The field was without two of its biggest drawcards when defending champion Peter Senior and Brad Kennedy both had their flights cancelled out of Brisbane due to COVID-19 restrictions but a strong crowd gathered to watch veterans and up-and-comers do battle in the innovative format.

Home-town favourite Wade Ormsby and Marcus Fraser drew a large gallery for the six-hole first round, both qualifying for the second stage but unable to progress through to the final.

Grange Golf Club member Kristalle Blum led the field in the opening round with a score of 2-under with Deyen Lawson, Ben Eccles, Zach Murray and Matthew Griffin the only other players to better par for the six holes.

Millar and Japan LPGA Tour player Karis Davidson posted 2-under in the second round with Ben Eccles missing the four-person final when he went down to Murray and Lawson in the 75-metre nearest-the-pin playoff after the trio finished at 1-under.

The final was played to a 90-metre ‘stadium hole’ set up on the Glenelg Golf Club chipping green with Millar’s putt from 10 feet matching Murray’s birdie from 25 feet to force a playoff, Lawson and Davidson both eliminated after leaving their attempts just short, centre-cut.

Millar and Murray again traded birdies from 18 and six feet respectively before moving on to a nearest-the-pin shootout, Millar’s shot to seven feet enough to claim an emotional win following the passing of his mother Annette midway through last year.

“Mum passed away on May 22 so I think she might have had a hand in looking down on a couple of those putts at the end there,” said Millar, winner of Blitz Golf Curlewis in 2019.

“The first one was a must-make and I happened to flush it right out of the middle of the putter down the line. It just looked in the whole way.

“I took a step or two when it got to about two foot out, it just looked like it couldn’t miss and in it went.

“The next time around I had the opportunity to roll one in first which was great.

“It’s been a rough year so nice to get off to a good start this year, really happy with that.”

Confined to Wednesday and Friday comps at Federal Golf Club in Canberra where he has been teaching the past six months – “I play off plus-6 so I don’t win too many” – Millar was grateful for the chance to stoke the competitive fires to a level he hadn’t felt since finishing runner-up to Jake McLeod on the 2018 PGA Tour of Australasia Order of Merit.

“I just love playing and competing, having the opportunity to do so,” said the 44-year-old.

“If you play rubbish, that’s fine, that’s on you, but when you don’t get a chance to play you really miss it a lot. I do anyway.

“I haven’t felt like that for a long time, probably back to 2018. Playing well in 2018 at the Aussie Open and the PGA, chance to win the Order of Merit and then playing the WGC event in Mexico so it would be a good couple of years.”

Tied for the third at the North Coast Open in December, Millar struggled with his mindset in the first round but quickly found his groove for the second round where he went close to making birdie on all three holes.

“If you’d been watching me after six holes you wouldn’t have thought I was going to win it but after three holes you might have thought I was a red-hot chance,” said Millar.

“I didn’t execute the way I wanted to early on with my mindset. I wanted to be solid and really committed and there were just a couple of times where I wasn’t committed enough with the putter and came up short.

“I was a bit annoyed with that the first six holes but then really got it together the next three. Every shot I hit that next three holes was a really good shot and nearly birdied all three.”