{"id":542386,"date":"2026-03-15T17:43:18","date_gmt":"2026-03-15T17:43:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/542386\/"},"modified":"2026-03-15T17:43:18","modified_gmt":"2026-03-15T17:43:18","slug":"zach-johnson-cruises-to-victory-in-first-champions-tour-start-australian-golf-digest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/542386\/","title":{"rendered":"Zach Johnson cruises to victory in first Champions Tour start \u2013 Australian Golf Digest"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>That didn\u2019t take long. Zach Johnson turned 50 just a couple weeks ago. On Sunday, playing in the final round of his PGA Tour Champions debut he shot a final-round 69 to cruise to victory in the James Hardie Pro Football Hall of Fame Invitational at Broken Sound Club in Boca Raton, Fla.<\/p>\n<p>The 12-time PGA Tour winner and two-time major champion shot 11-under 205 total to top Stewart Cink and George McNeill by four shots. He\u2019s the 22nd player to win his debut on the senior circuit. His last PGA Tour victory came 11 years ago at the British Open at the Old Course in St. Andrews.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cStaying in modest shape to play with these guys because it\u2019s still really good golf, highly competitive on a phenomenal track, I am humbled,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cI am extremely excited, and I have been excited. The first moment I stepped foot on this premises, I was like \u2018hey, this is special.\u2019 So well done. The guys have been amazing. To share it with my family, that\u2019s everything.\u201d<\/p>\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">3884 days in the making \ud83c\udfc6<\/p>\n<p>For the first time since the 2015 Open Championship, Zach Johnson is a champion!<\/p>\n<p>He wins <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/JamesHardieInv?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">@JamesHardieInv<\/a> in his PGA TOUR Champions debut. <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/MkubzPrYwB\" rel=\"nofollow\">pic.twitter.com\/MkubzPrYwB<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 PGA TOUR Champions (@ChampionsTour) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ChampionsTour\/status\/2030739243677413581?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">March 8, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Johnson opened with a 70 in South Florida and ramped it up with a second-round 66 where he started eagle, birdie on his first two holes. He\u2019d then make three more birdies to take the lead heading into the final round.<\/p>\n<p>On Sunday, Johnson bogeyed the third hole but then rattled off four birdies the rest of the way to easily claim his first Champions Tour title.<\/p>\n<p>Johnson has said that he plans to play a full Champions schedule this year and sprinkle in a few PGA Tour events. As a past champion he\u2019s exempt into the Masters and British Open and has already committed to the Cologuard Classic in Tucson, Ariz., and the Hoag Classic on Newport Beach, Calif., on the Champions Tour.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf my body\u2019s willing and able, at this point that\u2019s the half of it, I\u2019m going to keep competing,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019ve got the freedom at home to do so, my wife is amazing like that, so I\u2019m going to keep working.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>This article was originally published on golfdigest.com<\/p>\n<p>    <script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"That didn\u2019t take long. Zach Johnson turned 50 just a couple weeks ago. On Sunday, playing in the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":542387,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[566],"tags":[4225,64,63,755,138747,44,85],"class_list":["post-542386","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-article","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-golf","tag-golf-digest","tag-news","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/542386","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=542386"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/542386\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/542387"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=542386"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=542386"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=542386"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}