England duo Patience Rhodes and Lottie Woad helped Team Europe win their first-ever Patsy Hankins Trophy after defeating Asia-Pacific 19-13 at La Manga in Spain.
The duo played some fantastic golf over the three days, with Woad winning three and drawing one of her five matches, while Rhodes won three of her four games, as Team Europe won for the first time since its inception in 2016.
Rhodes especially had a tournament to remember, as she landed her second-ever hole-in-one from 131 yards on the 12th hole of the South Course, using Woad’s ball.
Rhodes, who is a member at Burnham & Berrow in Somerset, explained: “The wind was pretty gusty and I hit a wedge. I saw it pitch and it was pretty close but I looked away because we were in a foursome and someone reacted. I didn’t realise it went in!”
On her experience with Team Europe, Rhodes said: “I’m so happy to have been selected for this, it’s been an unreal experience. We’ve made lots of new friendships and it’s incredible to be part of history and win this event. Everyone is so happy and the atmosphere is amazing.”
On the first day of the tournament (Thursday), Rhodes’ hole-in-one helped the duo to beat Mizuki Hashimoto & Nanako Inagaki of Japan 4&3, before Woad won on the last hole alongside Ireland’s Beth Coulter against Ting-Hsuan Huang (Chinese Taipei) and Minsol Kim (South Korea).
Woad, whose home club is Farnham in Surrey, explained: “Myself and Beth were down the whole time and then she birdied 15, I birdied 16 with a 15-footer to get back to all-square, and then we both birdied the last to win which was the first time we’d led all day. It was a big match for the team.”
On Friday, the all-English pairing were beaten in the foursomes on the final hole by Japan’s Rina Tatematsu and Nanako Inagaki before bouncing back in the afternoon fourballs, as Rhodes and Beth Coulter beat Ting-Hsuan Huang and Mizuki Hashimoto on the final hole, and Woad won alongside Sweden’s Meja Ortengren 3&2 versus Avani Prashanth (India) and Shannon Tan (Singapore).
Woad admitted: “We were two-up and the wind was up and it made it difficult to judge some distances, the other girls just holed some long birdie putts so it was tough but it’s all a great learning experience. In my other game with Beth, we were 10-under overall. I had two eagles and she had one while we also had two birdies each. I landed one of my eagle putts from 15 feet on the 18th to get the winning point!”
Saturday’s final day saw Europe leading 11-9 at the start of play, with Rhodes going on to beat New Zealand’s Fiona Xu 3&2, while Woad halving her match with Huang, as Europe secured a 19-13 victory.