U.S. SENIOR OPEN
Irish Eyes Smile at The Broadmoor for U.S. Senior Open Champion Harrington
Ominous clouds enveloped Cheyenne Mountain early Sunday afternoon at The Broadmoor. Danger was approaching. Even the horns blew to tell everyone involved at the 45th U.S. Senior Open Championship to take shelter.
The USGA had moved up tee times by two hours as a precaution, knowing that potential thunderstorms could create a problem for the final round on the East Course. For the record, USGA officials blew the horn for a dangerous situation about 20 minutes after the last group walked off the 72nd hole.
Padraig Harrington certainly realized that weather wasn’t his only issue on Sunday. The 53-year-old from the Republic of Ireland had plenty of other concerns such as Stewart Cink and Mark Hensby – the two competitors he shared the 54-hole lead with – as well as several capable chasers, including last week’s senior major winner Miguel Angel Jimenez, and a course layout that had proven to have major-championship chops all week.
But eyes were definitely smiling for the affable Irishman. The three-time major champion carded a 3-under-par 67 and got some help from a couple of late missed birdie putts to hold off Cink by one stroke and claim his second U.S. Senior Open title in four years. His 72-hole total of 11-under 269 also was two ahead of Jimenez, who made a Sunday charge with a 64, the lowest round of the championship.
“We were looking at that cloud all day,” said Harrington. “There's no doubt about it. Because I was going well myself and Stewart was going well, you actually never want to stop when you're going well. You don't want to lose that momentum and have to restart.”
“I don't have any control over the weather, but I was hoping that it would stay away and we'd get it done and they blew the hooter as I was out there [doing a post-round interview] and now coming back in. It was important to get it done.”
Thomas Bjorn (72) and Hensby (73), who turned 54 on Sunday, shared fourth at 5-under 275, with Steve Flesch (70) and Steven Alker (70) finishing sixth (276) and seventh (277), respectively.
Harrington, who won a pair of Open Championships and a PGA Championship during his regular-tour days, became the eighth multiple champion of the U.S. Senior Open, joining the likes of fellow World Golf Hall of Famers Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player, Bernhard Langer and Hale Irwin.
“It's all about winning,” said Harrington, now the owner of 10 senior circuit wins. “Every time you come back out and you win, the nerves are there, the tension's there, you don't want to mess up. But I think winning a U.S. Senior Open or any tournament on the Champions Tour, it kind of validates your career. It validates the past in a lot of ways.”
Harrington is not one of those players who prefers looking at on-course leader boards. Knowing he was playing the final round alongside two fellow competitors tied for the 54-hole lead made the situation a little easier. When Hensby fell back with bogeys on Nos. 1 and 5, it suddenly turned into a match-play situation with Cink, the 2009 Open champion who owns 20 top-10 finishes in his first 26 starts on the PGA Tour Champions.
“I'm going to be honest, today I just got off to a bad start,” said Hensby, who finished third in 2022 when Harrington claimed his first Senior Open title. “We just hit a few clubs that probably weren't the right clubs and hit it in some bad spots where it's hard to two-putt. Just couldn't get any momentum going. Just couldn't get the putter right today.”
Harrington and Cink entered the final round in the top two in greens in regulation and there was no reason to think either would falter under final-round pressure.
Each got off to a good start on the statistically easier front nine, shooting 3-under 33s. Both took a turn with the lead on the second nine; Cink bogeyed No. 10 to fall one back, and then Harrington regained the lead a hole later with a birdie and Cink bogey. Cink tied things up with a birdie on 14 but then gave the shot back with a poor tee shot on the 455-yard, par-4 15th, a hole that Harrington had bogeyed the previous three rounds.
While this was happening, Jimenez, who birdied the last two holes a week ago before defeating Alker in a playoff at the Kaulig Companies Championship (formerly Senior Players Championship), was making a remarkable run with eight birdies over a 14-hole stretch to get to 10 under par and one stroke off Harrington’s lead.
Harrington missed golden opportunities to stretch his lead on Nos. 13, 14 and 15, and then he watched Cink stiff two shots on 16 and 17 inside of 8 feet. But with a little luck of the Irish, the Georgian missed both.
“Those are two putts where the break on the green is going against that mountain,” said Cink, who was competing in his first U.S. Senior Open. “There's not a lot on this course that goes against that mountain. You have to decide which one's going to win out. You can feel it in your feet and you can see where the mountain is and you know where the valley is. It's just really, really hard to commit.
“On 16, I was putting what felt like straight downhill. The ball just didn't act like a downhill putt because it was going against the mountain. On 17, everything looked and said, the balls even before me looked like they were breaking towards the front of the green, but that's where the mountain is. That ball just hung out there past the hole before it broke.”
Jimenez, as it turns out, bogeyed his first and last holes on Sunday, dropping him to solo third, his best U.S. Senior Open result since tying for second seven years ago at The Broadmoor. His 5 at the closing hole was a result of a poor tee shot into thick rough left of the fairway.
Cink and Harrington both hit great drives at 18, with the former’s ball coming up just short of the penalty area some 313 yards from the tee. As he discussed his 151-yard approach shot with longtime caddie Ronan Flood, Harrington was reminded of a piece of advice given to him three years ago by Irwin when holding a precarious lead going into the final hole.
“Ronan reminded me that Hale always said to hit the shot as if you are one shot behind,” said Harrington.
His half-swing, pitching-wedge approach stopped 7 feet from the flagstick, putting pressure on Cink. His 123-yard shot stopped further right of Harrington’s ball, and when he failed to convert the long birdie putt, Harrington needed only a two-putt to win.
Even when his birdie attempt curled 18 inches from the hole, a smiling Harrington hesitated before realizing he should mark to allow Hensby and Cink to finish.
As he exited the green, Harrington shared an extended hug with his wife of 27 years, Caroline, and his 17-year-old son Ciaran (pronounced Keer-Ahn) before signing his card and doing multiple media interviews. His other son, Paddy Jr., was back in Europe watching from afar.
The Francis D. Ouimet Memorial Trophy was in his possession once again.
“I just really enjoyed the experience here at The Broadmoor,” said Harrington. “Right from the start, you'd be surprised, you stay in a nice hotel; sometimes we stay in a very average place because it's near the [event]. Here we're staying in a beautiful hotel. It just settles you down for the week. Everything about it, being on site, which made it very easy, it just was a very nice, comfortable week.
“Look, I'm here working this week. I think there's nobody that wouldn't come here on a holiday, would they?”
By late Sunday afternoon, Harrington, didn’t care about ominous clouds. He was on Cloud 9.
“I don't know if we stopped talking. We just got busy. There was one stage on the front nine, I forget, we had to full on belly laugh, we were joking away about things. We were very relaxed. Mark Hensby was very good to play with as well. On the back nine, we got busier. There's not a lot of conversation in those couple of holes…and it was nip and tuck at that stage.” – Padraig Harrington on playing all four rounds with Stewart Cink
“When I looked at it, it was a three-shot swing. Mark [Hensby] and Stewart [Cink] looked like they were going to make birdie to go to 9 under. Mine was going to go by. As it turned out, [the shot] could have gone by five, six feet [past the flagstick]. I didn't feel good on the greens yesterday. I was having a really tough day. I could have ended up 6 under to 9 under. It did change things. I got into the last group, I slept soundly last night. I was in a nice place going to bed last night. So, I do believe that momentum definitely holds true in a whole tournament when you're getting breaks.” – Harrington on his 30-yard chip-in birdie to close Saturday’s round gave him great momentum for Sunday
“It was a lot of fun. It's always way more fun to be on the 18th green right now [accepting the trophy] than in the Media Center [as the runner-up]. It was still a lot of fun. I was proud of myself. I hung in there great, gave myself a chance. I didn't quite hole the putts at the very end that I really needed to take that next step up.” – Stewart Cink
“I've been hitting very well all week. We make mistakes. We are human. Just made a couple of mistakes. Made a few too many bogeys. Today, I make two bogeys too many. But I've been hitting [it] good. You make birdies and you play good, you're hitting well.” – Miguel Angel Jimenez
“I'll be back to work on Tuesday; we have Monday off. Splitting time out here on the PGA Tour Champions and working at Mill River. It's a good balance. My wife (Elizabeth) works with me, 5--which helps. She can kind of keep me in the loop of what's going on. I've got some great assistants. It's been working great.” – Jason Caron (65—279) on splitting time between his head club professional job and the senior professional circuit.
“It's a great advantage to know you going to be in the field so you can prepare yourself, know when you're going to be there. I never played [The] Broadmoor, so I came out the next week to scout the golf course. It's very exciting at my age (55) to play in a national championship. It's the Senior Open. It's the best.” – Qualifier Dicky Pride on finishing T-9 to earn an exemption into the 2026 U.S. Senior Open
David Shefter is a senior staff writer at the USGA. Email him at dshefter@usga.org.
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