Ernie Els claimed his third European Tour victory of 2005 and his 21st career European title Monday morning as he shot a final-round 65 to win by 13 strokes over Simon Wakefield and the rest of the field.

Els went wire-to-wire to claim the BMW Asian Open and set the Asian Tour record for largest margin of victory. He also stands in second for the largest margin of victory in a European Tour-sanctioned event, trailing Tiger Woods and his 15-stroke victory at the 2000 U.S. Open. This was Els' tenth wire-to-wire victory on the European Tour.

Wakefied shot a final-round 73 and didn't offer much competition to Els, finishing at -13. Thomas Bjorn shot a 72 to stand alone in third place. Wakefield's second-place finish has all but secured the Englishman his European Tour Card the 2006 season.

For Els, the victory offers validation that the changes to his swing were helpful. With a swing like Ernie's there's not a lot to change, but he noticed that his posture was a little off and adjusted accordingly.

Eddie Lee and Jean-François Lucquin finished at 10-under par and tied for fourth while Luke Donald and Stuart Little tied for sixth at -9.

Twelve groups were forced to complete their final round on Monday morning as the threat of thunderstorms delayed play on Sunday.

Pos  Player                 R1    R2    R3    R4    Tot
1    Ernie Els              67    62    68    65    -26
2    Simon Wakefield        67    69    66    73    -13
3    Thomas Bjorn           71    65    68    72    -12
T4   Eddie Lee              67    66    73    72    -10
T4   Jean-François Lucquin  70    66    69    73    -10
T6   Luke Donald            70    69    68    72     -9
T6   Stuart Little          71    70    72    66     -9
T8   Soren Hansen           69    70    68    73     -8
T8   James Kingston         70    71    69    70     -8
T10  Peter Hedblom          72    69    70    70     -7
T10  Edward Michaels        74    69    67    71     -7
T10  David Park             70    69    71    71     -7
T10  Jeev Milkha Singh      69    68    70    74     -7

Photo Credit: © Reuters/Aly Song.

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