Playing in the final group alongside six-time European Tour winner Brett Rumford, Martin added to his overnight score of 6-under 66 with a birdie at the opening hole only to give it straight back at the second.

Birdies at the sixth, eighth and 10th holes kept Martin ahead of the chasing pack but when he made bogey at the par-3 13th and got word that Jason Norris had reached 7-under the pressure gauge rose a few levels.

Having endured near misses at the 2018 WA PGA Championship and the 2020 WA Open it shaped as a nervy finish for Martin but Norris’s dropped shot at the final hole and his own piece of bunker brilliance ensured he finished one shot clear at 7-under from Norris (68), Matthew Millar (66) and amateur Simon Liddell (68).

With rain falling and the threat of lightning in the area, Martin raced through the final three holes and left himself with an approach shot from 147 metres from the fairway bunker on the final hole knowing par would be good enough to win.

“I hit 7-iron into the front trap which wasn’t that bad and fortunately I had my wife Courtney come and grab the clubs and keep them dry,” Martin explained.

“She gave me my lob wedge, I had a good lie and fortunately hit it to within one rotation of going in.

“If I’d had to putt something from outside four feet it might have been a little bit different.

“Making par up the last isn’t the easiest thing to do when you know you’ve got to do it to win the tournament.”

Despite finishing third at the 2020 WA Open at Royal Fremantle Golf Club and winning the Campbelltown Golf Club Pro-Am in December 2019 Martin doesn’t even have the status necessary to guarantee starts in the Adidas Pro-Am Series.

A fellow PGA Professional and the Marketing and Events Coordinator at Wembley Golf Complex, Martin’s wife Courtney has ensured her husband is in the field for next Sunday’s E-Z-GO Wembley Pro-Am but other than that and a sponsor’s invitation to the South West Open in June Martin remains unsure what his playing future holds.

“This win does help my career but it doesn’t get me into the next golf tournament,” said Martin, who works full-time for GolfBox in Osborne Park.

“I’ve got an eight-month-old little girl now so things are different.

“I didn’t go to Q School mainly due to COVID but I’m in talks with the PGA just to try and see what can happen.

“I’ve got those two events but apart from that I’ve got nothing else to play.”

Sharing the new course record with Martin on day one, Rumford couldn’t back up his first round of 6-under 66, a double-bogey on the par-4 third getting the veteran off on the wrong foot in a round of 2-over 74.

Seven birdies and a lone bogey at the par-5 17th saw Millar earn a share of the course record and second position alongside Norris and Liddell with South Australian Max McCardle (69) outright fifth at 5-under.

Cottesloe Golf Club member Michael Hanrahan-Smith matched the best rounds of the weekend with a 6-under 66 to finish tied for sixth with Rumford, Rick Kulacz (68), Daniel Gale (71) and Conor Brown (69) at 4-under, experienced Tour players Terry Pilkadaris (71), Andrew Martin (69), Brady Watt (69) and Braden Becker (70) a shot further back at 3-under.

The next event in the WA swing of the Adidas Pro-Am Series is the Toro Australia Pro-Am at Western Australian Golf Club on Monday.

View the final Sanwell Cottesloe Open leaderboard at pga.org.au.