LPGA Tour rookie Alexa Pano celebrated her nineteenth birthday in fashion on Sunday, profitable a three-person playoff to seize the ISPS Handa World Invitational in Antrim, Northern Ireland.
Pano carded a 6-under-par 66 in the fourth spherical to drag even with England’s Gabriella Cowley (70) and Germany’s Esther Henseleit (69) at 8-under 281 on the Galgorm Castle Golf Club.
Returning to the 18th gap to begin the playoffs, Pano and Cowley every made a birdie and Henseleit ended up with a par — eliminating the German from the proceedings.
Cowley misfired on a brief putt on the second playoff gap in her bid for her first profession LPGA Tour victory. Pano carded a birdie on the third playoff gap at No. 18 to grab her first profession LPGA Tour win and pocket $225,000.
Pano turned the third LPGA Tour rookie to report a win this season. Grace Kim captured the LOTTE Championship and Rose Zhang received the Mizuho America’s Open.
Pano moved up the leaderboard on the power of 9 birdies in opposition to simply three bogeys on Sunday.
Henseleit had six and three, respectively, and Cowley — the third-round chief — recorded an eagle on No. 18 to spotlight her fourth spherical. Cowley additionally had two birdies and two bogeys throughout her spherical.
Ryann O’Toole (70) completed in fourth place at 7-under, adopted by Germany’s Olivia Cowan (68) at 6-under.
—Field Level Media
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