Steady Sepp: Sepp Straka wins American Express golf title by two shots

Posted by Admin January 20, 2025 Golf

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For most of the final round at The American Express PGA Tour event Sunday, there were only two questions: Could Sepp Straka reach the tournament 72-hole scoring record of 29-under par, and could Straka complete the four rounds without a single bogey.

The answer to both questions, it turned out, was no. Straka made a bogey on the par-5 16th hole Sunday, and that in part kept him from reaching the tournament scoring record set by Nick Dunlap last year. But with a final-round 2-under 70, Straka did finish at 25 under for the week to comfortably put away the chasers Sunday.

In earning his third PGA Tour title, the Austrian star took much of the drama out of the final round with a steady and almost mistake-free round. Starting with a four-shot lead on the Pete Dye Stadium Course at PGA West, Straka was never truly threatened in the final round by the likes of Justin Thomas, Jason Day and Charley Hoffman.

Straka’s lead never dropped under three shots until his final putt, and his play was so consistent and pure that he didn’t miss a green in regulation Sunday until the 13th hole, and then only by a foot. The bogey-6 on the 16th hole came when his lead had ballooned back up to four shots.

The win earned the 31-year-old Straka his first title since the 2023 John Deere Classic, 500 FedEx Cup points and the $1,584,000 first-place check, the largest check of his career.

Thomas turned in a 6-under 66 on Sunday and finished two shots back in second place.

While Straka was playing solid if unspectacular golf, the contenders were missing the chances to close in down the stretch. Thomas had five birdies on the front nine, but burned the edges on critical birdie chances on the back nine at the par-3 13th, the par-5 16th and again at the par-4 18th. Day did the same thing, unable to make putts under 20 feet on the 15th and 17th holes and three-putting the 14th from 16 feet for a bogey.

Hoffman, the 2007 American Express winner, trailed by three shots on the 13th tee, but he hit his tee shot on the par-3 into a lake left of the green, then found that lake again with his third shot on the way to a triple-bogey 6.