PALM HARBOR, Fla., Sept. 22 (UPI) -- K.J. Choi cruised to his second career PGA Tour win Sunday, shooting his third straight 3-under-par 68 for a seven-stroke victory at the Tampa Bay Classic.
With golf's elite in Ireland for the American Express Championship, Choi posted the most decisive win on the tour this season with a four-round total of 17-under 267.
Glen Day made an early run at Choi but finished a distant second at 10-under 274. Mark Brooks was third at 275, a stroke ahead of John Morse and Rod Pampling of Australia.
Vijay Singh had the most lopsided victory of the season before this week, winning the Houston Open by six strokes.
Choi won for the second time in his last 13 starts, with just one top-20 finish in between. He claimed the Compaq Classic in May for his first title in three years on tour.
With Sunday's victory, Choi pocketed the $468,000 top prize and all but guaranteed himself a spot in the Tour Championship, which invites the top 30 players on the money list. He began the week 31st with just over $1.47 million.
Choi also became the second Asian-born player to become a multiple winner on the PGA Tour. Japan's Shugeki Maruyama won his second title earlier this year.
Choi put himself in even more exclusive company by becoming just the second player this year to record a wire-to-wire victory. Tiger Woods was the other, doing so earlier in the day at the American Express Championship and at the U.S. Open.
A four-time winner in Korea and Japan, Choi proved he may have belonged with the world's best in Ireland. He was rarely challenged over the weekend, offsetting his only bogey of the final round with four birdies.
Day sliced a six-stroke deficit to three with a birdie at the ninth hole, but he bogeyed the 10th after clipping a tree with his approach and watched Choi pull away with birdies at the 11th and 14th.
The only other player able to take some of the spotlight from Choi was 18-year-old Ty Tryon, who made his first cut as a PGA Tour member and tied for 41st at 285.
Stewart Cink and Hal Sutton also were at 285 as they made their final preparations for the Ryder Cup, which gets under way Friday at The Belfry in England.
