Golf: Kazuma Kobori finishes tied for second at British Masters

Kazuma Kobori finished in a tie for second at the DP World Tour British Masters. Photo / Getty Images

Kazuma Kobori has set a new personal best.

The Kiwi golfer has finished in a tie for second at the DP World Tour’s British Masters, riding an impressive final round up the leaderboard.

The 23-year-old carded a seven-under-par 65 on the final day of the tournament overnight, posting the best score of the day. That saw him move to 15-under for the tournament and move six places up the leaderboard.

Kobori went birdie, birdie, eagle, birdie to finish five-under over the last four holes.

“Yeah, I don’t know what happened to be honest. I was just hitting shot-by-shot and then I made a nice birdie putt on the 15, and then followed it up with a mid-range putt on 16. And then I was like, oh, yeah, playing pretty good,” he said after his round.

“I think at start of the day, the goal was to get to three [under] and that got me to four. I was like, yeah, this is going quite nicely. Very happy right now.”

Kobori held the clubhouse lead when he finished his final round, with Nicolai Hojgaard and Alex Noren his closest rivals, with the pair at that point one shot back but only through 14 holes.

That proved to be enough time for Noren to chase the Kiwi down. The Swedish veteran finished with three birdies and a par through his final four holes to end the tournament 16-under and take a one-shot win.

Hojgaard finished tied with Kobori for second, trading a bogey for a birdie on the 16th and 17th holes, before a par on the last.

The result sees Kobori set a new career-best result on the DP World Tour, bettering his third-placed finish at the BMW International Open in mid-July.

He takes home €261,276.28 ($521,899) while the result is expected to see him jump into the top 25 of the DP World Tour’s race to Dubai standings, with the top 70 at the end of the season moving into the playoffs.

It was a successful weekend for the Kobori family with sister Momoka also earning a top 10 finish with an eighth placing at the Hills Open in Gothenburg on the Ladies European Tour. Kobori finished six shots back from Swedish amateur Meja Ortengren who won the event at six-under.