Hatton conquers brutal conditions to claim Bay Hill success

Arnold Palmer Invitational report: What happened at Bay Hill?

In a week which saw Bay Hill play in a US Open attritional fashion Tyrrell Hatton navigated the tough conditions to win his first PGA Tour title.

The Englishman held the 54-hole lead and remained on top throughout the final round albeit joined by Sungjae Im for a period in the middle of the day.

Thanks to the testing winds and fast greens a final round of 74 was good enough to see him take victory on 4-under, one shot ahead of playing partner Marc Leishman.

With two birdies and two bogeys in his opening nine things were going relatively smoothly for Hatton but a double-bogey at 11, where he hit driver into the water, could have derailed his day.

As always Hatton let his feelings be known after his poor shots but he used that emotion to draw out positives and grind out the victory.

After the 11th he closed out the remainder of the round with seven pars and despite having just a few feet left for the win at 18 his hands were trembling over the putt – “that was the most nervous I’ve ever been.”

Last week’s winner, Im, followed up his maiden victory with a third-place finish after a tough back nine ended his title challenge. The 21-year-old who rarely takes a break continues to put in big performances.

• Related: Arnold Palmer prize money
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• Related: What happened on the European tour this week?

Arnold Palmer Invitational leaderboard

-4 Tyrrell Hatton
-3 Marc Leishman
-2 Sungjae Im
-1 Bryson DeChambeau
E Kieth Mitchell, Joel Dahmen, Rory McIlroy, Danny Lee

Full leaderboard (external site)

Arnold Palmer Invitational report: Talking points

Rory McIlroy recorded yet another top five after a torrid final round of 76.

The Northern Irishman was once again in contention after 54 holes but with a bogey and two doubles in his opening nine holes he was soon slipping out of the title picture.

For many McIlroy’s record is the sign of a consistently high performer but others are still expecting him to get the job done more regularly when in contention.

His Sunday round of 73 at the Genesis and his closing 76 this week are really the only two final rounds in which he has underperformed this year as he was simply outplayed at the Farmers Insurance and WGC-Mexico but yet he is still labelled with the tag of a choker by many.

We recently took a look at what more McIlroy needs to do to get rid of this label.

Despite his perceived Sunday woes McIlroy remains top of the world rankings and on Monday marks his 100th week as No. 1. Tiger Wood and Greg Norman are the only two players to have achieved this.

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Sticking with McIlroy he had a moment that every club golfer could relate to during his second round at Bay Hill.

The World No. 1 chunked not one but two shots in a row. Check it out and make yourself feel a little better about your weekend’s golf.

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Brooks Koepka had a weekend to forget after being beaten up by the conditions and the course to record rounds of 81 and 71 over the final two days.

We know the American says exactly what he’s thinking these days and after completing his fourth round we got his bluntest assessment yet.

Take a look at what the World No. 3 had to say here.