TUESDAY, JUNE 2, 2015 SPORTS Bowditch wins Nelson for second career win IRVING: Steven Bowditch certainly has a Texas trend going in his career. The Australian will stop short of calling it a Tour trend. “I’m obviously not at the superstar level,” Bowditch said, trying to explain how he went from eight missed cuts this season and a disqualification a week earlier at Colonial to winning the AT&T Byron Nelson on Sunday. “I just go out there and do my best and hopefully every now and then I get a chance to win.” Bowditch rode his best birdie binge on the PGA Tour to a 5-under 64 and a four-shot victory in the Nelson, making him two-for-Texas in career titles after winning the Texas Open in San Antonio last year. A Dallas-area resident for 10 years, Bowditch had 27 birdies while becoming SAN DIEGO: Harriette Thompson, then 91, starts the 2014 Suja Rock ‘n’ Roll Marathon the seventh player to lead all four rounds of the in San Diego, which she completed. Thompson is scheduled to compete in the 2015 event. Playing next to the resort hotel where he edition in San Diego on Sunday, May 31, 2015. If she completes the race she would got married, the 31-year-old Bowditch finished become, at age 92, the oldest woman to ever complete a marathon. —AP at 18-under 259 on the rain-altered TPC Four Seasons layout. Holding the large trophy, he posed for photos 92-year-old becomes oldest on the 18th green - just as he and his wife, Amanda, did four years ago. “It’s definitely the woman to finish marathon second best time I’ve had on that green - since we got married,” Bowditch said in the interview SAN DIEGO: A 92-year-old cancer survivor training woes, she nearly matched her fin- room while his wife watched from the back. rocked her way into the record books ish time of last year, which was 7 hours, 7 Charley Hoffman (65), Texan Jimmy Walker Sunday, becoming the oldest woman to minutes, 42 seconds. That set a record for a (66) and Scott Pinckney (66) tied for second at 14 finish a marathon. Harriette Thompson of woman 90 or older, shattering the old one under. Zach Johnson shot a 63 to finish alone in Charlotte, North Carolina, completed by more than an hour and a half. fifth at 13 under. Sunday’s Rock ‘n’ Roll Marathon in San A classically trained pianist who played Hometown favorite and Masters champion Diego in 7 hours, 24 minutes, 36 seconds. three times at Carnegie Hall, Thompson Jordan Spieth stayed at 7 under after an even- She was mobbed by well-wishers as she says she mentally plays old piano pieces par 69. Playing with Bowditch in the final group, crossed the finish line. she had performed to help her get through Dustin Johnson briefly overtook him early in the “I’m fine, they’re really pampering me the 26 miles, 385 yards. round before making an 8 at the par-4 sixth. He here,” Thompson said in a firm, joyful voice She didn’t begin running marathons finished at 11 under with a 69. as people all around her shouted congratu- until she was in her 70s, after a member of A sunny day wrapped up two otherwise sog- lations. This was her 16th Rock ‘n’ Roll her church approached her about being gy weeks of golf in Dallas-Fort Worth starting Marathon and, by far, the hardest. one of her sponsors in the marathon to with Colonial. A 5-inch overnight downpour “It’s always harder but this year has been raise money to fight leukemia and lym- after the first round of the Nelson turned one of a bad year for me,” she said, adding her hus- phoma. the toughest holes on the already-saturated band died in January following a lingering “At that time I had lost several people in course - the par-4 14th - into a pitch-and-putt illness and she battled a staph infection in my family to cancer and I said, ‘Oh, maybe I par 3 of barely 100 yards for the final three one of her legs. should do that,” she recalled. “When I got rounds. “I couldn’t train very well because my out there the first year I just planned to While birdies were the norm after easy wedge husband was very ill and I had to be with walk it, but everybody else was running so I shots from what might normally be a drop area him for some time and then when he died started to run with them.” in front of a greenside pond, Bowditch had to in January I had some treatments on my She isn’t sure if she’ll run again next save par from about 12 feet to keep a three-shot leg,” she said. “I was just really thrilled that I year. But after last year’s race she wasn’t lead, pumping his right fist after the ball could finish today.” The oldest woman to sure she’d run this one either. She added dropped in. previously complete a marathon was she enjoys raising money for cancer The temporary tee box was about 20 yards TEXAS: Steven Bowditch poses with the trophy after winning the Byron Nelson golf tourna- Gladys Burrill, who was 92 years and 19 research and figures the competition has farther back Sunday, and tour officials believe ment. —AP par of under 70 was a first according to records days old when she completed the 2010 helped keep her healthy. “I don’t think I’d biggest thrill by almost hitting the pin on the fly the erratic start caught up with him at No. 6. Honolulu Marathon. be living today if I didn’t do this running,” going back to 1983. The overall par total was 277. on the 198-yard hole. Johnson went out of bounds to the right off the Thompson is 92 years, 65 days old, the cancer survivor said. “I’m helping them After getting within three shots of the lead tee, then way left into tall grass off the rough according to race organizers. Despite her and they’re kind of helping me.” —AP Up by three at the spectator-friendly 17th, Bowditch leaned like he thought his tee shot on halfway through the tournament, Spieth never with his second tee shot. the par 3 might go in the water to the right of did threaten and ended his streak of second- It took him three swings to get out on his way the green. Instead, the ball flew over the pin and place finishes in all three previous Texas events to a quadruple bogey. Walker, who won the Vietnamese gymnast eyes landed safety on the back, and Bowditch raised this year. The 21-year-old Dallas player tied for Texas Open not far from home in March, also his putter as the putt rolled in to punctuate the 30th five years after finishing 16th in his first tour held the lead on the front nine but missed short win. “I was trying to hit it 30 feet left of the stick,” event as a 16-year-old amateur. “I really tried to putts for par on 11 and 12. He tried to make a big haul at SEA Games Bowditch said. “It was eyes closed and stomach soak it in today,” Spieth said. “I was getting frus- late run with an eagle chip at the par-5 16th and to the floor a little bit.” Spieth had an opening trated this week just trying so hard, which is a birdie on 17, but Bowditch answered with SINGAPORE: Patience, as much as skill and A year later, she won her first Asian title birdie but quickly gave it back at the par-3 2nd. what I’ve done in past years as well. I don’t know birdies on both holes. “I had told myself going flexibility, has become a necessary part of in the vault, denying a Chinese sweep of He went in the water twice for bogeys on the if that’s going to stop in the future.” into 15, you know, birdie, eagle would be big,” the armoury of Southeast Asia’s top-ranked the women’s gold medals at the Asian back nine, including on 17 a day after he gave Johnson birdied two of the first three holes Walker said. “But Steven played great today and gymnast, Vietnam’s Phan Thi Ha Thanh. championships. big galleries that followed him all week their even though he missed the first four greens, but hats off.” To the groom. —AP Despite its universal appeal, gymnastics Tranh was twice named Vietnam’s ath- has not been a permanent fixture on the lete of the year but hopes of another big Southeast Asian Games programme, an haul at the SEA Games were again put on inconsistency that has both frustrated and hold when gymnastics was left off the 2013 tested the resolve of the region’s leading programme, in part because not all of the Anna wins LPGA Classic competitors. Few gymnasts have suffered 11 competing countries enter athletes. more from the sport’s infrequent inclusion “For Southeast Asia, gymnastics is a at the SEA Games than the 23-year-old sport that needs long-term investment,” GALLOWAY TOWNSHIP: Anna on the LPGA Tour and one of my to 8 feet to the left of the hole and sprayed with champagne by some Thanh, one of Vietnam’s most celebrated Thanh said in a recent interview with Nordqvist gave her visiting mother family members were there with drained that putt as well to move to fellow players, and then looked for female athletes.