Calgary’s Wes Heffernan completed a wire-to-wife win of the BetRegal PGA Championship of Canada by five strokes at Beacon Hall Golf Club in Aurora, Ont.
Heffernan finished the 100th anniversary of the event with scores of 68-69-69-72.
“Today was a challenging mental day with the lead and trying to keep that lead, but I played really well, which was very fulfilling,” said Heffernan, who came into the week as the top player on the PGA Player Rankings and takes home $12,000 with the victory.
“I didn’t make any mistakes until the end and I had a nice cushion by that point,” he said.
After knocking in a 12-foot birdie putt on the second hole, Heffernan cruised through the front nine with eight consecutive pars, with none of the par putts being further than three feet.
As Heffernan noted, a bogey followed by a double on 16 and 17 put a dent in his lead, but by that point, there was nothing between the 45-year-old and the first P.D. Ross trophy of his career.
“I know the tournament has had quite the history and there’s been some fantastic players at this event. I got to play with Jim Rutledge the past two days, who is a Canadian legend, and he is on the trophy as well,” said Heffernan.
“I was fortunate enough to share these past two rounds with him and I was fortunate to come out on top,” he added.
With the victory, Heffernan becomes the third-consecutive Albertan to win the event after Dustin Risdon’s victory in 2019 and Riley Fleming’s win last summer.
“I have a lot of great family and friends to thank back home for their support,” said Heffernan, who teaches out of the Dynamic Motion Golf Performance Center. “Some people thought it was only three rounds, so I actually got some congratulations texts (Thursday), so I was happy to be able to get it done today.”
The final leaderboard is here.
Congratulations, Wes. Well done!