing at (-25).

“I’m still in a little bit of shock,” Gay said. “It kind of happened so fast there at the end the way things went down.  Last year was a struggle.  It was a long year, a lot of work.  I just wanted to come out this year kind of refocused, recharged, and believing in myself.”

Gay won on the par-4 10th, after putting his 9-iron second shot about 6 feet below the hole.  Howell drove his tee shot into the right rough and hit a back bunker on his second shot, which caused him to lead to a bogey for the hole.  Scott Stallings, who led the field going into Sunday, dropped a shot with a bogey on his final hole, which knocked him out of playoff contention.

Other notables such as Matt Kuchar (-20) and Brandt Snedeker (-19) remained competitive, continuing to climb up the leader board over the weekend.  Bo Van Pelt struggled with a 68 on Sunday, which capped him off at (-18).  As for the senior lefty, Mickelson’s 1^st round 72 placed him in a hole that he simply wasn’t able to recover from.  Phil went on to finish T37 at (-16).

Hats off to Brian Gay who began the final round six strokes off the lead at (-16).  His impressive final round surge up the leader board, going 9-under for a 63 on the round, propelled him to an important, early-season win.

Golficity’s Pick:  Brandt Snedeker T23 (-19)

(Cover Photo Credit)