Eggenberger's first victory as a professional
29.07.2021
Two solid rounds in the "red" gave Mathias Eggenberger an undisputed victory at the two-day Swiss PGA Tour tournament in Leuk. His first as a professional. With a total score of 138 strokes, he distanced Jean-Luc Burnier and the rest of the field by three or more strokes.
The last three tournament rounds of Swiss Golf Team and Swiss PGA member Mathias Eggenberger on the Challenge Tour and the Alps Tour were not really successful for the 29-year-old player. At the joint tournament of the Alps Tour and LETAS in mid-July, Eggenberger dropped from 6th to 26th place in the last round, and last week at the Challenge Tour event in Piedmont he did not have his best day in the first round: "I played too aggressively off the tee, which is not typical for me, and I had to pay dearly for my stray tee shots", Eggenberger said that weekend. On the second day, things initially went better. After ten holes, the Swiss was four under par for the day, "but then I made two annoying bogeys and three equally annoying three-putts". He missed the cut. Check off and drive from Piedmont directly to the Valais, where a Pro-Am was scheduled at the Links Leuk Golf Resort on Sunday and a Swiss PGA Tour tournament with 12,000 Swiss francs in prize money on Monday and Tuesday (26/27 July).
Victory from start to finish in Valais
Mathias Eggenberger feels at home on the 6142-metre links course in the Rhone Valley. After a cautious start with eight pars and one bogey on the front nine, the 29-year-old turned up the heat on the back nine on Monday afternoon, played five birdies and one bogey and came into the clubhouse with a convincing card of 69 (-3). Which meant the half-time lead for Eggenberger; Philippe Weppernig and Flavio Schneider were one stroke behind.
On Tuesday, Eggenberger took the competition by surprise with a lightning start: eagle on hole 1 (driver on the green, putt holed from 4 metres), birdie on hole 2 - "Eggi" thus clearly extended his lead. Another birdie and unfortunately three bogeys followed. Eggenberger played seven pars on the holes 9 to 15, while his pursuer Jean-Luc Burnier started a birdie firework - seven birdies were matched by only one bogey, the native of Western Switzerland played the best round of the day with 67 strokes and came up to one stroke behind the leader Eggenberger. "I made it more difficult for myself in this phase of the tournament than necessary, I was also a bit nervous", Eggenberger explained after the tournament. He started the second round much later than Burnier and was able to counter the attack of his opponent with two more birdies on the 16th and 17th holes. On the 18th Eggenberger putted for his second 69 of the week. With a total score of 138 strokes (6 under par), he finally distanced himself from the competition by three or more strokes and celebrated his first victory among the professionals. Eggenberger was clearly relieved after this triumph: "I am very happy to finally win again after five years. Now I want to take the positives from this tournament back home and to the Challenge Tour event in Finland next week".
Alex Messiqua and Philippe Weppernig shared third place in Leuk with 142 strokes each. A senior competition was also held at the same time as the tournament for the active players. With rounds of 74 and 71 strokes, Vivian John Ross also won clearly in the senior category; Tony Price in second place needed three more strokes.
Article retrieved from www.swissgolf.ch
Picture: (from left to right) Vivian John Ross & Mathias Eggenberger, Swiss PGA Tour 2021, Links Leuk Golfresort
