Padraig Harrington thought he had been let off the hook. The 53-year-old Irishman birdied half of the first 14 holes Sunday at Congressional during the final round of the Senior PGA Championship and was seemingly in control. Feeling confident, he promptly hit a big hook off the par-4 15th tee that resulted in a double bogey. Three holes later, at the historic 18th on the Blue Course, he missed a three-footer for par.

Thirty minutes later Harrington was meeting with the media while also keeping an eye on the television coverage. Angel Cabrera was aiming to win his second major in six days and held a two-shot lead over Harrington standing on the tee box on 18. Cabrera blew his drive way right, still found the green with his approach but three-putted to make bogey and only top Harrington by one, magnifying Harrington’s short par miss on the 72nd hole.

“I’d just really like him to two-putt,” Harrington said while watching Cabrera on 18. “And he’s not. Oh, God.

“Yeah, look, I’m disappointed now.”

On this championship Sunday outside the nation’s capital it was the two-time major winner (Cabrera) who topped the three-time major champ (Harrington), with both looking for their second Champions Tour major. Cabrera shot a final-round 69 to end the week at eight-under-par total, one ahead of Harrington and Thomas Bjorn. He just won the weather-plagued Regions Tradition, the first Champions Tour major of the year, on Monday before heading to Washington, D.C.

So, yes, that’s two majors in six days, and three Champions Tour titles in the last seven weeks.

Cabrera’s win at the James Hardie Pro Football Hall of Fame Invitational in early April was his first in 10 years and nine months. The former Masters and U.S. Open champion was jailed for 30 months in Brazil and Argentina for domestic assault and released in August 2023. He had played in 11 Champions events in 2019 and 2020 before his conviction. He returned last year to play some and is now the best player on the Champions Tour and its only three-time winner.

MORE: Angel Cabrera returns to winners circle for first time since release from prison

“I thought that I was going to fail, especially after being sitting without touching a club for a while,” Cabrera said. “But I’ve been working very, very hard and I feel that all the hard works pays off and this is what I’m having right now, like winning this tournament.”

The 55-year-old Argentine had a roller-coaster round of his own. He opened par, bogey, birdie, bogey, par, eagle and played Nos. 6-15 in five under par before finishing with two pars and a bogey on the last. He collected the $540,000 first-place prize and still has three majors remaining on the schedule, where he most certainly will be the favourite to win.

“I feel very emotional,” Cabrera said. “Maybe you cannot see but I’m very, very emotional inside, especially after all the things that I went through. I can’t believe that I made it but I’m here and very happy of myself.”

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Darren Carroll/PGA of America

Harrington will lament the 72nd-hole three-putt for a while, but it was the tee shot on the 15th hole that he’d like back. The always introspective Irishman went into great detail about how he felt on the 15th hole and how his confident nature in that situation has hurt him in many key spots in the past. He won the 2022 U.S. Senior Open and has seven top-five finishes in majors the last three years.

“I’ve had a lifelong problem with getting confident and cocky and I did on the 15 tee box it was such a simple tee shot,” he said. “Five-wood, a little draw down there, and I just totally didn’t get into it enough and then panicked at the last moment and hit a big hook.

“It’s always plagued me my whole life since I’ve been a kid. Just get over-confident and just don’t. I’d be much better off if I got to the 15th hole and there was water everywhere. Probably would’ve done a better job. I just sometimes just—it follows me around. I can get overconfident.

“I lost a tournament when I was 18 years of age back—what was it called, the Irish Youth and I did the exact same thing. Two ahead with three to play and relaxed. I’m much better off in with nerves and tension.

“I was just relaxed on 15 and then I did it on 18 tee, 72nd hole at Carnoustie. Couldn’t see myself hitting a bad —that was the exact same. Stood there so confident, and at the last moment I had a little bit of doubt,” he said, referring to the 2007 Open Championship where he made double bogey on the last hole but still topped Sergio Garcia in a playoff.

“If you start off with doubt, when you feel doubt over the ball it doesn’t feel so bad,” he continued. “If you start off confident then you feel doubt it’s like a blowup. So, yeah, I was just too confident. Happens.”

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Main Image: Mike Mulholland