MacIntyre loses out in sudden-death Finnish
Oban’s Robert MacIntyre is heading into the business end of the Challenge Tour season in the top 30 in the Road to Ras Al Khaimah Rankings after narrowly missing out on his breakthrough win on the circuit.
The Glencruitten left-hander, who recently turned 22, made home player Kim Kuovi pull out all the stops to come out on top in the Vierumaki Finnish Challenge at the Vierumaki Resort, in north-east of Finland. The pair shared the lead heading into the final round and fought out a thrilling head-to-head battle in the €180,000 event.
He started for home with a bogey – his only blip of the day – before bouncing back with birdies at the 12th and 13th before finishing with five solid pars.
The 2015 Scottish amateur champion led outright after Kuovi made his only bogey of the round at the 14th but the 27-year-old Finn birdied the 17th to force a play-off. That was decided at the first extra hole, where Kuovi holed from 15 feet for a birdie to claim his second win on the Challenge Tour this season after winning the Belt & Road Colourful Yunnan Open in April.
MacIntyre shot rounds of 68, 66, 67, 66 for a 21-under-par aggregate – a total that would have seen him win all but two of the previous events on the circuit this season.
‘This is some game we play,’ wrote MacIntyre on Twitter. ‘A great week, gutted to miss out on the win but what a game of golf that was.’
Kuovi agreed, saying: ‘It was just a great battle with Rob, he played awesome. He put the pressure on me all the way around and I just kept fighting, and I was the lucky one to come out on top.’
The effort earned MacIntyre ranking points that saw him jump 45 spots to 27th in the Road to Ras Al Khaimah.