Sunset at Pelican Golf Club delivered a twist no one expected. Linn Grant closed with a five-under 65 to win convincingly. The 26-year-old Swede finished at 19-under and walked away with $487,500. She won the tournament hosted by her childhood hero, Annika Sorenstam. But believe it or not, that was not the biggest prize handed out on Sunday. And the week’s richest payday belonged to someone else.

So, who won the most money? That prize went to the runner-up, Jennifer Kupcho. The 28-year-old finished in solo second place and earned $303,994 for ending at that spot. But she also won a separate, year-long contest: the Aon Risk Reward Challenge, which came with a $1 million bonus. That makes her total payday over $1.3 million, which is more than 2.6 times what Grant took home.

So, when a reporter asked how nice it was to finish like that, Kupcho admitted the $1 million bonus was a heavyweight. “Yeah, I think I was stressing about it really all like the last three weeks. Really stressed about it, obviously, this week. But to be able to make an eagle, that was insane on Friday and pretty cool. I mean, obviously, it wasn’t just that one round, one hole; it was the whole year. Yeah, to be able to say I’m a winner of Aon Risk Reward is pretty cool,” Kupcho said.

She entered the final week ranked fourth in the Aon standings. The two leaders, Minjee Lee and the current World No.1 and 2024 Aon Risk Reward Challenge winner Jeeno Thitikul, were not even playing. This left the door wide open for Kupcho, who had an average risk-reward score of –0.885 and ranked third, and for A Lim Kim, who averaged–0.905. The Aon Challenge hole for the week was the 529-yard par-5 14th. For either player to win the $1 million in the tournament, they needed an eagle and a birdie on that hole.

Kupcho got a birdie there on Thursday. And then came the magic moment during her second round, where Kupcho hit what she would later call an “insane” eagle. This birdie-eagle combination made her way, but the victory was not sealed on Friday because if Kim had made an eagle on the 14th hole on Sunday, she could have leapfrogged Kupcho. As Kim failed to get that shot, Kupcho became the 4th winner of the award for the 2025 season.

The Colorado native has been close to this prize before and finished 15th, 18th, and 19th position in the last three seasons. So she added, “I’ve been pretty close the last couple years. To finally get it done is awesome.”

While Grant couldn’t win the $1M bonus, the tournament victory meant everything to her.

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Though Jennifer Kupcho dominated headlines, the week’s best golf came from Linn Grant

The Swede grew up idolizing Annika Sorenstam. As a teen, she played in the Annika Cup. And now, she was sitting next to her hero after winning her idol’s tournament. “It’s just very fun to be sitting here with you with all the history we sort of have,” Grant said after the final round.

And Grant, who played 52 straight holes without a bogey, was simply “unbelievable,” according to Kupcho. “Linn just played amazing… Unbelievable golf by her,” Kupcho said. “There is nothing you can really do when you’re playing against someone that’s playing really well.” Tournament host Annika Sorenstam met Grant on the 18th green and said, “You made this course look easy. It’s not easy.”

Kupcho actually tied her for the lead on the first hole Sunday, and that only motivated Grant to push harder. “I’m glad she was playing well because I think that really pushed me to play better,” Grant said. And the victory was pure validation for Grant’s 2025 season, which was a bit of a down year for her. She had six top-10 finishes, but no wins until this week.

So, the 2025 Annika gave us two amazing stories. Linn Grant got her dream “full circle” win, and Jennifer Kupcho got a $1.3 million payday even when finishing second. What do you find more compelling: the dream win or the million-dollar bonus?