… Albany, Bahamas
European Tour ‘Golfer of the Year’ Jon Rahm has sympathised with Shane Lowry in pipping the Irishman for the leading Tour award.
Rahm was announced as the recipient of the prestigious award yesterday (TUES) in London at the now annual gathering of Tour officials and members of the Association of Golf Writers (AGW).
The Spaniard, who will tie the knot next week, won three times this past season including a second Irish Open and Spanish Open titles while his victory in the recent season-ending DP World Tour Championship earned him the Race to Dubai No. 1 title.
Lowry began his best-ever season leading start-to-finish in his very first event of 2019 to capture the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship.
Then in July, the Offlay golfer was a brilliant and historic six-shot winner in capturing the 148th Open Championship.
However, Lowry’s Royal Portrush winning form deserted him over the closing few months to see him eventually finish fourth on the Race to Dubai.
Rahm was asked his thoughts in denying Lowry the Tour’s ‘Golfer of the Year’ honours ahead of defending his Tiger Woods hosted Hero World Challenge title commencing later today (WED) in the Bahamas.
“Well, you could have made an argument for either of us as Shane won win Abu Dhabi and he’s The Open champion,” said Rahm.
“I think just because maybe I might have been, I’m not sure, a little bit more consistent than him, I did have three wins, but he did win The Open, that’s always big, and I think the Race to Dubai, winning that is what might give me the edge.
“It could have gone either way honestly. I would have been perfectly happy if he would have won just because of how big that Open Championship win is, and how he did it, that Saturday performance was quite impressive.”
Lowry is still a favourite to capture the up-coming RTE Sportsperson of the Year award while he’s a standout favourite to be honoured as ‘Male Golfer of the Year’ by the Irish Golf Writers Association soon at their annual dinner.
