22 year old Galway golfer Ronan Mullarney, a current Irish senior panellist and student in Maynooth, defied the challenging weather to win the 54 hole R&A Foundation Scholars Tournament on the Old Course in St Andrews yesterday. The two-day World Amateur Golf Ranking tournament featured 60 men and women students representing 20 universities from across the world. The tournament offers both winners a place on the International Team for the Arnold Palmer Cup match played against the USA at the Evian Resort in France in early July.
Ronan extended his overnight three-shot lead with a two-under-par 70 to finish on five-under-par and record an overall score of 208 for 54 holes. Four strokes behind, George Burns, from the University of St Andrews, and the University of Stirling’s Robert Foley and Jack Cope all finished on level par. It was Mullarney’s third attempt at capturing The R&A title and the Galway golfer and Ireland international was happy to continue his good form into the final day.
“I was delighted to win today,” he said. “I knew the score out on the Old Course was going to be most important. Our manager told us that going on the past the winner has the best score out there today. The conditions were brutal – just terrible. We got the front nine quite nice, but the back nine was nasty. We were well prepared for it from yesterday!”
Mullarney, ranked 448th in the World Amateur Golf Ranking admitted the draw of winning a place at the Arnold Palmer Cup was a key factor in playing the tournament.
“It’s some prize to have. I would be lying to say I wasn’t thinking about it the last few days. I’m looking forward to it. There was never really a question in my mind about coming here – it’s the home of golf with a chance to get into the Arnold Palmer Cup.
On The R&A Foundation Scholarship, Mullarney added, “It’s huge. We couldn’t travel to have the places we do without the backing they give us.”
