[Photo: Getty]

A third win in a stellar LPGA Tour season by Hannah Green has put the Australian within touching distance of a No. 1 world ranking for the first time.

Green, the 27-year-old Mt Lawley product won the BMW Ladies Championship in South Korea by a shot to become the first Australian since Karrie Webb in 2006 to win three times in a season on the LPGA Tour.

She joins Nelly Korda and Lydia Ko as three-time winners in 2024.

Green started the week ranked No. 8 in the world but she will likely jump to a new career-high inside the top five when this week’s rankings are released.

“I did not know that about Webby’s statistics,” she said after closing out the victory with rounds of 64-64-70-71. “But yeah, I’ve playing really solid this year. Obviously having two wins and a runner-up and things like that. But I just felt really different this off-season. I felt much more motivated.

“I got married in January. So this has been a very special year. But it helps that I’ve been hitting the ball well, and when the putter goes well, it does go well. So just making sure that I can stay consistent. But I still have four or five more tournaments for the rest of the year, so I want to continue to work hard and have myself in these type of positions.”

France’s Celine Boutier made a determined final-day run with a 66 but Green’s birdie at the 17th hole proved to be the difference.

“It was a crazy finish, I guess,” Green said. “I think I had 127 metres to the pin, and so I hit my 8-iron. The wind was a little bit swirly. It was sometimes into the wind, sometimes from the right. So I wasn’t sure if it was 8-iron but I got lucky with the timing of when I hit my shot.

“I left myself a very difficult putt down the hill, and I guess I was fortunate enough to see Ashleigh Buhai’s putt and she didn’t hit a great putt. So I knew that it was going to be very quick and felt confident even though I was very nervous, and yeah, it went into the middle. So that was really nice, and I knew that gave me the one-shot lead.”

The LPGA Tour has five more events for the season concluding with the tour championship in Florida after which Green will jump on a plane to Melbourne to take her place in the field for the ISPS HANDA Australian Open at Kingston Heath and The Victoria Golf Club.

Meanwhile nine Australians and Kiwis have made it through to the next round of the PGA Champions playoffs, with David Bransdon (third) and Rod Pampling (tied-fifth) showing strong form in Richmond, Virginia over the weekend. The top 54 players advanced, with Michael Wright grabbing the 54th and final place.

RESULTS

PGA TOUR

Shriners Children’s Open

TPC Summerlin, Las Vegas, Nevada

1 JT Poston 64-65-66-67 – 262 $US 1.26 million

T34 Ryan Fox (NZ) 70-69-65-69 – 273 $36,470

MC Aaron Baddeley 70-76 – 144

MC Cam Davis 75-78 – 153

LPGA Tour

BMW Ladies Championship

Seowon Valley Country Club, Seowon Hills, Republic of Korea

1 Hannah Green 64-64-70-71—269 $US330,000

T12 Lydia Ko (NZ) 67-66-71-71—275 $37,438

T33 Minjee Lee 67-73-66-77—283 $13,901

T46 Gabriela Ruffels 72-69-70-74—285 $8,559

T57 Grace Kim 67-71-75-74—287 $6,405

T67 Hira Naveed 70-72-70-78—290 $4,804

DP World Tour

Estrella Damm N.A. Andalucía Masters

Real Club de Golf Sotogrande, Andalucía, Spain

1 Julien Guerrier 62-72-63-70—267 €509,516.60

Won on ninth hole of sudden-death playoff

T43 Daniel Hillier (NZ) 68-69-72-72—281 €15,285.50

WD David Micheluzzi

Asian Tour

Black Mountain Championship

Black Mountain Golf Club, Thailand

1 Michael Maguire 68-64-68-65—265 $US360,000

T4 Ben Campbell (NZ) 68-70-66-64—268 $82,866.67

T7 Nick Voke (NZ) 68-67-69-65—269 $53,000

T33 Aaron Wilkin 66-71-69-69—275 $14,000

T44 Todd Sinnott 64-72-72-69—277 $10,600

T59 Kevin Yuan 65-68-76-71—280 $6,300

MC Douglas Klein 67-72—139

MC Jack Thompson 69-70—139

MC Kazuma Kobori (NZ) 73-67—140

MC Andrew Dodt 70-70—140

MC Justin Warren 70-71—141

MC Jed Morgan 73-69—142

MC Travis Smyth 70-72—142

MC Jordan Zunic 68-74—142

MC Sam Brazel 71-72—143

MC Wade Ormsby 71-74—145

MC Marcus Fraser 73-72—145

MC Deyen Lawson 77-68—145

MC Zach Murray 72-74—146

MC Lachlan Barker 73-74—147

MC Maverick Antcliff 74-75—149

MC Taewook Koh (NZ) 72-80—152

WD Brendan Jones

WD Harrison Crowe

PGA TOUR Champions

Dominion Energy Charity Classic

The Country Club of Virginia, Richmond, Virginia

1 Tim O’Neal 71-67-65—203 $US350,000

3 David Bransdon 70-69-67—206 $165,000

T5 Rod Pampling 74-67-68—209 $80,650

T20 Mark Hensby 72-73-67—212 $26,333

T26 Cameron Percy 71-75-67—213 $19,122

T26 Stuart Appleby 71-71-71—213 $19,122

T37 Steven Alker (NZ) 71-75-69—215 $12,190

T37 Greg Chalmers 67-72-76—215 $12,190

T51 Richard Green 73-76-69—218 $6213

T54 John Senden 72-74-73—219 $6213

T61 Steve Allan 73-78-70—221 $3565

T65 Michael Wright 78-67-77—222 $2875

Challenge Tour

Hangzhou Open

Hangzhou West Lake Golf Club, Hangzhou, China

1 Conor Purcell 63-69-67-67—266 €73,776.16

T54 Hayden Hopewell 67-73-68-75—283 €1,683.02

MC George Worrall 77-68—145

Korean PGA Tour

The Charity Classic 2024

Sulhaewon CC, Republic of Korea

1 Wooyoung Cho 69-67-64—200

T38 Scott Hend 71-67-74—212

MC Sungjin Yeo (NZ) 68-76—144

MC Kevin Chun (NZ) 75-75—150

MC Junseok Lee 76-75—151

MC Wonjoon Lee 76-75—151

Sunshine Tour

Fortress Invitational

Glendower Golf Club, Edenvale, South Africa

1 Robin Williams 64-65-70-67—266

T48 Austin Bautista 70-68-72-76—286