Colorado Golf Hall of Famer Kent Moore adds a CGA championship title in his 70s, winning the Super-Senior Amateur for the second time; Dave Runberg rallies in a big way to repeat as Masters division champ
By Gary Baines
ESTES PARK — Kent Moore is old enough that he could have entered this week’s CGA Super-Senior Amateur as a competitor in the Masters division, which is limited to players 70 and older.
But the Colorado Golf Hall of Famer from Greenwood Village had bigger things in mind.
Like winning the title that was at stake for the “young-uns” this week at Estes Park Golf Course — which Moore did on Wednesday. In other words, he prevailed in the championship for the 65-and-older set.
“I was really happy. I really wanted to win this,” the 70-year-old said. “I won my first CGA event at (age) 17, at Flatirons (Golf Course in Boulder, the 1973 CGA Junior Match Play). And I’m like, ‘I’d really like to win one at 70.’ And so I’m 70, so I’m like, ‘That’s a good goal.’ And so it was very, very satisfying to win.
“Kind of my last goal was to win one at 70, so that’s really fun to do that. I know golf is like, junior, regular, mid-am, (senior, super-senior). Golf just keeps adding something for you to play in, which is really nice.”
Moore’s game was all-around sharp this week in Estes Park.
Indeed, every decade from the 1970s through the 2020s, Moore has claimed at least one CGA title — and sometimes more than one. That includes each of the CGA’s open-age majors — the CGA Amateur in 1986 and the Match Play in 1989. Overall, Moore’s total number of CGA championships is close to 20, including a dozen in individual events.
This time around, he rallied with a 2-under-par 69 in the final round, then prevailed in a playoff against David Nelson of Littleton that lasted two holes.
Meanwhile, in the Masters division, a playoff also was necessary to decide things as 73-year-old Dave Runberg of Centennial made it two straight titles in the 70-and-older competition. He did so by mounting a big comeback on Wednesday, then also coming out on top on the second hole of a sudden-death playoff, beating day 1 Joe Clement of Longmont.
Here are some of the highlights of the two competitions at Estes Park GC:
Moore’s recovery shot on the second playoff hole set him up for the winning 8-foot par putt.
— CGA Super-Senior Amateur (65 and Older): Moore went into the final round two strokes behind co-leaders Nelson and John Hornbeck of Saratoga, Wyo., both two-time winners of the CGA Super-Senior Amateur. By day’s end, Moore would join them in the two-time champs’ club, having previously won this championship in 2016.
Fresh off a lesson over the weekend from renowned instructor Mike McGetrick which particularly helped Moore with his putting, he made four birdies on Wednesday, but three-putted the par-5 17th hole after having his ball muddied and in a divot following his second shot there. All told, he finished at 1 under par overall.
Nelson would match that total after posting an even-par 71 on Wednesday. Colorado Golf Hall of Famer Robert Polk of Parker, who posted back-to-back 72s to check in at 2 over, placed third, while David Dines of Highlands Ranch (73-72) was fourth.
David Nelson celebrates sinking a long birdie putt on the 10th hole Wednesday.
In sudden death, both Moore and Nelson parred the par-5 17th — where Moore missed a 10-foot birdie try. Then Nelson apparently had the upper hand on the 18th as his approach on the par-4 finished just shot of the front fringe. Moore’s tee shot trickled into the left rough, where he was left with a tough lie. Moore’s approach veered far to the right, where he was left with 62 yards to the flag — with a tree behind him and the green.
Asked if his second shot was a shank, Moore said, “It was close to it. … I hit it on the heel. The lie was bad, but it was a bad shot; that’s for sure.”
But the golfer from Cherry Hills Country Club rebounded with style, hitting his wedge over the tree and 8 feet past the flag.
Nelson, the winner of this event in 2020 and ’22, elected to putt out of the short rough in front of the green, and his ball bounced and finished well short of the cup — by about 15 feet. And after he missed his par attempt, Moore drained his 8-footer, securing the victory.
The hop on his third shot “kind of killed” the putt, Nelson said. “It looked like it was rolling nice, then it popped up and killed it. I needed to do a better job on that.
“Tip your hat to Kent. He played a great round today — a 69 to get in the playoff and beat me. What a heck of an up-and-down after that second shot.”
Nelson took an unusual route to a par on No. 9.
Asked what he was thinking after his errant second shot on 18 in the playoff, Moore noted something that his wife — fellow Colorado Golf Hall of Famer Janet Moore, who now works as a mental performance coach — imparted to him.
“My mantra for the tournament was to just keep charging,” Kent Moore said. “She’s big on mantras, and I’m like, ‘Whatever happens, just keep charging.’ You hit it over there; maybe you can hole it. I got over there and I had a great lie and a really good distance and an open shot. I hit it very, very solid.
“And (Nelson’s) ball on his putt hits something. …That’s very unlike him, but that’s golf.”
Both Moore, a former president of the CGA, and Nelson have not only won the CGA Super-Senior Am title, they’ve finished second or third more than once. In fact, in Nelson’s case this marks the third time in the 2020s he’s been involved in a playoff at this event. He lost in sudden death to champion Roger Prenzlow in 2021 before beating Prenzlow in a 2022 playoff.
“I’ve been close (besides winning twice), but again, tip your cap to Kent,” Nelson said.
Two-time champ Robert Polk finished third on Wednesday.
Moore surged to the top with three birdies in a four-hole stretch from No. 11 through 14, capping off the run by nearly holing his approach on No. 14 and tapping in from 2 inches for birdie. Overall, he hit roughly 30 greens in regulation over the two days, and got up and down for pars more often than not when he missed a green.
Suffice it to say most of Moore’s game was in fine form in the hills of Estes Park.
Dave Runberg took home the winner’s medal for the Masters division for the second straight year.
— Masters Division of Super-Senior Amateur (70 and Older): It sure wasn’t intentional, but Runberg certainly put himself behind the 8 ball in his Masters division title defense this week.
The 73-year-old, who plays out of CommonGround Golf Course, was 10 over par through his first 15 holes of this week’s tournament. Suffice it to say he was far from in ideal shape to win his second straight Masters title. Yet there Runberg was on Wednesday holding the winner’s medal.
How did he to it?
He played his final three holes on Tuesday in 3 under par — going par, birdie, eagle — then shot an even-par 71 on Wednesday to force a playoff. Then, he birdied the second hole of sudden death — from 3 feet — for the victory over Clement.
Add it up and Runberg played his final 23 holes in Estes Park — including the playoff — in 4 under par.
That’s apparently what it takes to win after trailing by seven strokes heading into the final round. He ended up carding scores of 78-71 for a 7-over-par total in regulation.
“I just feel very fortunate to have played as well as I played today, because I was seven strokes behind,” he said. “I played really poorly yesterday, but (at least I) finished par, birdie, eagle, to stay within shouting distance. And all I tried to do today was just play as well as I could. And Joe (Clement) is going to shoot whatever Joe shoots, and if he played as well as he did yesterday, then it’s his tournament.”
Runner-up Joe Clement (left) congratulates Runberg after his winning birdie on the second playoff hole.
As it was, Clement backed up his first-round 71 with a 78. The 70-year-old was a reasonable 3 over par for the day through 12 holes on Wednesday, but then made five straight bogeys before a final-hole birdie got him into a playoff.
“It looked like (Clement) played (Wednesday) about like I did yesterday; he shot the same score that I did yesterday,” Runberg said. “So he was 71-78, and I was 78-71, so here we are. There was a lot of golf left (going into Wednesday). So I focused on shooting the best round I could, and fortunately, Joe kind of came back to the rest of us.”
After both players got up and down for pars on the first extra hole — the par-3 10th — Runberg hit his approach on the short par-4 11th to 3 feet. After Clement missed his 15-foot birdie try. Runberg barely snuck his birdie into the left side of the cup.
“I didn’t exactly ram that in the back of a hole,” he said with a smile. “I was just a little bit nervous and I’ve been working on a different grip with that long putter. But all’s well that ends well.”
Runberg finished regulation by cozying a pitch to 2 inches for a par.
Besides the playoff, the highlight of Wednesday for Runberg was four consecutive one-putts from No. 12 through 15, including three from about 10 feet — one for birdie and two for pars.
This week was quite a change for Runberg in this event, though he won in both 2025 and ’26. Last year’s victory margin was 10 strokes; this time, he needed a playoff for the title.
Runberg’s two wins in the Masters division of the CGA Super-Senior Amateur are just part of his accomplishments in recent years. In 2025, he also won the Legends title in the Trans-Miss Senior championship. In Colorado, he made it to the semifinals of the 2026 CGA Super-Senior Match Play, where he lost 1 down to eventual champion Nelson.
For all the scores from the CGA Super-Senior Amateur at Estes Park Golf Course, CLICK HERE.
About the Writer: Gary Baines has covered golf in Colorado continuously since 1983. He was a sports writer at the Daily Camera newspaper in Boulder, then the sports editor there, and has written regularly for ColoradoGolf.org since 2009. The University of Colorado Evans Scholar alum was inducted into the Colorado Golf Hall of Fame in 2022. He owns and operates ColoradoGolfJournal.com