He won by three shots in the end but there was a world of emotion bookended between the 400-yard drive and a six-foot putt that topped and tailed Gavin Moynihan's second Irish Amateur Open victory in the space of four years.
When he won at Royal Dublin as a 17-year-old in 2012, the flame-haired Dubliner announced his arrival as a star while playoff defeat in 2013 was just another chapter in a year that saw him win Walker Cup honours for the first time.
He didn’t make it to the North Bull Island last year as he was still in college at the University of Alabama having been signed up as a star.
But having lost form and confidence there and opting to return home permanently at Christmas to regain his mojo, he admitted that his anxiety levels were climbing when he started the year poorly and then missed the cut in the Lytham Trophy at this year’s Walker Cup venue just eight days ago.
‘Couldn’t wait’
“Even a few weeks back, I just couldn’t wait to get back to Royal Dublin,” said Moynihan, who defied winds gusting up to 40mph in his final round battle with his 17-year-old club-mate Kevin LeBlanc, carding a 74 to win by three strokes on four-under-par 284, from fellow senior international
Cormac Sharvin
from Ardglass, who shot 72.
“The fact that I have played here four times, missed the cut my first year and won twice and lost in a playoff the other, I just felt it was the week that could kickstart my year and it has.
“I can’t believe how happy I am. I was really down after the trip to Argentina and then missing the cut in the Lytham Trophy last week.
“So to get a win and hopefully secure my place on the Walker Cup team again now is a huge burden off my shoulders.”
The course record 65 he posted on Saturday to snatch a share of the 54-hole lead with LeBlanc and move four clear of the field on six under par, was clearly one of the keys to his win.
But Moynihan preferred to point to the 76 he shot in the worst of the Friday afternoon wind and rain, when he was seven over par through 10 holes but refused to give up.
LeBlanc, who was just two behind Moynihan standing on the 18th tee, four putted from 30 yards having come up just short of the green.
He took six, carding a 78 to tie for third with Scotland’s Ewen Ferguson on level par but it was merely academic after he’d watched Moynihan cannily play left of the green in two and then skip a low spinning, 67-yard lob wedge to within six feet of the stick to set up what proved to be a closing par four.
With his performance coach Jude O’Reilly, a former tour caddie, helping him with his game, LeBlanc is clearly a star in the making.
“Kevin will win this one day, no bother to him,” a generous Moynihan said of his young rival. “He was only 17 the other day and he’ s playing ahead of his years. Nothing fazes him and he could easily make the men’s team for the Home Internationals this year, I have no doubt.”
If LeBlanc is one for the future, Moynihan is clearly one of the men of the moment and his experience proved key in the end as he birdied the first and second to go one clear, edged two ahead through the turn and kept his rival at arms length as they battled home against the wind.
