Jon Rahm already has another goal to cross off his list of the things he wants to accomplish in his professional career. A long, very ambitious list, as Rahm wouldn’t have it any other way.
This Sunday in Madrid, for the first time in his career, he defended his title. And he did so in the best place possible, taking home the win for the second time in the Mutuactivos Open in Spain, performing before a sensational crowd at the Club de Campo Villa in Madrid.
Rahm won the tournament with a majestic performance on the last 27 holes. His partial score in that round and a half was twelve under par, untouchable for the rest of the competitors in the grand Open de España.
The Spanish golfer took the lead on the back nine on Saturday. He pulled off a prodigious sequence of seven under par in seven holes (from the 10th to the 16th), including a tremendous eagle from the fairway. He shot a 63, making a huge leap in the tournament. He positioned himself as leader with a five-shot advantage over Rafa Cabrera Bello and Samuel del Valle.
On Sunday, he encountered a new situation in his career. He had never started off on a Sunday as the leader with such a high advantage over his opponents. If there were a shadow of a doubt as to how things would pan out, it quickly vanished. He made a spectacular eagle on the 4th hole, after having had three clear options for birdie on the first three holes. That’s when he moved up to a six-shot advantage, which went all the way up to eight at one point in time in the round.
In the end, he was always in control and did not make any significant errors, apart from a bogey on the 17th, which was caused in attempts to seal the deal in order to please the crowd, and he finished with a five-shot advantage over Rafa Cabrera Bello.
It’s the tenth win of Rahm’s career, including the Ryder Cup in 2018 in Paris. He took home the trophy in the Open de España for the second time, 1,200 days after going pro. In other words, his average is one win every 120 days. Incredible. Additionally, nine of the victories were over the past three years. Nobody in the world in the major tours has more wins in that time frame. He’s catching up to Dustin Johnson. With this win, Jon is now Number 1 in the Race to Dubai, and fourth in the world. Now, he’ll take a six-week break, and he’ll finish out the year in the DP World Tour Championship and the Hero Challenge in the Bahamas, where he’ll defend his title.