Writing from Bolingbrook, Illinois
Sunday, August 10, 2025
Your name is Dean Burmester. You are a champion golfer, but can go through airports unnoticed. In fact, until Sunday, you could go through rounds of golf unnoticed as well.
Maybe that changes now. Sunday at Bolingbrook Golf Club, Burmester won his second tournament in as many years on the LIV circuit, and for a second time did so in sudden death.
He ran in a 5-foot birdie putt on the first hole of unscheduled golf – Bolingbrook’s 18th for the tournament, the ninth in everyday play – to knock off a pair of fellows who need private jets to travel in peace: Jon Rahm, the defending champion who is recognizable on six continents, and Josele Ballester, the rookie pro sensation who will soon be similarly swamped by attention.
Or maybe it doesn’t. Burmester is a balding 36-year-old South African, with a less imposing resume than Rahm, Bryson DChambeau and many of the other LIVers on the trail. But on this day, Burmester was the top dog, after starting his round like he wanted to go home early.
Bogey, bogey, bogey, his trek began, and he tumbled from 9-under and two strokes ahead to 6-under in a pack. He played flawlessly after that, got back to 9-under with a 5-foot birdie putt at the 16th hole, and watched Rahm and Ballester join him after he failied to score another birdie at the last to avoid sudden-death. (They made birdies of four and three feet, respectively, at the 18th to gain the right to keep playing.)
On that 55th hole, it was Burmester who hit a better approach, a splendid wedge out of light rough to the right of the fairway to the aforementioned five feet to set up the winning putt – after he watched Ballester miss from 15 feet and Rahm was errant from a dozen feet.
“This rough is no joke,” Burmester said. “The grass was with me, which helped. There’s a bit of luck, but I pitched it exactly where I wanted to.”
Perhaps Burmester doesn’t win, perhaps doesn’t contend, if his wife Mel doesn’t participate in an ultra-marathon in West Virginia recently. He praised her to the skies after winning.
“That Sunday I was on my phone watching her, and that truly gave me an inspiration to kind of – if she can do that, she can run 90 whatever kilometers in a day, nine and a half hours or whatever it was, then I can do anything,” Burmester said.
Golf is less arduous, but Burmester has also been dealing with a personal issue he did not divulge, and if there’s one thing golf does in four hours-plus, it gives someone time to think. Burmester managed to keep his mind on his game.
“I've just been grinding and trying to get better,” he said. “Today was not easy.”
But it was eventually successful, and profitable. Burmester collected $4 million for the individual win and another $750,000 for being a part of the winning team, Stinger. Since he was occupied in the playoff, captain Louis Oosthuizen picked the other team members, Charl Schwarzel and Branden Grace, for the two-on-two sudden-death playoff against Torque. Both birdied to take care of business.
“We may all be looking at houses,” joked Oosthuizen.
All four stayed in the same house this week.
Don’t feel bad for Rahm and Ballester, who each pocket $1.875 million in individual earnings for finishing second, nor for Carlos Ortiz, whose fourth-place finish a stroke out of the playoff at 8-under 205 earned him a cool million.
“I had a good opportunity the last few holes to maybe close it, but I couldn't do it, and yeah, I'll learn from it,” Ballester said. “When you lose in a playoff to a birdie, there's not much you can do. I think I hit a great second shot. I executed a great putt. It could have gone in. Hopefully next time it does.”
Ballester has improved every start since joining LIV at Virginia. A tie for 50th there, solo 48th in Dallas, tied for 23rd in Andalucia, Spain, tied for seventh in London and now a playoff loss here. Indianapolis is next week, and he may see the checkered flag first.
But Sunday, it was Burmester and his Stinger teammates making like Dan Gurney and spraying the Champagne.
Around Bolingbrook
A brief shower scattered the gallery of about 10,000 spectators around noon. … Anthony Kim, the butt of too many jokes in his comeback, scored 5-under 66 in the final round, his second straight under-par round after an opening 82. … Joaquin Niemann (tied for 17th) still leads the LIV standings, but Jon Rahm closed the gap to a little over 12 points. Niemann still leads the money race with $21,447,381 in earnings. Dean Burmester increased his season haul to $9,673,333.
– Tim Cronin