The HealthOne Colorado Open championship season closed on Friday, Aug. 28 with the conclusion of the Colorado Women’s Open.
Coincidentally, but appropriately, that same weekend three veterans of recent Colorado Opens or Colorado Women’s Opens made good in very notable and significant ways.
Shane Bertsch of Parker, winner of the 1998 Colorado Open and a 10th-place finisher this year, regained his PGA Tour on Aug. 30 after toiling on the Web.com Tour for the last three years.
That same day, Kris Tamulis, who has posted two top-10s at the Colorado Women’s Open since 2010, won the Yokohama Tire LPGA Classic for her first LPGA Tour victory.
And also on Aug. 30, the 2011 Colorado Open low-amateur, Zac Blair, recorded his best finish ever on the PGA Tour, tying for fourth in The Barclays. The Utah resident has since advanced to the third event of the FedEx Cup Playoffs, the BMW Championship — one of just four PGA Tour rookies to do so.
All in all, it’s been like a welcome blast from the past for the Colorado Open, which has featured a plethora of big-name players in its fields over the years, though primarily before the turn of the century. Indeed, participants in the Colorado Open have accounted for more than 35 major championship victories. The most successful in that regard are Sam Snead (seven major wins), Phil Mickelson (five) and Hale Irwin and Billy Casper (three each).
Blair, Bertsch and Tamulis certainly don’t fit into the World Golf Hall of Fame category, but their recent surges do bode well.
Here’s a brief look at how each fared in the Colorado Open championships, and what they’ve accomplished recently:
— Bertsch, a Denver native, is now 45 years old, but in June he claimed his third victory on the Web.com Tour — and first since 2005 — winning the Rust-Oleum Championship. With four other top-10s on the Web.com Tour this year, Bertsch finished ninth on the Web.com regular-season money list, easily good enough to regain his PGA Tour card.
Bertsch (pictured above) has played in 174 events on the PGA Tour, but just two since 2012. He’s posted five top-10s in his PGA Tour career, with the best finish being a fourth in the 2011 Frys.com Open.
Bertsch, the ’98 Colorado Open champion, returned to the tournament this year for the first time since 2002, tying for 10th place.
— In these days when ever-younger players are winning on the LPGA Tour, Tamulis (left) is an anamoly. With her recent victory at the Yokohama Tire LPGA Classic at 34 years and 8 months, she became the second-oldest winner on the LPGA Tour in 2015, behind only Cristie Kerr (37). The victory came after Tamulis had gone her first 185 LPGA events without a win. The $195,000 she earned more than doubled her previous winnings for 2015. Tamulis currently sits 31st on the 2015 money list with $373,758.
The resident of Naples, Fla., finished fifth at the 2010 Colorado Women’s Open and seventh at the 2013 tournament.
— Blair (below) is certainly no stranger to the Colorado Open. His dad, Jim Blair, won the tournament twice in the 1980s. And Zac himself competed in the event three straight years beginning in 2009. He placed 34th in ’09, missed the cut the next year, and placed 18th in 2011, claiming low-amateur honors. Then he returned to Colorado the next summer for the U.S. Amateur at Cherry Hills Country Club, where Blair placed fifth in stroke play (65-71–136) then lost in the round of 64 of match play to eventual runner-up Michael Weaver.
The now-25-year-old Blair, who went from PGA Tour Latinoamerica to the Web.com Tour to the PGA Tour in just six months, has continued his ascendency as a PGA Tour rookie. His fourth-place showing at The Barclays was his second top-10 of the season. The former BYU golfer has won more than $1.2 million for his rookie season, and by being one of the 70 golfers to make it to the BMW Championship, there’s the potential for much more.
“My goals the whole year were, one, to keep my card, and the second goal was to make it to the Tour Championship,” Blair said. “So I feel like I’m in a good spot. If I go out and handle my business, I can accomplish that second goal.”
Going forward, the folks at the Colorado Open championships, now with CoBank as the title sponsor, can only hope that more of the tournament’s veterans make good at golf’s highest levels, as Bertsch, Tamulis and Blair have.
