José María Olazábal has just turned 51 and, although one year ago he could have started playing on the senior circuits in the United States or Europe, it was not until now that he took the plunge, and did so on the other side of the Atlantic “pond”, on the Champions Tour. The venue was the Allianz Championship in Boca Raton (Florida), where the two-time Masters champion shot rounds of 71, 67 and 72 for an overall score of six over par and finished in a discreet 41st place.
Competing in the same tournament, won by Scott McCarron, Miguel Angel Jimenez finished 23rd, four strokes ahead of his compatriot. Jimenez is already a three-time winner on the Champions Tour and in 2016 finished fourth in the season finale standings, with earnings of $1,613,820.
In addition to his two Masters titles (1984 and 1989), Olazábal has won four other tournaments on the main U.S. circuit, the PGA Tour: the NEC World Series of Golf in 1990 and 1994, the International in 1991 and the Buick Invitational in 2002. He has twenty-one victories on the European Tour and two in Japan.
On the eve of the Allianz, Champions Tour Chairman Greg McLaughlin had this to say about Olazábal: “We are delighted to welcome him to the Tour; he is a true gentleman and one of the great players of all time.
Leave a Reply