TULSA, Okla. — Byeong-Hun An moved to the United States in pursuit of a better golf game.
He left his life and his mother half a world away in South Korea and moved to a country where he didn’t speak the language to learn the game he’d first tried out by chance one day while his father was hitting balls at the driving range.
At 17, he entered the 109th U.S. Amateur in hopes of making it through the stroke-play qualifying portion and into match play. He left with the trophy, the youngest ever to do so.
“It was a good decision, I think. Thanks to my dad telling me to come over here to play golf. It was worth it,” An said. “I guess I’ll have to try to win the bigger ones now.”
An will get a chance to play in just about all the bigger ones.
He earns an exemption into next year’s U.S. Open and British Open and, if tradition holds, he’ll be invited to play in the Masters too. Not bad for a kid who’s still a senior in high school.
“I can’t believe it. I just won,” said An, who was missing the first week of school at Bradenton (Fla.) Preparatory Academy and defeated Clemson senior Ben Martin 7 and 5 in the 36-hole final.
Footnotes.
Second-round co-leader Loren Roberts birdied the final two holes to steal the Boeing Classic title in Snoqualmie, Wash., and keep Mark O’Meara winless on the Champions Tour.
• Rookie M.J. Hur made a 6-foot birdie putt on the second playoff hole of the Safeway Classic at North Plains, Ore., to beat Suzann Petter- sen for her first LPGA Tour victory.
• Peter Hedblom shot a 5-under 67 to win the Johnnie Walker Championship title in Gleneagles, Scotland, by one stroke over fellow Swede Martin Erlandsson, who made 10 birdies and shot 62. The Associated Press
