Lilia Vu lips out a par putt on 18 to fall right into a four-way tie for second on the 2024 AIG Ladies’s Open.
Luke Walker/Getty Photographs
When Lilia Vu arrived at St. Andrews’ 18th gap Sunday night, she nonetheless had a slim likelihood to win her third main title. A number of minutes later, she’d not solely misplaced the AIG Ladies’s Open, however a brutal lip-out had value her an infinite sum of money as nicely.
The 26-year-old American star, who broke out in 2023 with two main victories together with on the Ladies’s Open, began the week because the defending champion and among the many betting favorites.
Lydia Ko wins AIG Ladies’s Open for first main title in 8 years
She started the ultimate spherical the place she was anticipated to be: one shot behind 54-hole chief Jiyai Shin with an important alternative to defend her Open title and additional cement her place amongst golf’s elite. However by the again 9 of Sunday’s closing spherical, it appeared like the one participant ranked above Vu within the Rolex World Rating, Nelly Korda, was intent on claiming a historic win for herself.
However when Korda made an unpleasant double bogey on the par-5 14th gap, all of a sudden Vu discovered herself tied for the lead at six below with only some holes left to play. Korda finally slipped out of competition with a bogey at 17. At across the similar time, Lydia Ko drained a clutch birdie at 18 to finish a spherical of 69 and take the clubhouse lead at seven below.
Vu would want one birdie on her closing two holes to drive a playoff, and two birdies to win outright. At 17, she was solely capable of save par, giving her one final likelihood to maintain her title hopes alive.
Vu was capable of attain the inexperienced in two on the Previous Course’s iconic closing gap. However with the centuries-old R&A clubhouse looming behind her, Vu left her mid-range birdie try a couple of ft brief.
It was a disappointing finish to an amazing main marketing campaign, or so everybody thought. With the prospect of a playoff gone, Vu set as much as hit her par putt, which might have given her a solo-second end, ok for a powerful paycheck of $939,026 from the file $9.5 million purse.
However tragically for her checking account if not for her profession, Vu’s brief par putt lipped out of the outlet. The following bogey gave her a one-over 73 for the day, dropping her to a closing rating of 5 below. It additionally dropped her from solo-second right into a four-way tie for second.
Splitting the winnings with three different gamers proved extremely expensive for Vu. Her new paycheck was value $594,759. Which implies that the final-hole lip-out value her a whopping $344,267.
To place it in perspective, the sum of money Vu misplaced was about $25,000 extra than the following participant on the leaderboard, Ariya Jutanugarn, earned for her solo-sixth end ($319,336).
For her clutch win, the third main title of her Corridor of Fame profession, Ko took residence a cool $1.425 million.
