Ochoa’s ‘best shot’ seals ADT crown

LORENA OCHOA could only see the top half of her golf ball that was buried in Bermuda rough. Even more daunting was the water that separated the 161 yards between her and the 18th hole.

No less than $1million (€680,000) was riding on this shot Sunday at the ADT Championship.

“It came out perfect,” she said.

On the verge of an unseemly collapse, Ochoa wrapped up a sensational season with what she called the best shot of her career. Clinging to a one-shot lead over Natalie Gulbis, who was already on the green 15 feet away for birdie, Ochoa hit 6-iron that rolled 30 inches from the cup for one final birdie.

It gave her a 4-under 68 for a two-shot victory in the ADT Championship and the $1m prize, the richest in women’s golf.

“I had a horrible lie,” Ochoa said. “Because of the conditions, and because I was only one shot leading the tournament, I think it was my best shot so far in my career.”

Even more stunning was how she got into this predicament.

Despite being the no one player in women’s golf, Ochoa has a short history of blowing tournaments, and this would have been a doozy. After blowing away the seven other players who qualified for this 18-hole shoot-out, she had a four-shot lead with two holes to play.

But she butchered the par-three 17th with an 8-iron over the back of the green, and three more putts from 20 feet for a double bogey. Gulbis made a seven-foot birdie putt, narrowing the lead to one shot with one hole to play.

It was about the only drama of the balmy afternoon, certainly more than Ochoa needed.

“It was fun for the fans” she said, “but it didn’t feel very good.”

Ochoa hammered a tee shot over the corner of the lake and the bunker, but it wasn’t enough to hop out of the rough, and the ball sank to the bottom of the grass. Gulbis hit first, a hybrid 3-iron that covered the flag and put even more pressure on Ochoa.

“Lorena was spending a lot of time looking at her lie, so I was assuming that the lie was not very good,” Gulbis said. “She’s the best player in the world, so I thought that at least we’d get kind of an eye-for-an-eye putt.”

That thought didn’t last long.

Gulbis made Ochoa’s 30-inch putt look even shorter when her birdie attempt stopped well short of the hole. Even so, Gulbis again showed she’s more than just a glamour girl, giving everything she had in what looked like a hopeless situation. She shot 70, the only other player to break par.

Gulbis earned $100,000 (€68,000) as the runner-up but Ochoa finished the year with $4,364,994 (€2.9m), having already shattered the record set by Annika Sorenstam five years ago of $2,863,904 (€1.95m).