Joaquín Niemann was the first Latin American golfer to reach the top of the World Amateur Ranking, and the first Chilean to win a PGA Tour tournament, becoming the third non-American player to win a PGA tournament under the age of 21, after Severiano Ballesteros and Rory McIlroy.
Joaquín Niemann has won four of the first eight tournaments of the current LIV Golf season.
In August 2022, after winning his second title on the U.S. Tour, Niemann moved from the PGA Tour to LIV Golf where he was named captain of the Torque GC team. In this league financed by the Saudi Sovereign Wealth Fund, Niemann has six wins, two of them last year and four this season (half as many as he had played this season through June!), in which he is posting dazzling results never before seen in LIV Golf.
In 2023, the Chilean scored his first DP Tour victory at the Australian Open. Niemann is a golfer who takes everything in stride. He brings a calm and down-to-earth attitude to life, both on and off the course. Watch Niemann the next time he holes a long putt or places a long iron shot just short of the flag. No cheers or applause, just a slight smile at another great shot, no matter the pressure of the moment.
Even when he holed out to complete his historic round of 59 in Mexico at the LIV Golf Mayakoba 2024, his reaction was one of mild satisfaction rather than wide-eyed delirium. Perhaps it’s because Niemann, who celebrated his 26th birthday in November 2024, has been breaking barriers and setting new benchmarks for so many years.
It is most likely the product of a calm but steely personality that makes him well suited to the psychological demands of high-level golf.
His rise has not gone unnoticed by his teammates. The rest of the LIV Golf team was certainly talking about Niemann after his two individual victories early in the 2024 season.
Jon Rahm, captain of Legion XIII GC, put it simply: “He’s just doing what we all need to do, which is basically hitting where we want to hit more often and holing putts. It seems like, when he wants to, he’s got a couple extra miles on the swing when he needs it.”
The most promising signing
Chile is a country with less than 100 courses and very few players who have left their mark on the sport at the highest level. At the same time, it is no surprise that Joaquín Niemann has risen to the top in his chosen field, given that sporting excellence runs through his veins. His mother, Pamela, represented Chile in field field hockey, while his father, Jorge, played college basketball.
It was he who gave Joaquín a set of plastic golf clubs when he was only 2 years old. By the age of 4, young Joaquín was already playing with real equipment and learning the game at the San Cristóbal Polo and Riding Club, northeast of the Chilean capital, Santiago. He remembers hitting a 36-meter shot during a family barbecue that hit his grandmother in the leg. “It was a pretty good
shot,” says Niemann, also relieved that his grandmother was unharmed.
Niemann’s parents have always supported his professional decisions. When Joaquin signed with LIV Golf, Jorge said: “As a father, I will always continue to support him in everything he does and I hope he will be very happy in this new stage”.
Amateur feats
By his mid-teens, Joaquin Niemann was winning regularly on the amateur circuit, including at the IMG Academy Junior World Junior Nato Championships in San Diego in 2015 and the World Junior Golf Cup in Japan the following year.
He was the world’s top-ranked amateur for 44 weeks between May 2017 and April 2018, during which he played his first
major, the 2017 US Open. His number one ranking earned him a spot in the 2018 US Open and British Open, while his victory in the 2018 Latin American Amateur Championship secured him a spot in the Masters. However, Niemann decided to turn professional, which meant losing his place in the first two aforementioned majors.
First victories on the PGA Tour
Joaquin Niemann entered the professional world with impressive speed. He finished sixth at the 2018 Valero Texas Open, his first tournament as a professional, and followed that up with three more top 10s in the next seven events.
That earned him a PGA Tour card for the following year and meant he achieved the rare feat of earning that honor after starting the season with no status.
Niemann became the first Chilean winner on the PGA Tour when, at age 20, he won A Military Tribute at The Green brier in 2019, which also made him the youngest in ternational winner on Tour since 1923.
By 2021, Niemann was already a regular at the majors and began a streak of making the cut in four consecutive Masters. His best Masters finish came in 2023, when he tied for 16th behind champion Jon Rahm.
Niemann recorded his second PGA Tour victory in early 2022, when a 19-under-par total gave him a two-stroke victory at the Genesis Invitational.
He also enjoyed a first European Tour win at the Australian Open in late 2023 when, buoyed by his strong finish to the LIV golf season, he beat Japan’s Riku ya Hoshino with an eagle on the second extra hole.
The quality of his play was so high that he received invitations to three major tournaments in 2024, the Masters, the PGA Championship and the Open Championship.
Chilean captain leads the Toque GC at Liv Golf
Joaquin Niemann’s career at the highest level of golf has been characterized by his quick acclimation to each new level, and the same story was true after he signed with LIV Golf in August 2022. In his first event, the LIV Golf Invitational Boston, he came close to starting with the victory before having to settle for a tie for second place behind Dustin Johnson, who won with an eagle on the first hole of the playoff.
Niemann finished seventh overall in his inaugural year. In 2023, the team he proudly captains, Torque GC, won the most team titles and the most prize money during the season before finishing third in the team championship.
However, it was in 2024 that Niemann reached new heights in the LIV Golf rankings after a sensational start to the season. He won two individual events (Mayakoba, Jeddah) and posted five more top 5s on his way to finishing second in the individual rankings for the entire season.
In 2025, the talented Chilean player again got off to a strong start, winning two of the first four events, starting with a victory at LIV Golf Adelaide and following with a win at LIV Golf Singapore.
Niemann continued his brilliant start to 2025 by winning the individual title at LIV Golf Mexico City, marking his third victory in the first six events of the season.
His fourth victory – up to the moment of writing this article – came at LIV Golf Virginia, with a final round of 63 strokes.
A unique Swing
Joaquin Niemann’s swing is at once idiosyncratic, simple, visually appealing and extremely effective. His excellent hand-eye coordination is complemented by an unusual head movement when impacting the ball with the club.
His coach is his Chilean compatriot Eduardo Miquel, who has helped him perfect a technique that has led him to success at the highest level.
More success is surely ahead for Niemann, whose words after winning for the second time in 2024, in Jeddah, epitomized both his quiet confidence and his recognition
of the work still to be done. “It’s probably my best moment, the best I’ve ever played in. I just want to keep going in the same direction. There’s a lot to improve and I just need to be curious about it and see how much I can learn.”
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