Golf Compendium

Stewart Gardner was a Scotsman who immigrated to the United States around the turn of the 20th century, and later became an American citizen. Although Gardner never won a big golf tournament, he still holds two tournament records in the U.S. Open set in the first few years of the 1900s.

The Yomiuri International was a 72-hole, men's golf tournament in Japan played in the years before the creation of the Japan Golf Tour. It took place 10 times from the early 1960s to the early 1970s, and typically featured a healthy contingent of international golfers.

Phil Mickelson has never won the U.S. Open golf tournament. But he does hold this tournament record: most times runner-up. Mickelson, who has wins in each of the other three major championships of men's professional golf, has finished second six times in the U.S. Open.

Based only on his wins in the U.S. Open — he had four of them — Ben Hogan had an incredible record in this major championship. Consider that he played the tournament only 22 times, yet has those four wins, plus two runner-up finishes, and numerous other Top 10 finishes.

The 2023 PGA Championship was the 105th time this tournament was played. But it was the third time this major was won by Brooks Koepka.

Have you ever heard another golfer, or an announcer on a golf tournament broadcast, say something along the lines of "(Golfer X) needs 150 yards to cover"? Do you know what that expression means?

Hugh Boyle was an Irish golfer who won tournaments on the British pro circuit mostly in the late 1960s, as well as playing in the Far East and Africa. He has the distinction of being the first golfer from Britain or Ireland to win in Japan.

The 2021 PGA Championship was the 103rd time this tournament was played, but it produced a first: Phil Mickelson became the first golfer at least 50 years old to win a major championship.

The 2022 PGA Championship was the 104th time this tournament was played. The champion won this major for the second time, but he needed a playoff to do it.

Who is the oldest major championship winner in golf? Has anyone aged 50 and over won one of the men's majors? The answer to the second question was no — until 2021, when, for the first time ever, a golfer 50 or older did win a major. That golfer was nearly 51, in fact, and broke this record that had stood since 1968.

A public course is a golf course that is open to the general public. Simple enough. But there are several more-specific types of golf courses that fall under the "public course" term.

Jim Barnes was an English golfer who lived most of his life in the United States, where he was one of the best pro golfers of the first quarter of the 1900s. He won big tournaments from the mid-1910s until the late 1930s. Along the way, Barnes won four major championships, including the PGA Championship the first two times it was played.

The 2025 Masters Tournament will be the 89th time this tournament is played. The Masters Tournament is one of the four major championships of men's professional golf, and the first one played each year. It was first played in 1934, cofounded by Bobby Jones.

"Play It Again Sam" is the name shared by two different golf formats — two formats that are close to being the opposite of one another. In one version, Play It Again Sam takes a golfer's handicap and converts it into mulligans that golfer can use during the round. In the other version, Play It Again Sam grants your opponents the ability to make you replay a stroke.

The 2024 Masters Tournament was the 88th time this tournament was played. Scottie Scheffler won the Green Jacket for the second time.

So your organization is staging a golf tournament to raise funds for charity, and you want to do something big. How about a million-dollar prize for the first golfer to make a hole-in-one? That's big! Only problem: You better have a million bucks stashed away just in case someone wins that big prize! And that's what hole-in-one insurance is for.

The GTE Northwest Classic was a Champions Tour (senior tour) golf tournament played in the Seattle, Washington, area from the mid-1980s through the mid-1990s. It was 54 holes (three rounds) of stroke play.

The "cart path" is the designated route around a golf course that golf carts are expected, or in some cases required, to follow.

The 2023 Masters Tournament was the 87th playing of this golf tournament. Jon Rahm overcame Brooks Koepka on the final day to win his first Masters title and his second overall major.

The term "captain's pick" refers to a golfer who failed to meet the criteria required for automatic membership on a team in a team golf competition, but who is added to that team at the discretion of the team's captain.

You've signed up for the company golf tournament, or perhaps a charity tournament at your local club. The format, according to the sign-up sheet, is Fort Lauderdale. What does that mean?

The 2022 Masters Tournament was the 86th edition of this major championship. Scottie Scheffler was the winner, earning his fourth overall PGA Tour win and first major championship victory.

The golf format called 14 Clubs is for four-person teams competing against other four-person teams. And the key to the format is right there in the name: Each quartet of golfers is only allowed 14 golf clubs. That's total — 14 clubs spread among four golfers.

Golfers sometimes use the term "finishing hole," or we sometimes hear announcers on tournament broadcasts using it: "Tiger and Phil have reached the finishing hole." And the definition? It's mostly just what it sounds like: the hole that is the finish of the round.

Performance in major championships has outsized influence over how golf fans (and history) judge professional golfers. And winning majors is the goal, but playing great in majors — posting high finishes, Top 10 finishes — is also expected of great golfers.

In golf, "lip out" refers to a putted ball that catches the edge, or lip, of the hole without falling in. The rim around the hole is also called its "lip," so a ball that catches the lip but stays out is a "lip out."

Before the World Golf Championships (WGC) arrived in the late 1990s, the Johnnie Walker World Golf Championship came on the golf scene in the early 1990s. It was played in Jamaica with a limited field of 24 golfers (based on world rankings).

Katherine Harley was an American golfer in the early 1900s. Her claim to fame is two victories, separated by six years, in the biggest golf tournament available to American women of her era: the U.S. Women's Amateur Championship.

"Tiger Slam" is a golf term that was invented in 2001 to describe an accomplishment by Tiger Woods — an accomplishment no other male golfer had ever pulled off. What did Woods do? He won four major championships in a row.