Olympic dream fuels Fabian Gomez win

Argentina's Fabian Gomez wins the Sony Open in a dramatic play-off against Brandt Snedeker - Gomez is now set to represent Argentina in the2016 Olympic Games

Fabian Gomez wins the Sony Open

A birdie on the second extra play-off hole meant that Argentina’s Fabian Gomez beat USA’s Brandt Snedeker to win the Sony Open.

Gomez shot an incredible 62 in the final round, which included a run of seven straight birdies at one point, he holed a monster on the 72nd hole to get into the play-off.

Snedeker shot a 66 on Sunday to complete a tremendous tournament and a welcome return to form for the former world number 4.

The win means that Gomez is now ranked 55th in the world and has given himself a superb chance to qualify for the Rio Olympics later on this year.

With the top 2 players from each county qualifying for the chance to win the gold medal Gomez and Emiliano Grillo (33^rd) are well ahead of third place Angel Cabrera who is currently ranked 227th.

Gomez seemed to be very happy about being able to represent his country on the world’s biggest stage

“I'm really excited about being able to get in the Olympics,” he said. “My main goal, I work hard to be able to win, but I know that by winning I will be able to reach that.”

HOW TO QUALIFY FOR THE OLYMPICS

Gomez became the 4th Argentinean to win multiple Tour titles, joining Roberto de Vicenzo, Jose Coceres and Angel Cabrera.

“Oh my gosh, that is so good, Get a good kick” – third-placed Zac Blair needed to eagle the last to make the play-off and hit 3-wood to 10 feet from 230 yards.. but he missed the putt.

There was near controversy when Blair was asked if he anchored his putter when it was in contact with his shirt on the 17th hole in the final round. Blair said

“I was asking him, ‘What is he talking about?’ But I honestly don't know what to say, other than (that) I'm not even sure what happened until I guess I saw it. I definitely wasn't anchoring it on purpose.”

Since the anchoring ban came in on Jan 1^st, this is the first such time this anchoring question has come about, will be interesting if this is a continued issue.

Sony Open in Hawaii Waialae CC, Honolulu Hawaii Jan 14-17 Purse $5.8 million , par 70

1 Fabian Gomez (ARG) 69-64-65-62 260 $1,044,000 2 Brandt Snedeker (USA 63-65-66-66 260 $626,400 3 Zac Blair (USA) 65-65-64-67 261 $394,400 4 Si Woo Kim (KOR) 64-67-65-68 264 $278,400 T5 Greg Owen (ENG) 69-65-67-64 265 $220,400 T5 Kevin Kisner (USA) 63-66-66-70 265 $220,400 T7 Jamie Lovemark (YSA) 67-69-65-65 266 $187,050 T7 Graham DeLaet (CAN) 73-62-65-66 266 $187,050 T9 Zach Johnson (USA) 64-66-70-67 267 $150,800 T9 Jerry Kelly (USA) 65-66-69-67 267 $150,800 T9 Hudson Swafford (USA) 66-69-65-67 267 $150,800 T9 Jason Dufner (USA) 67-67-65-68 267 $150,800

Bold signifies Titleist ball use