KAPOLEI — Maybe now the good ol' boys back in his native Arkansas will finally see fit to cut Pete Upton a break.

After years of giving him grief for losing to "a girl" on a golf course there was televised evidence yesterday of what Upton has maintained all along, that Stacy Prammanasudh can be one exceptional player.

Good enough, it turned out, to go wire to wire for the one-stroke victory with the Fields Open in Hawai'i pack at her heels for 4 1/2 hours. Tough enough to birdie the first two holes and then hold off a field that was never able to rattle her focus or grab the lead away from her at Ko Olina Resort, where her 4-under-par 68 final round produced a 14-under 202.

If the second — and self-described toughest — tournament title in her five-year LPGA career was the most satisfying for Prammanasudh, who celebrated with a one-two pump of the arms and kiss of her husband, it was even more so for the man who now walks behind her, Upton. It was his second tournament on the bag since replacing her father, Privat "Louie" Prammanasudh as caddie and visible proof of the bragging he has done on her behalf.

Upton was a teaching pro when he first met his wife-to-be on the short end of a scorecard at a Tulsa, Okla. golf course where she played with her then-boyfriend. She won by 2 strokes and while Upton told his buddies back home about the woman he met, the one he was eventually sure would be his wife, they were more interested in reminding him he had lost to her. "They gave me a hard time," Upton said. "They wouldn't let me forget it."

Never mind that she was, as he would learn from the boyfriend, a nationally-ranked college player and an eventual All-American. All his buddies cared was that he was a teaching pro. A guy. And, hence, an easy target.

Upton, knew differently. For he knew talent. Even now, Upton said, "I can give her a run for the money (only) when I'm playing good and she's kind of off her game. But I can't hold a candle to her. We don't let her play from the front tees, either, and she beats everybody at the (Cedar Ridge in Tulsa, Okla.) club anyway."

Yesterday there was no touching — or catching — her at Ko Olina. Not even by the hard-charging youth brigade of Morgan Pressel, Ai Miyazato, Angela Park and Jee Young Lee who could neither count on Prammanasudh to give them an opening or manufacture a breakthrough themselves.

In Waikiki earlier in the week, Prammanasudh and her husband came across a stand selling a belt buckle with a large "S" on it. "He (Upton) said it stood for Superman," Prammanasudh said. "I said, 'no, it stands for 'Stacy' — got it?'"

After yesterday, chances are even the good 'ol boys back in Arkansas got it, too.

Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8044.