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Brandt Snedeker inspired by Luke Donald's blueprint for success - Derek Lawrenson's World of Golf

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Luke Donald can be permitted a wry smile as he returns to the game this week after a three-month winter break.

The Englishman lost two years of his career believing he had to think big and hit the ball like Dustin Johnson.

Now he’s back to discover that the best player in the world on current form got to the mountain top by trying to be like . . . well, Luke Donald actually.

On form: Brandt Snedeker won the Pebble Beach pro-am after two second-place PGA Tour finishes in a row

      More from Derek Lawrenson...   DEREK LAWRENSON: Plucky Pepperell is well worth his salt after stellar show at Wentworth 27/05/13   World of Golf: Proof that the Rory rumour mill can drive any journalist mad... 20/05/13   Derek Lawrenson: Taming Sawgrass was a major sign Tiger is ready to add to his dynasty 13/05/13   DEREK LAWRENSON: Rock provides firm base for developing future English talent 06/05/13   DEREK LAWRENSON: Guan is a marvel at just 14... but shouldn't he be in school? 29/04/13   Derek Lawrenson: Just when the Ryder Cup heroes seemed to have gone missing... McDowell scrambles back to his best form 23/04/13   DEREK LAWRENSON: Scott told us he'd birdie the last... and he did! First Australian winner of Masters gives us a genuine Augusta fairytale 15/04/13   DEREK LAWRENSON: Will another outsider put Augusta's star names in the shade? 08/04/13   DEREK LAWRENSON: Major rethink sees Poulter joining rusty Rory in Texas 01/04/13   VIEW FULL ARCHIVE

‘Luke became the No 1 player by picking his way around a golf course, learning what his strengths are and what he needed to focus on,’ said American Brandt Snedeker, who followed up two second-place finishes in successive weeks behind Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson with a victory of his own at the Pebble Beach pro-am on Sunday.

‘He gave us the blueprint and it really inspired me.’

Indeed, Snedeker is so like Donald it is not so much his blueprint he copied but his DNA.

Let’s see: a man who is not long off the tee but a brilliant putter who learns to win in his 30s after starting a family that gives him an added perspective on the game. Sound familiar?

Let’s hope Snedeker goes on to do a little inspiring of his own.

For what’s not to like about a man who won $11million at  the FedEx Cup last year, has already added another $3m this year and yet still drives round in a six-year-old car with a torn-off wing mirror?

Instead, the 32-year-old is using much of his new-found wealth to fund children’s charities back home in Tennessee.

And so a week dominated by the stench of the Vijay Singh affair and his bid to change his body shape by illegal means had ended with a win for the most normal top-class professional golfer you could ever wish to meet.

That’s what you call an antidote.

Example: Snedeker is using Luke Donald's blueprint for success

Lucrative: The 32-year-old American won $11million at the FedEx Cup last year

It means that at the top of the world rankings we now have  the most intriguing fourball imaginable. On one side, Rory and Tiger, and good luck trying to copy them.

But on the other, there’s Luke and Brandt, leapfrogging any number of flashier talents with their work ethic and reminding us there’s still no greater gift out there than being able to putt.

 

The sternest of challenges

Irishman Shane Lowry will find himself a heavy underdog if, as expected, his first-round opponent in the Accenture Match Play Championship in Arizona next week proves to be world No 1 and management stablemate Rory McIlroy.

But for inspiration when it comes to the improbable he need reflect on nothing more than the remarkable sequence of events that earned him his place. For Lowry to be last man in the 64-man field it needed Australian Jason Day and American Patrick Reed to both birdie the  par-five 18th hole at Pebble Beach on Sunday. Day did so easily enough but when Reed hooked his ball off the tee, Lowry’s chances were both literally and metaphorically on the rocks.

Challenge: Irishman Shane Lowry (above) could be drawn against World No 1 Rory McIlroy in Arizona

Reed, however, was somehow able to play a 100-yard recovery shot on to the fairway, from where he struck his approach to 11 feet and rolled in the putt. It earned him a share of seventh spot with the Swede Freddie Jacobson, who had to finish seventh on his own to move ahead of Lowry in the world rankings. Instead it was Lowry who claimed that precious last matchplay spot by - wait for it - two ten-thousandths of a world ranking point. The luck of the Irish, indeed.

  QUOTE OF THE WEEK‘Once again, scoring on the European Tour is incredible — Richard Sterne wins Joburg Open by seven at -27!! Thank Christ I’m not playing any more.’

Englishman Gary Evans, in typically colourful terms, reacts to another eye-opening win. Sterne, Louis Oosthuizen, Charl Schwartzel, Branden Grace and, oh yes, the godfather himself, Ernie Els. What a year this promises to be for South African golf — and what style it will all be achieved with as well, for you won’t find five more elegant technicians.

Ko’s just a knockout teen queen

Given the way she has KO'd all the great names in the women's game to rack up three professional victories at the age of just 15, has there ever been a more appropriately named golfer than the remarkable New Zealander Lydia Ko?

I used to think Michelle Wie coming within a stroke of making the halfway cut in a men's US Tour event at the age of 14 was top of my list of things by teens you see once in a lifetime. But a victory by Ko in her native land on Sunday to make it three wins in three different countries on three different tours at such a tender age?

Let's hope she doesn't suffer in years to come from the 'too much too young' syndrome that plainly afflicted Wie.

Talent: Lydia Ko has won three professional tournaments at just 15 years of age

  More... Snedeker goes fourth as McIlroy continues to rule the roost in top 10 world rankings Teenage golfer Ko claims third tournament win in Christchurch, and breaks records in the process Sterne hits record score to claim victory in Johannesburg over favourite Schwartzel






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