October 19, 2014 – Joe Miller won the eighth Long Drive European Tour tournament, played at Domaine de Barbossi, after beating CJ Hellström by 2 sets to 0 with a hit of 362 yards, and he is now the new European Long Drive 2014 Champion.

The France LDET Championship started with Group 1 where we have seen the American long driver Maurice Allen, one of the fastest players in the world. After the 3 rounds, he was the best of his group with a mark of 337 yards. In the pairings, the best scores of the other players were: Timo Petrasch (Germany, 316y), Dewald Lubbe (SAF, 300y) and Philippe Jost (France, 296y).

The 18 hole of Domaine de Barbossi has plus difficulties: a group of bunkers and several trees in both sides of the grid, so hitters had to be very technical instead of powerful to land the balls straight ahead into the grid. In Group 2, we saw in action three English guys and French hitter. The English Tom Hollingworth was the best of this group with a hit of 327 yards. The other players who were qualified: Scott Beaven (England, 321y), Dan Konyk (England, 320y and Eric Houballah (France, 302y).

The highlight in Group 3 was four pros and one young amateur, Jack Groves (England, 17 years old). The Swedish CJ Hellström showed their power and recorded an incredible hit of 352y. Also go through to the next round: John McSloy (Scotland, 322y), Ronan Le Gac (France, 306y) and Jack Groves (England, 299y). Stanislas Heck (France, 295y) was eliminated.

The tournament’s qualifying rounds resumed with Group 4, where Joe Miller, Nº1 LDET ranking, went into action. In this group there were five players too, with an amateur Fredrik Frost (Denmark) that did a really good performance. He surprised everyone getting the second place (320y). Miller was first with an unusual and short mark of 335y. The best hits of the players in this group were: Lee Gauthier (England, 319y) and Fabien Trillard (France, 302y).

The players could follow their swing and fly ball analysis with TrackMan. One of the leader systems in golf stats has left figures as the ball speed of CJ Hellström and Joe Miller (142 mph) or Lee Gauthier (132 mph). On the amateur category the champion was Frederik Frost.

After the Matchplays, the quarter finals pairings in the afternoon have been: Maurice Allen vs. Dewald Lubbe; Joe Miller vs. Timo Petrasch; Tom Hollingworth vs. John McSloy; and CJ Hellström vs. Scott Beaven. Miller got the longest ball of the day with a bomb of 370 yards.

At semifinals we saw two high voltage duels. One of them between Allen and Miller. The American long driver did not make it easy to Miller who needed three sets to beat him. In the other battle, Hellström left behind McSloy in just two sets.

In the big final of the France event Miller also achieved above the 360y. He only needed two sets to confirm that he is the best of Europe. The next and last LDET´s stop of 2014 season will be hosted by Lumine Golf & Beach Club in Tarragona (Spain). The 14th & 15th November will take place The Masters LDET Cup.

Pictures: ©LDET.

Por REDACCIÓN