The PGA Tour of Australasia came back with a bang on the weekend following a thrilling finish to the WA PGA in Kalgoorlie.
Justin Warren walked away with an emotional win that came with an even more special backstory.
Watch the final two rounds of the WA Open LIVE on Fox Sports, available on Kayo from 17–18 October.
Meanwhile, some golfers could be forgiven for feeling a little worse for wear before the tour heads southwest to Secret Harbour Golf Links following their globetrotting efforts.
Here’s what we learnt from last weekend’s WA PGA Championship.
‘THE TEARS ARE COMING’: Two years of torment end with brilliant Aus PGA tournament triumph
The road to success can be bumpy … especially in a moonboot
Hit the ball a long way, putt well and work hard.
Combine all those elements and it would seem a successful career in professional golf is yours for the taking.
Despite owning those attributes, however, significant success and tournament victories haven’t come quickly for Justin Warren, who broke his professional victory duck at the WA PGA on Sunday after receiving an invite into the field.
Spending time on the Asian Tour and his home circuit, the Picton product has always been considered a prodigious talent.
Yet talent counted for little as the 31-year-old was consigned to a moonboot and menial tasks, like cleaning golf carts, as he faced an uncertain future following injury.
“I had surgery on my foot, and kind of came back too hard too quickly, and put myself back out of the game,” an emotional Warren said immediately after his victory in Kalgoorlie.
“Back in a moonboot for about eight months last year, just took my time with it, made sure that there wasn’t going to be any issues when I came back out and started playing.
“Basically, put a golf shoe on at Christmas time last year and everything felt great, so the doctor said ‘Go as hard as you want’, and I’ve been trying to play as much as I can, whatever I can get into here and up in Asia on my medical exemption.
“It’s been a long journey, tough to get back here, but everything is worth it to be here right now.”
The journey made victory taste even sweeter, with the ‘Prince of Picton’ turned ‘King of Kalgoorlie’.
The triumph has earned him a two-year exemption on the Australasian Tour, as well as spots in the Australian PGA Championship and Australian Open.
Meanwhile, Warren’s win came with a little more pain — but it was north of his previously troublesome foot.
Fighting back tears, Warren first had to wipe his eyes after clinching the title with a 25-foot birdie putt that resulted in a celebratory champagne spray from his fellow Tour pros.
“I can’t see” and “champagne stings” were some of the Warren’s first words after clinching his first professional win.
Warren’s celebrations are now on hold.
He heads to Macau to play on the Asian Tour this week, while the rest of the Australasian field moves southwest to the WA Open.
Not your average commute
Starting a constant run of events through to Christmas, the Aussie Tour has been in something of a hiatus since opening in Papua New Guinea two months ago.
During that time, players have travelled near and far to compete and ready themselves for the summer of golf.
Five of the competitors in Kalgoorlie on the weekend had to complete a rather unimaginable commute.
Ryan Peake, Matias Sanchez, James Marchesani, Declan O’Donovan and Jack Buchanan all teed it up the week prior on the DP World Tour at the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship …
That event takes place in Scotland, including on The Old Course at St. Andrews.
From playing for US$5 million alongside pro-am partners that included the likes of Kevin Pietersen, Piers Morgan, James Milner, Ronan Keating and Michael Vaughan, the fivesome made their way straight to West Australian Goldfields, nearly 700kms northeast of Perth.
There, they competed for the comparatively modest $250,000.
The travel clearly took its toll, too, with only Buchanan and Peake making the halfway cut.
Peake’s journey has been particularly brutal. He only arrived on the Wednesday afternoon before the first round on Thursday, before he drove straight back to Perth ahead of this week’s WA Open.
Golfers literally suffer in their jocks
If you thought that wasn’t enough unglamorous enough for Peake, it gets better.
The one-time jailed bikie was hilarious evidence of why every shot matters in a golf tournament on the weekend.
Whether it is to win, make the cut, earn a few extra dollars, or collect a dinner bet with a mate, professional golfers will grind over every stroke … sometimes in less than their Sunday best.
That was the case for the former NZ Open winner when the burly left hander did the supposedly impossible and found water in the desert.
Stripping down to his underpants to keep his clothes clean, and in ankle deep water, Peake took an aggressive swipe to avoid a penalty stroke.
The West Australian didn’t avoid the cameras of the PGA Tour of Australasia’s social team though, with the vision making its way to social media … much to the delight of Peake’s fellow Tour pros.
“I wish this post was censored,” commented DP World Tour player, and Peake’s fellow West Aussie, Connor McKinney.
Honesty is still the best policy
Bobby Jones, one of golf’s greatest players and co-founder of Augusta National, famously said when receiving kudos for calling a penalty on himself, “You might as well praise me for not robbing banks”.
The American’s example was back on display last week via another US player in Tyler McCumber.
Teeing it up on an invite after four hip surgeries in recent years, McCumber was in contention on Saturday.
But after completing his third round he suddenly dropped further down the leaderboard.
News then filtered through that, having moved his ball marker for playing partner Todd Sinnott, the son of 10-time PGA TOUR winner Mark was unsure if he had returned his ball to the original spot.
What followed was something quite remarkable.
“We checked the vision, the vision was a bit inconclusive, but Tyler in himself was unsure and didn’t feel right, so he opted to take a two stroke penalty,” Tournament Director Heath McLeod explained.
McCumber reportedly also gave Kalgoorlie’s banks a wide berth during his visit.
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