At 28, Immelman is at fitting age

AUGUSTA, Ga. -- As Trevor Immelman walked up the 18th fairway early Sunday evening at Augusta National Golf Club, he carried no other burden other than the one plainly in front of him, the one you could see. Just steer one last putt into the hole and win the Masters.

Sometimes, shouldering the weight of expectations is a heavy load and there are many for whom it is impossible. For Immelman, the lifting simply took a little longer.

On a blustery day when the greens dried out and the scores soared, Immelman kept his feet on the ground, shot a three-over 75, held on despite a double bogey at the 16th and won the Masters by three shots over Tiger Woods.

It was moment of fulfillment for a child prodigy, tapped on the shoulder as a teen and told he was surely destined for something special, his swing compared to no less than Ben Hogan’s by legendary South African countryman Gary Player -- that was the lad from Cape Town.

“Here I am, the Masters champion,” Immelman said. “It’s the craziest thing I ever heard of.”

Immelman’s rounds of 68, 68, 69, 75 added up to an eight-under total of 280. His closing round equals the highest score by a winner since Arnold Palmer in 1962, if it matters.

What should matter, more than the $1.35 million Immelman earned for the victory, is that he earned his own green jacket, eased into it by last year’s champion Zach Johnson.

And so the first South African to win the Masters since Player’s title in 1978 is not Ernie Els or Retief Goosen or even Rory Sabbatini, it is Immelman, a 28-year-old, smooth-swinging, low-key, unflappable, shot-making, cool-headed first-time major champion . . . and no longer a work in progress.

Player left an encouraging voice mail on Immelman’s cellphone Saturday night and told Immelman he believed he would win. It was the right call.

“It gave me goose bumps,” Immelman said. “He told me I needed to believe in myself. He just told me to go out there and be strong through adversity. He told me adversity would come today, and I would have to deal with it.”

And so he did. Clinging to a two-shot lead at the turn, Immelman saved par at the 11th after he blocked his approach to the right, but made his putt from the fringe.

“I was happy to see that one go in.”

Leading comfortably by five shots at the par-three 16th, Immelman backed off his shot because of the swirling wind. He pulled his shot into the water and made a double bogey. But Immelman’s lead was still three shots over Woods, who had already finished.

Immelman simply knew he had to remain steady.

“With the conditions, there was disaster around every corner.”

The first player to lead or share the lead after each round since Seve Ballesteros in 1980, the 29th-ranked Immelman is also the first player in his 20s not named Woods to win the Masters since Jose Maria Olazabal in 1994.

For Woods, his final round of 72 added up to his second consecutive runner-up finish at Augusta National, but he was never closer than the three-shot final margin.

His well-publicized goal of winning all four majors this year is over, and Woods joked about it.

“I have learned my lesson now with the press,” Woods said. “I’m not going to say anything.”

Stewart Cink tied for third after his closing 72, the same position as Brandt Snedeker, who shot a 77 after beginning the day only two shots out of the lead. Steve Flesch’s 78 dropped him into a tie for fifth with Phil Mickelson and Padraig Harrington.

The beginning of the end for Woods came at the end of Amen Corner, the 510-yard 13th. He drove it left into the pine straw but punched back out on the fairway and then spun his approach back about four feet below the hole with an excellent chance at a birdie.

But he missed.

Gone was the memory of his 30-foot birdie putt at the 11th and just as gone was his best shot at catching up.

For the tournament, Woods played the par-five holes in four under, equaling the worst he’s done at the Masters as a pro. He was also four under on the par-fives in 2003.

His 11 birdies for the week were only one more than his worst total at last year’s Masters.

“I just didn’t make any putts all week,” Woods said. “All week, I was dragging the blade through. I just didn’t quite have it.

“You have bad weeks, you have good weeks. Certainly this week was not one of my best.”

At least Woods was in good company with his misery. One by one, the contenders fell by the grassy wayside. Casey, who started the day in fourth, dropped six shots in a five-hole stretch on the front, a distasteful period called double bogey, bogey, bogey, bogey, bogey and wound up with a 79.

“It’s very difficult to rationalize,” Casey said.

Flesch was at even par for the day through 11 holes but knocked it into the water at the 12th to make double bogey, then slipped out of sight with a four-bogey stretch starting at the 14th.

“I was trying to make birdies, I just was making bogeys instead,” Flesch said.

Snedeker eagled the second but had eight bogeys the rest of the way. He held a towel to his face and wept after he signed his scorecard and reflected on his disappointment.

“It’s one of those things,” he said. “You’ve got to kind of pick yourself up, realize what you did wrong and go fix it.”

Mickelson’s demise package arrived a day earlier, when he shot 75 on Saturday, and he was too far back to make much of a statement. Mickelson finished with an even-par round of 72 and a keen understanding of what it means to fall short.

“I was hoping obviously to make more of a run than I did, but it was a tough day today, and I felt like I had to fight pretty hard to keep it around par,” he said.

And so it went the right way for Immelman, who was a scratch player by age 12, after starting to learn to play when he was 5. Mark Immelman served as his younger brother’s first teacher.

He made the cut in the 1999 Masters as an amateur after winning the 1998 U.S. Public Links. Two years earlier, he had played -- and lost -- in the finals of the British Amateur, the New Zealand Amateur and the U.S. Junior Amateur.

As a member of the PGA Tour, Immelman has only one victory, but he has won five times worldwide. Then, last December, he wondered whether he would play golf again when he had a brush with apparent cancer. Surgeons removed an eight-pound benign tumor from behind his rib cage.

Immelman said he realized at that time that golf wasn’t his entire life, but then decided to rededicate himself to it anyway.

Only a few months later, there’s a new green jacket in his wardrobe.

How does this happen? Nick Dougherty is only 25 and he was playing in his first Masters, but had an idea.

“I think,” said Dougherty, “a lot of it is karma.”

That’s as good an explanation as any.

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thomas.bonk@latimes.com