‘I want to be No.1’: Min Woo Lee wears the chef’s hat in thumping PGA win

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Min Woo Lee has Steph Curry’s number in his phone. He kept tagging the NBA legend so many times on Instagram, you suspect Curry might have just followed him a little out of sympathy.

In the end, they traded some DMs, and when Curry invested in Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy’s made-for-television league, Lee cheekily asked Curry to put him on his team.

“He hasn’t replied to me yet,” Lee laughed.

Now he might know how others feel.

After wrapping up his biggest tournament win in the Australian PGA Championship at Royal Queensland on Sunday, Lee’s mother Clara emerged from the gallery to suggest her own pleas with her son have been falling on deaf ears.

Midway through American rapper Post Malone’s Brisbane concert on Thursday night, Lee’s phone pinged with a text message from mum. Her son had started the tournament with a flurry of birdies, to be one behind a surprise leader. But the real show, to Lee, was later that night.

Min Woo Lee celebrates his eagle on the ninth hole.Credit: PGA of Australia

Please don’t be tired.

“But he was a little bit tired,” laughed Lee’s mother Clara. “I kept telling him, ‘quiet night, quiet night. You have to have a good rest’.”

By the time he made it to the first tee on Sunday, Clara knew her son was rested again.

She gave him a brief hug as he strode to the tee box, told him to be patient, and less than five hours later Min Woo had crowned himself as the new rock star of his sport.

Min Woo Lee is sprayed with champagne on the 18th green.Credit: Dan Peeled

Lee’s (-20) final round three-under 68 was enough to comfortably beat Japan’s Rikuya Hoshino (-17) with Marc Leishman (-16) finishing third. For those who have followed Lee’s journey, it almost felt inevitable this day was coming.

“It’s No.1 for sure,” Lee said of the win. “Right now is obviously the top, in front of Australia and in front of my family. I’ve been waiting for so long to play really well in Australia and I’m glad I did it\ this week in the Australian PGA. I knew it was coming, my team knew it was coming.”

Per script, it wasn’t boring.

His three-shot overnight lead was gone within two holes, but by the time he left the party hole 17th a few hours later, he was wearing a chef’s hat – a nod to his “let him cook” slogan – handed to him by a fan, and rousing the crowd with a thunderclap. You sensed he didn’t want to leave for the 18th.

But the day’s defining moment came on the ninth hole.

Lee’s burgeoning social media presence includes videos of him holing out from off the green. He writes on the posts he’s calling for a doctor: Doctor Chipinski. Fittingly, he delivered the hammer blow, dunking a 50-metre pitch for eagle.

“I probably haven’t screamed louder than that ever,” Lee said. “It was probably one of the best shots I’ve ever hit. I know my coach Ritchie [Smith] doesn’t like me closing that lob wedge too much, but I ended up doing it, and it ended up going in … so he can shut up for a bit.”

In the background of the television picture, his great mate and fellow Perth native Curtis Luck had his arm raised in the air long before the ball bumped its way up to the hole.

“I knew straight away as soon as it took its second bounce and released, I was like, ‘that’s going to be perfect’,” Luck said. “It was only a question of time whether it was going to roll up to a foot or be in the hole. I can’t do anything but put thumbs up to amazing shots like that.

“He’s always been a stud, but he’s pretty world-class now.”

By the time Lee walked to the third tee, his lead had evaporated. Hoshino made a birdie-birdie start, Lee dropping a shot straight out of the gates on the first.

But Lee never wavered, a flawless short game driving him to a momentous victory as he tries to win his first Australian Open in Sydney alongside sister Minjee.

“I’m not usually nervous, but I was nervous today,” Clara said. “Today was Australia, I felt he had to win this tournament. He’s totally different in personality to Minjee and it’s so much fun to watch him. He’s just a performer.”

Added Min Woo: “Limits? There’s no limits. I want to be the No.1 player in the world.

“Minjee’s one of a kind golfer. Everyone knows she’s good and I’m slowly becoming a name myself. Every time I win, it seems like next week she wins.

“If you guys want to put some money on my sister next week…”

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