Unheralded Menor clinches Splendido Classic crown

TAGAYTAY – Rene Menor literally broke through the hard way, wearing down Thai Pasavee Lertvilai in a record six-hole playoff and snaring the ICTSI Splendido Classic crown of the PGT Asia Tour at Taal Splendido here yesterday.

Menor, who matched Lertvilai’s closing six-under 66 to force a threeway playoff with American John Michael O’Toole at 12-under 276, hit his drive on the par-5 No. 10 into the hazard but found a big lift as the Thai drove out-of-bounds.

He took a penalty shot but had a closer approach for his third shot while Lertvilai had to tee off again from the mound, enabling the unheralded local shotmaker to finish off the PGTA QSchool topnotcher with a scrambling par and annex his first-ever championship.

“I couldn’t believe I won,” said an overwhelmed Menor, who banked $17,500 for his tough feat that nearly tripled his combined earnings in a long winless spell on the local circuit “Actually, I didn’t even expect I would be able to come back and survive a long playoff duel.”

But he did as Lertvilai blinked and wound up with a bogey and settled for runner-up purse of $11,500 in the second leg of the PGT Asia Tour sponsored by ICTSI.

O’Toole, who battled from eight down by shooting a course-trying record 64 in bogey-free fashion, bowed out right in the first playoff hole on No. 18, stumbling with his first bogey in the day. He took home $7,000.

Four more trips back to the closing par-4 hole failed to produce a winner and the Menor-Lervilai duel had to be brought to No. 10 for the sixth playoff hole.

Menor, who has had a series of solid starts in a number of tournaments, only to crumble under pressure and fade, this time fought back from six down off third round leader Rufino Bayron in regulation.