Play it again: Rohrbaugh repeats as RWGA City Amateur champion

 

By VIC DORR JR.

 

Kristine Rohrbaugh didn’t play golf Friday morning. Instead, she worked at golf. She worked diligently, defiantly and ultimately successfully.

 

Rohrbaugh earned her second consecutive Richmond Women’s Golf Association City Amateur championship and third city title overall with a gritty 19-hole victory over Liza Lewis in Friday’s Championship Flight final. Rohrbaugh never led in regulation. Lewis never trailed. Rohrbaugh lost the first two holes and trailed by three with nine holes remaining. She led only once: after sinking a foot-and-a-half putt for a winning par on the first hole of a sudden-death playoff.

 

“It was such a back-and-forth day,” Rohrbaugh said. “I’ll admit: I was a little discouraged when I made the turn at 3-down. I took a little bathroom break at that point. I think it really helped. I was able to settle myself down. Peggy” – her caddie, Stonehenge clubmate Peggy Freeman – “did a great job of keeping me focused and in the moment. She kept telling me: ‘There’s still hope. There’s still a chance. You can still win this.’”

 

Rohrbaugh’s competitive nature told her much the same thing.

 

“I’ve had matches go to 18 many times in the past,” she said. “I’ve always seemed to come out on top. I tried to rely on those memories.” Her experience, she said, delivered an encouraging message: “’You can pull through and get the job done’” no matter the circumstances.

 

Friday’s circumstances were at times dire. Rohrbaugh’s ball striking was inconsistent. She hit two provisional tee shots on the front nine and received a significant break on the par-5 15th -- No. 7 on Salisbury’s Monacan nine -- when  her tee ball caromed noisily through the high branches of an oak grove before dropping harmlessly to the fairway.

 

“It’s nice to know that even if you’re not having your best day in terms of hitting the ball, you can still get around by relying on your short game and your putting,” she said.

 

Rohrbaugh relied on her putting to the extent that a bird relies on its wings. Her day in microcosm was a 20-foot first putt that traveled 19 feet. Lewis, on the other hand, found herself looking frequently at gnarly 4-5-footers.

 

Said Rohrbaugh, a 32-year-old accountant with Ernst & Young: “This was one of the best putting weeks I’ve ever had – especially in a tournament of this length. It’s very reassuring when you start to feel that you can two-putt for par from anywhere as long as you can put it on the green.”

 

The par-4 19th hole – No. 1 on the Huguenot nine – followed precisely this pattern. Rohrbaugh’s approach shot bounced onto the green and died 22 feet from the flag. She rolled her first putt to within 18 inches. Lewis, in trouble off the tee, soon was confronted by a 9-foot putt to extend the match. She missed.

 

Lewis was the tournament’s qualifying medalist. Her quest for her first City Amateur title was spoiled by an uncooperative putter and difficulties in Salisbury’s deep bunkers. She barely escaped the sand at No. 12 and needed two swings to escape at No. 14. The second swing carried her ball only as far as the shaggy grass on the bunker’s lip. Rohrbaugh won both holes. On each occasion, she pared a two-down deficit to one. She lost No. 18, thereby permitting Rohrbaugh to tie the match, after dropping her second shot into a bunker guarding the front of the green.

 

“Maybe it wasn’t meant to be this time,” said Lewis, a 26-year-old traditional media buyer with Lewis Media Partners. “But that’s OK. I’ll have plenty of other opportunities. Who knows? Maybe it’s for the best. Maybe the experience will teach me something: what shots I need to hit, what decisions I need to make, what my frame of mind needs to be.” In particular, she said, “The next time I take a 1-up lead to 18, I need to be thinking: ‘The pressure’s on her – not me.’”

 

Rohrbaugh became the 94-year-old tournament’s first back-to-back champion since Caroline Curtis won in 2017 (Hanover) and 2016 (Richmond Country Club). She became the fourth active player with at least three City Amateur victories. The others: Boodie McGurn (5) Lindsay Wortham (3), Maggie Balch (3) and Peggy Freeman (3).