Oosthuizen could have lucky charm

Louis Oosthuizen is just four shots off Rory McIlroy's lead after carding a third-round 66 in the USPGA Championship

Words: Robin Barwick

Louis Oosthuizen is not expected to win the 2014 PGA Championship today. No-one is apart from Rory McIlroy. But then Oosthuizen was not supposed to win the PGA Championship’s Longest Drive Competition on Tuesday either, but he still did.

Oosthuizen stepped onto the 10^th tee late in the day on Tuesday to blaze his drive 340 yards to win the PGA of America’s prize of a gold money clip. Yesterday the South African shot his second round of 67 in as many days to sit at 204 for three rounds, nine under par, and four shots behind leader McIlroy.

“I putted beautifully,” started Oosthuizen, 31, after his round. “I missed a few putts over the edges, but I made some good ones as well. The way the golf course is playing now, you can attack quite a bit, and you don’t often get that opportunity in a major. It will be fun tomorrow and I will try to give myself as many birdie opportunities as I can, because I feel like my putter is really behaving.”

Who knows, perhaps that gold money clip the 2010 Open champion won on Tuesday could be a good omen. The gold clip was given as the prize because of the story of Jack Nicklaus, who won a similar money clip for winning the PGA Championship’s Longest Drive Contest back in 1963 – a money clip the Golden Bear still uses to this day.

Recalled Nicklaus recently: “George Bayer was the longest hitter on the PGA Tour at the time, he was the favourite to win the Contest, but I upset him and won it. To this day, I feel it was one of the greatest victories of my career.” As it happens, once Nicklaus had won that gold money clip back in 1963, he went on to win the PGA Championship that week too. Louis, take note.

Robin Barwick travelled to the PGA Championship courtesy of Mercedes-Benz. Mercedes-Benz is the official car of the PGA Championship