Eduardo García Palacios
Life is cruel to us from the moment we are born, that instant in which, paradoxically, we begin to die. Always, alas, the same fatal destiny awaits us. This turbulent existential sea that rocks us has just taken to its unfathomable depths one of the people who has done most for the promotion of Andalusia, and also of Spain, as a golf tourist destination.
Jaime Ortiz Patiño has left us, slowly, quietly, as if not wanting to disturb, humbly …. as he was, despite his immense stature in the international golf scene, where he rubbed shoulders and was highly appreciated by the most dazzling figures of the sport, both players and the most important leaders of world golf.
Getting the Ryder Cup for Valderrama was not a coincidence, but the result of a titanic task and very professional actions carried out by Don Jaime and his collaborators, among which, humbly, was this company.
To reap such a splendid harvest in 1997, he had first sown some exceptional seeds. First, he prepared the land for cultivation, when he acquired the Las Aves course and improved it – hand in hand with its famous designer, the American Robert Trent Jones – until it became the world-famous Valderrama.
Then, once Don Jaime estimated that the course was up to his expectations, which were obviously many, he began to pull the powerful strings that wove his fabulous social relations and, together with another great and also humble man, Mel Pyatt, he gestated what would become for many years the best professional golf tournament in Spain and one of the most brilliant of the European Tour. The Volvo Masters, of course.
The best players in the world faced, with more or less fortune, the challenging Cadiz course, which during those glorious autumn days sharpened its claws as never before… with the invaluable help, of course, of Don Jaime.
I still remember with what enthusiasm and dedication the alma mater of Valderrama lived each tournament. Patiño was the first to get up to go to the course, before dawn, to check that everything was in perfect condition, and woe betide the irresponsible one who had not done his job properly! With the stimpmeter in hand, he would personally take charge of measuring the speed of the greens…
Valderrama was his life, his great passion…. Despite the enormous success achieved by the Volvo Masters, which became the tasty cherry that crowned each season of the European Tour and often decided who would be crowned number one on the Tour, Don Jaime had a dream that kept him awake at night.
He wanted the Ryder Cup, which had never been played outside the British Isles, to be played on such a historic continental occasion at his beloved Valderrama.
And, of course, he succeeded. He could hardly contain his emotion that September 1997 during the brilliant opening ceremony of the Ryder Cup, which was attended, among other world-class personalities, by the King and Queen of Spain. Millions of golf fans had their eyes on Valderrama. And the spectacle of the competition was, with Seve captaining the Europeans, at the tremendous height of the event. Don Jaime had attracted to Spain, and to Andalusia especially, the media spotlight of world golf.
And as he did not have enough, after the Ryder Cup, he made another splendid gift to his country 26 Andalucía Golf / España Golf The humility of a great man of adoption by bringing, for the first time to Spain, the American Express World Championships. I still remember the anger of Tiger Woods on the 17th when his ball rolled from the then very bloody green into the water, and also the enormous duel that the then world number one held for the victory with Miguel Angel Jimenez in the first of the two editions of the tournament that were played in Valderrama. After the two world events of the AMEx, the Volvo Masters would return to its home, after a move of several years to Montecastillo.
Thanks to the initiative and drive of Jaime Ortiz-Patiño, Spain became the epicenter of world golf.
His death leaves the whole golf family a little orphaned. We have lost an irreparable figure, probably the person who has done the most for the worldwide promotion of Spanish golf.
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