Great Major Championship Moments
Majors produce moments that ordinary tournaments cannot. The combination of legendary venues, the accumulated weight of history, and the specific pressure of needing to close under those conditions distils the game to something essential. Certain shots and finishes are not merely highlights reel material — they reordered what golfers believed was possible and reconfigured how the sport understood itself. These are a handful of those moments.
The 1960 US Open: Arnold Palmer's Final-Round Charge
Before Palmer played the last round at Cherry Hills Country Club in Denver, he was seven strokes back with 18 holes remaining. At lunch between the two final rounds in the era's 36-hole Saturday format, he told sportswriter Bob Rosburg that he was going to drive the first green — a par-four of around 346 yards at altitude — and make birdie. He did exactly that, opening with a birdie and making six more in the first seven holes. His 65 gave him a final total of 280, good enough to beat the amateur Jack Nicklaus and Mike Souchak. It was Palmer who invented the concept of a major championship charge, and Cherry Hills in 1960 was the original proof of concept.
The 1970 Open Championship: Doug Sanders' Missed Putt
History at St Andrews is not written only by those who win. Doug Sanders needed a putt of no more than three feet on the 18th green of the Old Course to win the Claret Jug outright. He bent down mid-routine to remove a piece of grit from his line, stood back up, hurried his stroke, and pushed it right. The miss left him in an 18-hole playoff with Jack Nicklaus the following day — which Nicklaus won after famously hurling his cap into the air. Sanders' putt is one of the game's most instructive examples of the cost of interrupted pre-shot routine, and he carried it for the rest of his life with an equanimity that commanded genuine respect.
The 1986 Masters: Nicklaus' Back Nine
Jack Nicklaus arrived at Augusta in 1986 as a 46-year-old who had not won a major since 1980. He was four behind the leaders entering the final round and widely dismissed as a sentimental participant rather than a contender. What followed on the back nine Sunday afternoon remains the most galvanising display of competitive golf on record. Nicklaus made eagle at the 15th, then holed a dramatic birdie putt at the 16th over the ridge of the famous sloping green, then birdied the 17th. His 30 on the back nine, watched by his son Jackie caddying for him, gave him a total of 65 and a 279 aggregate that held under the pressure of Tom Kite and Greg Norman coming down the 18th. His sixth Masters title and 18th major at 46 remains the oldest major win in the modern game.
The 1991 Ryder Cup: 'The War on the Shore'
Not a stroke-play major, but the most dramatic team-golf conclusion ever contested. At Kiawah Island's Ocean Course — new, difficult, and exposed to Atlantic winds — the Ryder Cup came to Bernhard Langer's six-foot putt on the 18th green for Europe, which would have halved the match against Hale Irwin and retained the Cup. Langer missed. Europe had led heading into the singles, the match had swung minute by minute, and the outcome was decided in the last pairing on the last green of the last match. The wound on European golf lasted years; Langer's reputation as one of the game's great champions survived it intact, but the image of that final missed putt became the defining image of the event.
The 1996 Masters: Greg Norman's Collapse
Norman entered the final round at Augusta with a six-shot lead over Nick Faldo. What unfolded was one of the most painful collapses in major championship history — not from a single catastrophic blow but from a mounting accumulation of errors while Faldo played nearly flawless golf. Norman shot 78; Faldo shot 67; the final margin was five shots in Faldo's favour. Norman's generosity in defeat, congratulating Faldo sincerely at the 18th and telling him he was not going to be a sore loser, revealed a character that the outcome itself could not diminish.
The 1999 Open at Carnoustie: Jean van de Velde
Carnoustie 1999 produced what may be the most bewildering series of decisions in major championship history. Jean van de Velde arrived at the 72nd hole, a par four, with a three-shot lead. What he needed was a bogey at worst. What he did was take driver off the tee, find the grandstand wall (from which the ricochet saved him), play onto rough ground, wade into the Barry Burn in a famously absurd contemplation of playing the shot from the water before removing his shoes, and ultimately make triple-bogey to fall into a three-way playoff. Paul Lawrie, seven behind at the start of the final round, won it. Van de Velde's triple was one of history's defining lessons in course management under pressure — and in how quickly championships can reverse.
Tiger Woods at the 2000 US Open and the 2000 Open Championship
The summer of 2000 produced two major championship performances that reframed what professional golf could look like. At Pebble Beach for the US Open, Woods won by 15 strokes with a total of 272 — the largest margin in the history of the championship. Two months later at St Andrews, he won The Open by eight strokes without once visiting a bunker across four rounds. At 24, he had won the last three majors he entered. The question was no longer whether the rest of the field could beat him but whether the field could keep up.
The 2019 Masters: Tiger's Return
The 2019 Masters was the conclusion of a narrative that golf had carried since Woods' back injuries rendered multiple surgeries necessary, each one appearing potentially final. Woods arrived at Augusta having spent years uncertain whether he would play competitive golf again. He began the final round two behind Francesco Molinari and closed with a 70 that was not error-free but was decisive enough when Molinari made double-bogey at the 12th to cede the lead. Woods' 15th major, 11 years after his 14th, produced a moment at the 18th — embraced by his son Charlie and daughter Sam in the same spot where he had embraced his father Earl after the 1997 Masters — that carried an emotional weight the sport had rarely seen.
These moments endure because they crystallise the game's essential drama: the athlete against the course, against the field, and against themselves, all simultaneously. Open the map to find the courses where history keeps being made.