Garcia beats Damron & Hart in playoff

Spain's Sergio Garcia won the Byron Nelson Championship on Sunday after holing a short par putt on the first playoff hole to hold off the challenge of Robert Damron and Dudley Hart.

Garcia, whose last win on the U.S. PGA Tour was in the 2002 Mercedes Championships, was the 54-hole leader by two shots but managed only a one-over-par 71 in finishing on 10-under 270 along with Damron and Hart.

Damron carded a 66 and struck the shot of the day when he holed out from 175 yards with a seven-iron for an eagle-two at the 15th hole. Hart birdied the par-three 17th to reach 10-under with a final-round 67.

World number one Tiger Woods had another bad day driving the ball but still managed to shoot a 69 to finish one stroke out of the playoff in joint fourth with Tim Herron and Duffy Waldorf.

South Africa's Ernie Els, the world number three, carded a 67 and tied for seventh on 272 with Zimbabwe's Nick Price, Japan's Shigeki Maruyama and Australian Stephen Leaney.

Garcia seemed tentative for much of his round. He birdied the first hole, bogeyed the second, then repeated the sequence with a birdie at the seventh and a bogey at the eighth. Another bogey at the 15th hole dropped Garcia back to 10-under.

In the playoff the Spaniard drove into the first cut of rough at the 18th, and his approach came up some 40 feet shy of the pin.

His first putt stopped about two feet short but he calmly rolled the ball in for victory and a cheque for $1,044,000.

Hart made a mess of the extra hole with a drive into the left rough followed by an approach into thick rough over the green. After moving the ball only a few feet with his pitch, he needed three more shots to get down for a double-bogey six.

Damron found the fairway off the tee and struck his approach on to the green but 50 feet from the pin. He left his putt only three feet from the hole.

With both Garcia and Damron looking at what appeared to be sure pars, Damron, a fidgety player who usually takes a great deal of time with each shot, quickly stepped up and struck his second putt without taking a practice stroke.

The ball finished nowhere near the hole and he tapped in for bogey.

"It was a difficult day," Garcia said. "I hit a lot of good shots, but the wind was tricky. I hit a lot of good shots that didn't end up as close as I thought they should have."

Despite shooting one-over, Garcia said he was not displeased with his round.

"I really don't like I played that badly," he said. "I tried to play aggressive but smart. I was trying to leave myself putts of 15 to 20 feet for birdie and try to hole some of them."

Just as he did in last week's Wachovia Championship, Woods held the 36-hole lead but could not win.

The world number one hit only three of 14 fairways on Sunday and 23 of 56 for the week.

Still, after making an improbable birdie putt at the 17th from 25 feet, Woods needed only another birdie at the last to reach 10-under.

His tee shot sailed left into the gallery, however.

When Woods saw his lie in the rough, he angrily kicked his golf bag, then drew out a wedge and hacked the ball over the trees and into the fairway.

With 75 yards left to the hole, Woods left his third shot a few feet short of the pin and ended his bid to join the playoff.

"I'm a little bit disappointed because obviously I didn't play well, and I had a chance, even as poorly as I played," Woods said.

"It was frustrating I wasn't able to hit fairways, but on top of that, I hit good shots that were landing in the fairway and were running into the rough. I hit four shots that did that.

"That was frustrating."

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