'Incredibly special' - Justin Rose on landing wire-to-wire win on PGA Tour

“Incredibly special,” admitted Rose as he reflected on setting all sorts of tournament records after following an opening 62 with scores of 65-68-70 to post a 23-under-par total.

Not since Tommy Bolt did the trick back in 1955 had a player gone wire-to-wire in this PGA Tour tournament. “That's an amazing stat,” admitted Rose.

As is the fact he pulled off the feat at 45, becoming the oldest wire-to-wire winner on the PGA Tour since Rocco Mediate won the 2010 Procore Championship at the age of 47.

Rose, who won the US Open in 2013, came close to adding a second major in The Open at Royal Troon in 2024 before losing in play-off to Rory McIlroy in The Masters last year.

This was his 13th PGA Tour triumph and, though it will definitely happen at some point, it’s easy to see why he’s not ready to be a Ryder Cup captain at Adare Manor in 2027.

‘It builds a lot of confidence’

Referring to being in contention in majors in recent years and also shooting the lights out on Saturday alongside Tommy Fleetwood in last year’s Ryder Cup, he said: “I think those days or those weeks or those rounds are definitely showing me that the gas is still in the tank.

“Obviously accessing it is the job now or is the trick. You know, how do I do that more often, that's always the trick, but at least knowing it's there builds a lot of confidence.

“Yeah, majors is where I have my attention, for sure. I've achieved a lot in the game, but I've achieved a lot of it just once. So I'll take multiple of anything that I've achieved.

“I've been really close to The Open, I've been really close to The Masters. The dream of winning all four was obviously the ultimate goal since I've been a kid. It it seems a long way off to think that way, but, if you think about some of the results I've had in the last year or 18 months, I'm not that far away so may as well keep believing.”

Rose’s jump of seven spots in the world rankings - it means Bob MacIntyre is down one place to sixth - came in the week that Brooks Koepka made his PGA Tour return after leaving LIV Golf.

‘It did validate my decision’

It’s no secret that Rose could have joined the breakaway circuit as well, but he spoke openly about being happy playing on both the PGA Tour and DP World Tour.

“It would have been easy to potentially do other things, but none of that excited me really. And none of it gave me access to what I wanted to achieve,” he declared.

“I've been sniffing and knocking on the door of a couple majors since those decisions were made and those moments. Yeah, it did validate the decision. Yeah, the way things are in the world of golf right now, I feel like it's good to see people wanting to kind of play where it motivates them to be their best.”