Schultz needs extra holes to triumph in women's Senior Amateur

The USGA Senior Amateur at Flint Hills National Golf Club in Andover, Kan., was dominated by Stan Lee of Heber Springs, Ark., who beat the pants off most of his opponents and emerged as a performer extraordinaire.

An intense man who lost 15 pounds during the week because he was too nervous to eat, the 55-year-old Lee defeated 60-year-old Sam Farlow of Birmingham, Ala., 4 and 3 in the 18-hole final. Playing in extremely windy conditions, Lee was 2 under par through 15 holes.

With his convincing victory, Lee became the youngest winner in the history of the event. The minimum age for the Senior Amateur is 55, and Lee turned 55 on Sept. 1, the opening day of the championship. If he had been born one day later, he would have been forced to wait another year to play.

After shooting 66 in a sectional qualifier, which tied him for the lowest score in the nation, Lee remembers driving home and saying to himself, "This is my year to win this thing. Nobody's going to get in my way."

That's when his wife, Kathy, brought him back to earth, saying: "If you stand up on your high horse, somebody's gonna kick it out from under you."

More determined than ever, Lee marched through the field. His big test came in the quarterfinals. Battling Logan Jackson of Winston-Salem, N.C., Lee found himself 1 down as he stood on the 18th tee. The par-5 18th at Flint Hills is a sweeping dogleg that requires players to hit two shots over a lake. Most play safe off the tee, then lay up the second shot, removing most of the risk from the diabolical hole. Lee pulled out his driver and crushed one. He still had 240 yards over water to the flagstick, into a stiff breeze. He selected his 12-degree fairway wood.

"That was the best shot I've ever hit in competition," Lee said. "A 240-yard 3-wood into a 20-mile-an-hour wind is not my favorite shot, and I had to hook it (to avoid some trees). I was the most stunned person on earth when it finished 10 feet from the hole." Lee's birdie sent the match into extra holes, and he won with a par on the 19th.

Lee was a putting fool against Farlow. In the first 10 holes of the final, he made birdie putts of 18, 45 and 14 feet in addition to saving par from 8 and 10 feet. "There's no way to beat that," Farlow announced to the gallery at one point. In the USGA Senior Women's Amateur, Anna Schultz finally won a USGA event.

Schultz, playing in the final match of a USGA event for the third time, came out the winner for the first time with a 20-hole victory over Robyn Puckett in the USGA Senior Women's Amateur Sept. 6 at Sunriver (Ore.) Resort's Meadows Course. "It's overwhelming," said Schultz, who lost to Diane Lang at this event last year. "I am so thrilled. I've wanted this for so long. This is what we work for and what we dream of. It's something everybody wants so badly."

Schultz, 52, of Rockwall, Texas, lost to Ellen Port, 3 and 2, in the 2000 U.S. Women's Mid-Amateur Championship in Newport Beach, Calif.

In the 18-hole Senior Women's Amateur final, Schultz jumped to a 4-up lead through nine holes before Puckett, 60, of Irvine, Calif., mounted a fight. "I wasn't into it early on, and I was trying to find myself," Puckett said. "I was hacking away... I just knuckled down."

Schultz remained 4 up through 12, where the players traded birdies. Puckett then won four of the next five holes to square the match. "As soon as she calmed down a little bit, I knew I would have my hands full," Schultz said. "She started playing great on the back (nine)."

Both players parred the 18th and the 19th. With the honor on the 20th hole, the par-5 second, Puckett nearly hit her drive into the water on the left, her ball crossing the hazard line, but the ball was playable. She punched out, then hit a fairway wood into the water hazard fronting the green. Her fifth shot found the green. Schultz reached the green in regulation and was conceded her par putt for the championship.

Story courtesy of our sister publication, Golfweek.