Simi Valley Senior Golf Tournament : Charles Shoots a 74 but Holds On to Win

On a pleasant day at Wood Ranch Golf Club, it is calm until 11 a.m. Even when the wind arrives, it is sometimes just a gentle breeze.

Then there was Sunday, the final day of the $275,000 GTE Senior tournament. The wind, gusting to 25 m.p.h. and changing speeds in a way that would have done Don Sutton proud, took control. It was in command just as Bob Charles had been in charge the first two days of the event.

Oh sure, Charles, who went into the final 18 holding a seven-shot lead, won the tournament by four strokes. But mainly because of the wind, what figured to be a dull finale to an exciting week, turned into a thriller.

Charles actually found himself in a tie with Bruce Crampton as a result of a five-stroke switch on the first three holes of the back nine. He regained the lead when Crampton missed a 2 1/2-foot putt on the 13th and regained command on the 15th when he sank an 80-foot chip shot from the rough for an eagle and a three-stroke lead.

The left-hander from New Zealand finished with a two-over-par 74 and a 54-total of 208. He became the third senior in a row to follow a victory in the Vintage Invitational at Indian Wells with a win in this one. Peter Thomson, winning the first PGA Seniors Tour event held in this area at MountainGate in 1985, was first, and Dale Douglass, as a tour rookie, did the same thing last year.

Crampton was one of five players to battle the wind successfully on the final day, shooting a 71 for a 212. Surprisingly, in the treacherous winds that dried out the greens and turned excellent iron shots into bouncers through the putting surface, there were two 69s. Charles Owens, despite a weeklong battle with the flu, and veteran Miller Barber both were three under par for the day. There were two others 71s, by Billy Casper and Chi Chi Rodriguez.

But for most of the seniors it was a losing proposition. Even Charles, who shot a pair of 67s on the first two days, succumbed to the winds.

“I think it is a difficult proposition trying to protect a lead,” Charles said. “It is much easier to come from behind. I had a lot of anxiety out there today. It affected my swing. I didn’t hit the ball the way I had been doing for the last two weeks. Of course, the winds had something to do with it. I think they cost me at least four shots.

“When Bruce caught me with the eagle on 12, my thought was, ‘At least I can finish second.’ Fortunately, he missed the putt on the next hole, and I rolled in the chip on 15.”

Charles, despite two bogeys on the front nine, teed off on the 10th with what seemed to be a comfortable five-stroke lead. The first hole on the back nine is 422 yards long from on top of a hill. A large body of water runs along the fairway on the left.

Charles, trying to be careful, used a 3-wood, pushed it to the right, and the crosswind did the rest, sending it into the water. Charles wound up with a double bogey when he hit his next shot short of the green, then two-putted. When Crampton put his second shot within three feet and sank the putt for his first birdie of the round, there was a three-shot swing.

The wind was also a factor on the 12th, a 400-yard hole that was playing downwind. Crampton hit a long drive the wind carried within 53 yards of the hole. When his approach with a sand wedge rolled into the cup, he had an eagle and a tie for the lead.

“Even when I caught up,” Crampton said, “I wasn’t thinking about winning. There were still six holes left. Nobody came up to me to offer the trophy. Of course, you feel bad when you don’t win, but everything considered, I had a good week.”

As a consolation, Crampton won more money at Wood Ranch than Charles Did. Charles earned $41,250 for winning. Crampton, who picked up $22,000 in the Skins Game Tuesday, took home an additional $24,250 for finishing second.

The seniors tour’s third tournament in the Los Angeles area was a huge success, even beyond expectations. The main reason, of course, was the presence of Arnold Palmer.

Although Palmer went into the final round trailing Charles by 11 shots and never made a move, Arnie’s Army made up a majority of the crowd of about 17,000.

The fans were rewarded with two more incidents that are certain to enlarge the legend. First, was his drive on the 520-yard sixth hole. With the wind behind him, Palmer, playing despite a painful right knee, hit a tremendous shot that sailed past Rodriguez’s decent drive and ended up 100 yards in front of it. It matted not that Palmer’s next shot, an 8-iron from about 150 yards, hit in a bunker and he wound up with a bogey.

On the eighth hole came the coup de grace. The hole is a short par 4 from an elevated tee. Everyone but Palmer lays up and pitches over water to the small green. Not Arnie. The gambling man tried to send his drive over the water Saturday, hit it fat and in the middle of the lake. Sunday, he cleared the water on the left, a little past pin-high but 30 feet off the green. The roar of approval was deafening.

Harold Henning, a South African, finished third at 215, while the leading U.S. golfer was Rodriguez, a Puerto Rican, at 217.