Mickelson gets best of Woods

Thousands of fans caused a bottleneck at the entrance to the HSBC Champions golf tournament in Shanghai, all of them eager to see the Sunday showdown at Sheshan International between Phil Mickelson and Tiger Woods.

The Shanghai surprise? Woods turned out to be merely a spectator, too.

Mickelson built a six-shot lead over the world's No. 1 player on the front nine, then rallied to beat another familiar foe, Ernie Els, with two clutch putts for a one-shot victory in the season's final World Golf Championship.

Mickelson closed with a 3-under 69 and won for the first time playing with Woods in the final group.

Even with Woods out of the picture -- he shot a 72 and wound up five shots behind -- Mickelson provided his usual dose of entertainment.

Trailing by one shot, Mickelson whiffed on a risky flop shot below the 16th green, only to save par with perhaps his best putt of the year, an 18-foot slider that dropped on its final turn. He followed that with a 10-foot birdie on the 17th, which turned out to be the difference when Els hit into the water on the par-5 18th and made bogey.

"We all expected that Tiger and myself would be shooting in the mid-60s and pull away a little bit," Mickelson said. "And yet, our group was not making any birdies. It was the groups in front of us. And I was very fortunate to come out on top by a shot. But this feels terrific, because I had to fight very hard throughout the day. Nothing came easy."

That was particularly true for Woods.

He looked out of sorts from the start, missing birdie putts of 4 feet and 10 feet.

Hearing a series of camera shutters in the middle of his swing on No. 7 caused him to hit his tee shot into a plugged lie in the bunker, and it took Woods three shots to cover the final 75 yards and reach the green for another bogey.

"Anything that could go wrong went wrong for me today," Woods said. "Just one of those days."

Mickelson finished at 17-under 271 and earned $1.2 million for his fourth victory of the year.

Els, who started the round seven shots back, put together a stunning charge.

He ended up with a share of the course record, matched earlier by Rory McIlroy, 20, who finished fourth, and Daisuke Maruyama.

Ryan Moore, who won his first PGA Tour event in August, closed with a 68 to finish third, two shots behind Mickelson. It should move him into the top 50.

ALSO SUNDAY

Mizuno Classic: At Shima, Japan, South Korea's Bo Bae Song won her first LPGA Tour title, closing with a 4-under 68 for a three-stroke victory over top-ranked Lorena Ochoa, Brittany Lang and Hee Young Park.

Song had a 15-under 201 at Kintetsu Kashikojima to win $210,000 in the event co-sanctioned by the Japan LPGA.

Ochoa shot a 64, and Lang and Park had 68s.

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