Jackson wins US Amateur strokeplay

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August 26, 2009

Tim Jackson continued to confound the golfing world on Tuesday when he won the stroke play qualifier at the 109th US Amateur.

Last month the 50-year-old real estate developer shook the golfing fraternity when he led the US Senior Open against some of the greatest professionals the world has ever known and here, now, on Tuesday, he made history when he became the oldest-ever US Amateur medallist, supplanting three-time US Amateur champion Walter Travis, who set the previous record in 1908 when he was 46.

And this despite Jackson being docked a shot for slow play.

He was initially warned at pace-of-play checkpoints along the way and finally was one of two players in his group given a one-stroke penalty when he reached the scoring tent, but it really didn’t matter.

He had done enough to ensure that he will tee-off on Tuesday as the number one seed in the 64-strong field going forward into the match play stage of the championship.

This after following his first-round 68 at Southern Hills Country club on Monday with a 2-over-par 72 in the second round at Cedar Ridge Country Club on Tuesday for a 140 total that earned him the stroke play medal by one shot from three players who are all young enough to be his sons.

They are Ben Martin, who turns 22 on Wednesday, and Mark Anderson, and Will Strickler, who are both 23. The trio all finished on 141.

“This is phenomenal,” said Jackson, who won the 1994 and 2001 US Mid-Amateur and has twice played in the Walker Cup.

“I’m not a record book reader or anything like that but today, I went out there and I just went for it. I hit shots today that, in the years past, I might just have laid up or played 40 feet away from the hole. I played my butt off and just tried as hard as I could.”

Jackson, a quarter-finalist at the US Amateur in 1994 where he was beaten by eventual champion Tiger Woods, and in 1995 when he lost to the losing finalist Buddy Marucci, set a host of records with his heroics in the SA Senior Open three weeks ago.

There he shot the lowest round by an amateur (a first-round 66), the lowest 72-hole score by an amateur (288) and the lowest score by any player in the first 36 holes (133), tying six others for the record.

USA Walker Cup team member Bud Cauley, 19, Trent Whitekiller, 22, who plays college golf at Oklahoma State, James Sacheck, 23, and Scott Langley, 20, were two strokes off the pace at 142.

Among the high-profile amateurs who missed the cut were 2008 US Amateur runner-up Drew Kittleson, 20, and Nick Taylor, 21, of Canada, who was the low amateur at the 2009 US Open.

A 27-man playoff for the final four places in the match play field of 64 will begin at 7:30am on Wednesday on the 14th hole of Southern Hills. The first round of match play begins at 8 am

Begun in 1895, the US Amateur is the oldest of the 13 national championships conducted annually by the United States Golf Association, 10 of which are strictly for amateurs.

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