Tabuena beats Alido by 2
TARLAC — Miguel Tabuena cashed in on a key two-shot swing on No. 12 to wrest control then outgunned Ira Alido in a clash of skills and nerves in the stretch to fashion out a 65 and retain the ICTSI Luisita Championship crown by two here Friday, May 12.
On the outside looking in majority of the way, Tabuena even fell by two strokes off Alido with a bogey on the first hole but found his touch and rhythm in time to engage the third round leader in a shootout after the duo detached themselves from a crammed leaderboard with torrid frontside assaults on the Luisita Golf and Country Club course.
When the smoke cleared, Tabuena emerged virtually unscathed and a winner again at the Robert Trent Jones, Sr.-designed layout the way he did when he repelled Clyde Mondilla in sudden death here last year.
“The turning point was actually when I caught Ira on the ninth hole, we were even after No. 9. But there were still so many holes left,” said Tabuena, who after a bogey start, rattled off five birdies in the next eight holes and tied Alido, who fired four birdies of his own in the same stretch, at 12-under overall.
But as Alido regained the lead with back-to-back birdies to launch his backside bid against Tabuena’s birdie on No. 10, the latter countered with his own feat on the par-4 12th, which Alido bogeyed for a crucial two-shot swing that pulled the recent Asian Tour’s DGC Open winner ahead for the first time.
He never relinquished the lead, hiking it to two with another birdie on the next then after the duo traded bogeys on the tough No. 15, Tabuena birdied the par5 16th to all but put the outcome beyond doubt. He parred the last two to cap a brilliant closing 3233 round for a 72-hole total of 14-under 274 on a course he calls home.