O'Driscoll showing promise despite second playoff loss in 10 days
Fraser Moore with his winner's cheque. Picture © RafaCabrera.com
Tommy O'Driscoll might have lost in sudden-death for the second week running, but he appears to be hitting form as he prepares to return to the Alps Tour later this month.
The 20-year Kerry professional, playing out of Golf de Clement Ader in Paris, had a 10 footer at the 18th to win this week's Gecko Pro Tour event at The Westin La Quinta Golf Resort in Marbella but missed and lost on the second extra hole.
O'Driscoll, who turned professional on February 9 last year, also lost in a playoff on the Gecko Pro Tour at Paraíso Golf Club on January 24. But having shot several rounds in the mid-60s over the past few weeks, he can only have more confidence as he builds up for his second season on the Alps Tour, which resumes in Egypt on February 14.
He led by two strokes overnight thanks to a six under 65 that featured his first hole-in-one as a professional.
He was still two strokes ahead when he birdied the seventh, eighth and ninth to turn in two-under par.
But with the field snapping at his heels, he double bogeyed the short 11th after bunker trouble, then bogeyed the 12th to see his lead vanish.
In the end, he missed a 10-foot birdie putt for victory at the 18th, signing for a one-over 72 that left him tied with England's Blane Breheny (70) and eventual winner Fraser Moore of Scotland on five-under par.
Returning to the 18th for sudden-death, Breheny bogeyed and was eliminated before O'Driscoll drove into a fairway bunker at the second extra hole and was blocked out, eventually losing to a par four by 26-year old Moore, a Europro Tour regular.
