Smith and Mount Maunganui-based Van Der Nagel are good mates who travelled to Gisborne together.
Van Der Nagel, the nephew of local man Collin Jeffrey, was competing in it for the third time and with Poverty Bay hosting the Freyberg Masters national interprovincial from November 6, it was a great chance to check out the course.
The pair were highly impressed — Smith describing it in one word . . . “pure”.
Both men were relatively unchallenged en route to Saturday’s final.
Smith had not gone past 14 holes in his first two matches and was taken only one further by Patutahi’s Hukanui Brown in the Saturday morning semifinals before shaking hands.
Van Der Nagel also won his semi on the 15th against one of the stories of the tournament — 18-year-old Zach Rolls, who defeated Dean Williams (of Canterbury course Amberley) in the first round, then 2019 PB Open champion and Poverty Bay senior club champion Simon Jeune in the quarterfinals.
Left-hander Rolls, who won the third 16 at the PB Open last year, hung in to be square with Van Der Nagel after nine holes but fell away in the second nine.
His efforts earned him the Bill Donnelly Memorial Trophy awarded to the top all-round junior golfer.
The final was expected to be a high-quality affair although a stiff wind put paid to any McIlroy-like performances, particularly on the front nine of a course in which the order of holes was changed for the Open — the usual fifth hole becoming the 18th and the sixth converted to the 10th among the alterations.
At the halfway stage, the pair were locked all-square.
Smith won the 11th with a par after both men went into trees on opposite sides of the fairway, and he went 2-up with a birdie on the 14th.
Van Der Nagel’s putting kept him in it which he admitted later was a surprise as it wasn’t a strong part of his game.
Both men were short of the par-3 15th and opted to putt from well off the green.
Smith took three to get down, Van Der Nagel two and the deficit was one.
A superb wedge-hit third shot by Van Der Nagel to within gimme distance on the par-5 16th squared the match, and he sank a clutch 6-footer on the 17th for the half.
Van Der Nagel had a chance to close out a comeback win on the 18th but left his 18-footer birdie effort agonisingly short and the pair headed back to the first tee for a sudden-death playoff.
The shot of the final came on that par-5 hole. Smith missed the fairway right and while it was a reasonable lie, the ball was sitting in the rough above his feet with a large tree uncomfortably near his line.
He pulled out a 3-wood and flushed his ball to 15-feet of the hole.
Van Der Nagel had crushed his drive down the middle and his 5-iron-struck shot found the heart of the green. His 30-foot eagle putt burned the edge of the hole and he watched nervously as Smith missed his eagle attempt.
Van Der Nagel made what proved a fatal mistake on the par-3 20th, putting his 9-iron tee shot into the left bunker.
Smith hit a 6-iron tee shot under pressure to the front right, and after Van Der Nagel left his sand shot short and missed his par putt, Smith slotted a 2-footer for the title.
Walking back to the clubhouse afterwards, Smith paid tribute to his mate.
“If there was anyone I was going to lose to, I would have been happy if it was him.”
Van Der Nagel was likewise complimentary of his mate who he has been encouraging to play more.
Van Der Nagel is one of two selectors for the BoP masters squad. There is a quadrangular to be played early next month before the team are finalised and Smith, on this showing and having led BoP to several national interprovincial titles in the past, is clearly in the mix.
In his prize-giving speech, Smith lauded the quality of the course, saying he had been “privileged” to have played great courses in his career and Poverty Bay was up there with the best.
Second 16 winner David Solomann, from Gisborne but now playing at Whitford Park in Auckland, also heaped praise on the course and greenkeeping staff led by William Brown — the reigning PB Open champion who was unable to play due to a recent operation.
Solomann described it as “a treasure”.
Solomann chipped in for birdie on the 16th to win his final over Electrinet Park Ian Loffler, who deserved special mention for his attrition.
Loffler played six rounds over three days, then had to go back out yesterday for the Park intermediate men’s club championship final. He lost to Tom Reynolds.
Other division winners at the PB Open were Allan White (Poverty Bay, third 16); Carl Carmody (PB, fourth 16); Barry Matthews (Titirangi, fifth 16; Joe Tuoro (Hastings, sixth 16); and John Pittar (PB, seventh 16).
The tournament action came to a climax with the E&H/BDO Nearest Pin Challenge featuring seven finalists. Poverty Bay’s Deevon Gray put one of his two 100-metre attempts closest to the hole to win the $1000 Prezzy Card.
In what is surely a first at any tournament at Poverty Bay let alone the Open, two players — Marcel Campbell (Poverty Bay) and Chris Coleman (Hastings) — twice each made eagles on the 290m par-4 14th (usually the 10th) hole.
The pair drove the green each time — one of Campbell’s efforts finishing centimetres away from what would have been a historic hole-in-one.
