Golf Digest/US Tour: Australian John Senden held his nerve to win his maiden PGA Tour title at the John Deere Classic - and with it a chance to play in the Open championship at Hoylake this week.
Senden held off a determined challenge from American JP Hayes to card a final round 68 for a 19 under par total and one-shot victory.
Hayes' closing 65 gave him outright second on 18 under with Germany's Alex Cejka and American Heath Slocum tied for third two shots further back.
Senden held a four-shot lead going into the final round and got off to the perfect start with birdies at the first two holes, and then added another at the seventh.
CHAMPIONS TOUR: Bobby Wadkins captured the Ford Senior Players Championship title despite posting a double bogey on the last hole to take the title at 14-under-par 274. Jim Thorpe finished one stroke back with Des Smyth, in a tie for third place at 12-under-par 276 with Loren Roberts, Jay Haas and Gil Morgan.
WOMEN'S TOUR: England's Rebecca Hudson came from a shot behind to claim her first Ladies' European Tour title at the OTP Bank Ladies Central European Open in Tata, Hungary yesterday.
Hudson, 27, from Doncaster, shot rounds of 66, 65 and 70 to finish on twelve-under par 201 after 54 holes, two shots ahead of Germany's Anja Monke. England's Lora Fairclough and Finland's Riikka Hakkarainen, the Tenerife Ladies Open champion, tied for third on nine-under-par.
CHALLEGE TOUR: After a gruelling four hole sudden-death play-off, Spain's Carlos Del Moral emerged the victor at the Texbond Open after defeating England's Lee S James over extra holes to complete "the best week of my life".
Having carded a two under par 72 to tie the Englishman on 18 under par 270 after 72 holes, Del Moral and James went back to the 18th tee at the glorious Gardagolf to determine who would walk away with the €19,200 first prize.
"This has been a wonderful week - the best week of my life and the best day of my career so far. ."
EUROPEAN AMATEUR CHAMPIONSHIPS: After a generally disappointing few days for Irish amateur golf there was something to cheer about at the end of the week as Ireland chalked up final day victories in three of the four championships but still the best position achieved was sixth - in the youths.
Ironically it was in the youths contest at San Roque in Spain that the Irish suffered defeat on Saturday going down 3½-1½ to the Netherlands in what was a closely-fought contest.
Four of the five matches went to the home green but Ireland lost in two of them and halved another.
Spain captured the title when they beat Italy in the final and England overcame 2004 champions Scotland to capture Bronze.
In the European boys championship at Malmo in Sweden they demolished Germany 4-1 which meant they ended up in ninth position. Norway became champions by beating Scotland.
In the Euro under-21 women's team championship at Utrecht,Sweden the Irish beat Austria 3½-1½ but they still had to be content with 11th place - a great disappointment especially with Curtis Cup-bound Tara Delaney in their side. Sweden grabbed the gold with victory over Spain and England took the bronze.
In the girls championship at Esjberg, Denmark there was some comfort for Ireland in that they beat Iceland 3-2 on Saturday, a result that gave them 16th spot. Germany are the champions after beating Spain in the final.
