Karl Vilips wins Puerto Rico Open for first PGA Tour title
RIO GRANDE, Puerto Rico — Karl Vilips of Australia ran off three straight birdies to break out of an unexpected duel and played his best golf down the stretch Sunday for an 8-under 64 to win the Puerto Rico Open, his first PGA Tour victory in just his third start as a pro.
The new “Sun Day Red” brand of Tiger Woods adorned the apparel of a PGA Tour winner, and it was Vilips, the Stanford alum who has built his life around playing on the PGA Tour for as long as he can remember.
The victory gets him into The Players Championship next week and the PGA Championship in May, along with a two-year exemption on the PGA Tour.
“It’s a dream come true for me and my dad,” said Vilips, referring to a father who helped create a path to a U.S. school since Vilips was 11, a top junior career and scholarship to Stanford. The 23-year-old spent one year on the Korn Ferry Tour.
“This is what we dreamed of as a kid,” he said.
Vilips responded to a sensational charge by Rasmus Neergaard-Petersen of Denmark, who birdied six straight holes to start the back nine and closed with a 63. The Dane briefly took the lead when Vilips made a bogey on the 12th hole with a wedge from the fairway.
Vilips never flinched. He birdied the next three holes, including a nifty pitch to set up birdie on the par-5 14th hole to regain the lead, and a tee shot to 5 feet for birdie on the par-3 15th.
He was never out of position the rest of the way and holed a 6-foot birdie putt on the final hole for a three-shot victory.
“Come on!” he yelled when the final birdie fell.
Neergaard-Petersen was playing on a commissioner’s exemption for international players. He fell back with a 73 on Saturday and then came charging on the final day.
The runner-up finish gets him into the Valspar Championship in two weeks.
“When I made the putt on the 15th is when I thought if I can post a good number, we’ll see,” Neergaard-Petersen said. “I’m super happy for the day. I’m looking forward to another opportunity.”
Joseph Bramlett, another Stanford alum, shot 68 to finish alone in third, five shots behind.
Kieron Van Wyk, the South African trying to become the second amateur in as many years to win on the PGA Tour, didn’t make enough birdies to keep up. He finished with a 70 and tied for fourth with Steven Fisk (68).
Vilips, who finished at 26-under 262, earned $720,000. Because the tournament was held the same week as the Arnold Palmer Invitational, he does not get a Masters invitation by winning.
JOHANNESBURG — Scottish golfer Calum Hill made par on the second playoff hole to outlast South African rivals Jacques Kruyswijk and Shaun Norris and win the Joburg Open on Sunday.
The extra holes took place to the backdrop of thunder and lightning at Houghton Golf Club, with all three players parring the first playoff hole — the par-4 18th — to go back up to the tee.
Norris, who led overnight by four strokes, dropped out of contention after hitting his second shot into water from a fairway bunker before Hill left his birdie putt from off the green just short, tapping in for par.
Kruyswijk needed to roll in a par putt from 3 feet to extend the playoff but pushed it right.
Hill, ranked No. 286, clinched his second European tour title — the first being the Cazoo Classic in 2021.
He shot 8-under 62 to set the clubhouse target at 14 under and was joined in the playoff first by Kruyswijk (66), who was seeking a second victory in three weeks after winning the Magical Kenya Open last month, and then Norris after his two birdies in the last three holes to complete a round of 70.
Norris, bidding for a wire-to-wire victory, won the Alfred Dunhill Championship in December.
ESPN
Former Stanford star Karl Vilips delivers a Sunday Tiger-like performance to win the Puerto Rico Open in fourth tour start
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PUERTO RICO OPEN
Kevin C. Cox
The Stanford golf lineage is a long and imposing one, but contemporaneously begins with Tiger Woods and his inescapable shadow. So it was that another former Stanford star, Karl Vilips, wearing Woods’ new signature clothing line, Sun Day Red, stepped out from that shadow and delivered a Tiger-like Sunday performance in the final round to win the Puerto Rico Open.
Vilips, an Australian playing only his fourth PGA Tour event, began the final round leading by a stroke over another former Stanford golfer, Joseph Bramlett, then closed with an eight-under par 64 at Grand Reserve Golf Club in Rio Grande, Puerto Rico, to win by three.
“Dream come true for me and my dad,” Vilips said. “Going at it for a long time. This is what we dreamed of when I was a kid. It’s pretty surreal.
“Last night that was about the only thing on my mind was everything that comes with a victory here. I had a hard time getting to sleep. But on the course it was just staying in the present, doing what I can do and I think I did a really good job of that because it is tough to not think about everything. Once I hit that wedge close on 18, those thoughts definitely started flowing in my head.”
RELATED: Here’s the prize money payout for each player at the Puerto Rico Open
Vilips, 23, briefly lost his lead when Rasmus Neergaard-Petersen of Denmark, playing his first PGA Tour event, birdied the first six holes on the back nine. But he never flinched, posting three consecutive birdies to regain a lead that he did not again relinquish. He completed 72 holes in 26-under-par 262.
It no doubt is risky to project stardom in a fickle business on a neophyte professional, but his victory on Sunday, in concert with his amateur pedigree, suggests that Vilips at least is worth watching as he upgrades his schedule to include the Players Championship via this victory, a home game in that he now lives in Jacksonville.
Vilips has both Bobby Jones and Tiger Woods on his amateur resume. One-hundred years after Bobby Jones, at 15 in 1917, won the prestigious Southern Amateur, Vilips, at 15 in 2017, won the same tournament. Moreover, Vilips twice won the Callaway Junior World in his age group, four fewer times than Tiger won the Junior World is his age groups.
Golf Channel put Vilips’ Stanford golf coach Conrad Ray, Woods’ teammate at Stanford, incidentally, on the air in the midst of the back nine. Ray, in fact, first took notice of Vilips in the same Junior World.
“I watched him play at the Junior World at 14,” Ray said. “An awesome athlete, really fierce competitor. Pays attention to detail. You match that with some hard work and wanting to win is a great combination.”
When Vilips had a moment to ponder what he had done, he checked his phone and discovered that Tiger himself had contacted him.
“I got on my phone after the round and I was just scrolling, like who was texting me?” he said. “Then there was a voicemail saying it’s Tiger and I couldn’t like process it in the moment, I was just trying to—I’ll get back to that later. That’s pretty cool.”
Meanwhile, South African Kieron Van Wyk, also 23, but still an amateur, began the final round trailing Vilips by a shot, posted a 70 and finished in a tie for fourth in his PGA Tour debut.
In an off-Broadway PGA Tour played alongside the Arnold Palmer Invitational, the Puerto Rico Open, with Vilips and Van Wyk, nonetheless delivered an entertaining window into the future of the game.
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Australian prodigy Karl Vilips wins Puerto Rico Open in just his fourth PGA Tour start
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Vilips proved why he’s one of the top prospects in world golf with victory in Puerto Rico. (Getty Images: Kevin Cox )
Karl Vilips has claimed a three-shot victory at the Puerto Rico Open, securing his first PGA Tour win in just his fourth start.
Vilips is just the 12th player ever to win on the PGA tour so early in his career.
The 23-year old is counted as one of the best prospects in world golf.
Doing Tiger Woods proud, Australian golf sensation Karl Vilips has etched his name once again in the history books with a life-changing victory in his just fourth start on the PGA Tour.
Vilips withstood a fierce challenge from an inspired Dane Rasmus Neergaard-Petersen to secure a stylish three-shot triumph at the Puerto Rico Open.
“It’s a dream come true for me and my dad doing it, going at it for a long time and this is what we dreamed of when I was a kid,” Vilips said.
“So yeah, it’s pretty surreal.”
After starting Sunday’s final round with a one-stroke advantage, the 23-year-old closed with a sublime eight-under-par 64 to join the legendary Seve Ballesteros as one of only 12 players since 1970 to win on the world’s biggest tour in one of his first four starts.
With a tournament record 26-under total, Vilips’s breakthrough is the latest incredible milestone for a former child prodigy destined for super-stardom ever since winning the US Kids Golf World Championship at age seven and nine and the Callaway World Junior at 10 and 12.
At 15, the Melbourne-born, Stanford University graduate beat Woods’s long-standing record as the youngest Junior Orange Bowl winner by eight months.
After also winning on the secondary Korn Ferry Tour in 2024 to gain his PGA status, Vilips was last month named the first brand ambassador to wear Woods’s Sun Day Red.
Dubbed “Koala Karl” in the US, now the five-time AJGA All-American has wasted no time living up to his star billing, overcoming Neergaard-Petersen to shatter the Puerto Rico Open scoring record by five shots.
A spectacular hole-out from the fairway for eagle on the par-5 sixth vaulted Vilips three shots clear of the pack.
Neergaard-Petersen was six shots behind Vilips before producing a blazing back nine to snatch the lead with a sixth straight birdie on the 15th hole.
When Vilips found the rough and made his first bogey of the day at the 12th, he suddenly found himself chasing for the first time.
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But he responded brilliantly with a bounce-back birdie on 13 to regain a share of the lead, then added further birdies on 14 and 15 as well to see off his pursuers.
Vilips paid credit to his caddy for helping him stay cool under the intense pressure.
“It’s frustrating to make a bogey with a wedge from the middle of the fairway,” he said.
“My caddy just said to me to stay in the present and try to do everything you can to execute the next shot and I was able to put that behind me and just start again.”
Vilips let out a huge roar after holing his ninth birdie of the day at the last to clinch a two-year exemption on the PGA Tour and a dream start at next week’s prestigious Players’ Championship in Florida.
With a closing 63, Neergaard-Petersen finished outright second.
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