New Zealand has a major champion in men’s golf for just the third time in history, after Ryan Fox produced a closing charge to win the British Open at Royal Birkdale. Fox survived a wild ride along the back nine before delivering a 12-foot birdie on the final hole to claim his first major title.
Fox closed with a two-under 68 on Sunday, finishing the tournament at ten-under to edge out American Cameron Young by a single stroke. He had been trailing the 54-hole leader by two shots at the start of the day, and birdied four of his final six holes to complete the comeback, ultimately holing the toughest hole on the course to become the third Kiwi to win a major. The win made him the second New Zealander to lift the Claret Jug, following Bob Charles’ victory in 1963 at nearby Royal Lytham & St Annes.
The final round was tighter than the scoreline suggests. Five different players held a share of the lead at some point on Sunday, and Young sat atop the leaderboard for two hours without hitting a shot, having finished his own round of 64 well before the group behind him reached the closing holes. Fox began the day trailing 54-hole leader Sam Burns by two shots, and converted just the fifth birdie of the day at the long par-4 18th, sneaking his ball in on the left side of the green.
The victory is a remarkable turnaround for a player who, entering the week, had never finished inside the top ten in twenty-nine previous major starts. Before Sunday, his best major finish anywhere had been 16th, and bookmakers had priced him at 125-to-1 to win the tournament. A record-tying eight-under 62 in Saturday’s third round put him firmly in contention heading into the final day, matching a mark also shot earlier in the week by Lucas Herbert and Sam Burns.
Fox comes from a well-known sporting family; his father Grant Fox was a record-setting All Black and World Cup winner, while his grandfather Merv Wallace played first-class cricket. Ryan didn’t turn professional until 25, and spent years grinding through the Australasian tour before working his way onto the DP World Tour in his early thirties and eventually the PGA Tour at 37 — a slow, unglamorous path compared to the pedigree suggested by his family name.
Speaking afterwards, Fox described the win as surreal, saying he used to get up in the middle of the night as a kid just to watch the tournament from home, and that he didn’t have enough words in his vocabulary to explain how it felt to now be Champion Golfer of the Year. He said he’d spoken to his kids the night before, who told him simply to bring back a trophy.