Going up against a seven-time major winner more than twice her age, it was teenager Hyo-Joo Kim who showed the calm nerves of a veteran.
Kim came from a shot back on the last hole to beat Australian great Karrie Webb by one shot on Sunday and win the Evian Championship, becoming the third youngest major winner at 19 years and 2 months.
The South Korean trailed the 39-year-old Webb heading into the 18th but turned the tables with a birdie from 12 feet out. Webb then missed a chance to force a playoff when a difficult attempt for par from the same distance drifted left of the hole.
“I feel very happy, like a bird,” Kim said through a translator. “I want to fly in the sky.”
Kim led Webb by one shot overnight and they both posted 3-under rounds of 68 in perfect conditions, with no clouds or wind to disrupt them.
She finished on 11-under 273 overall, having shot the lowest ever round in a major with a 61 on Thursday.
Only Morgan Pressel and Lexi Thompson — both from the U.S. — have won majors at a younger age than Kim, who is studying physical education in Seoul.
She seemed to take it all in her stride.
When Webb’s putt rolled wide, Kim removed her glasses slowly and then walked up to give Webb a small hug.
Her caddie, Gordon Rowan, said Kim didn’t know she’d won at first.
“I don’t think she was aware of the real situation of the scores,” Rowan said. “I said `You’ve won. She said `No, no, I haven’t,’ which was quite sweet.”
Webb finished ahead of three other South Koreans. Ha-Na Jang and Mi-Jung Hur were tied for third at nine under, with Na-Yeon Choi in fifth another shot back. Defending champion Suzann Pettersen of Norway was one behind Choi.
Casey captures Europe’s KLM Open
New dad Paul Casey shot a four-under 66 Sunday to win the KLM Open in Zandvoort, Netherlands, at 14 under, a single shot ahead of fellow Englishman Simon Dyson.
Casey’s win came less than two weeks after his partner gave birth to their first son.
“First tournament as a dad and first win as a dad,” Casey said after his victory at the Kennemer Golf & Country Club.
Casey looked to be cruising to victory before recording his only bogey of the day at the par-three 15th. He followed that with a wild tee shot on the 16th but his second shot out of the rough landed wide and bounced onto the green, giving him two putts for par.
Dyson, looking for his fourth KLM Open title, birdied the 18th to move within a shot of the lead, but Casey comfortably closed out with pars on the 17th and 18th for his 13th European Tour title.
Andy Sullivan completed an all-English top three, thanks in part to a hole-in-one on the 15th which won him a 100,000-euro seat on a commercial flight into space offered by a sponsor.
Thomas wins first Web.com Tour event
Justin Thomas won the Nationwide Children’s Hospital Championship in Columbus, Ohio, for his first Web.com Tour title, beating Richard Sterne with a birdie on the first hole of a playoff after Sterne blew a late three-stroke lead.
Thomas hit a wedge from 79 yards to within two feet to set up his winning birdie on the par-four 18th. Sterne missed a birdie putt after leaving his approach 20 feet short and right.
Playing the four-event Web.com Tour Finals for PGA Tour priority after wrapping up a tour card with a top-25 finish on the Web.com regular-season money list, Thomas earned $180,000 to jump from fifth to third with $470,470 with one event left.
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