SIX OF SEVE’S BEST

Features

bruced
July 16, 2007

Seve Ballesteros announced his retirement today. The Spaniard was golf’s great improvisor and he leaves behind the memory of many great shots.

Seve Ballesteros announced his retirement today. The Spaniard was golf’s great improvisor and he leaves behind the memory of many great shots.
Here are six of the best.
-1976 Open Championship, Royal Birkdale
The 19-year-old Ballesteros delivers a delicate pitch-and-run shot through the bunkers on the last to claim a share of second place with the great Jack Nicklaus. ‘The Golden Bear’ later wrote he knew the young Spaniard was “something special” from that moment on.
-1979 Open Championship, Royal Lytham
Ballesteros all but clinched his first Claret Jug with the famous car park shot. After ballooning his tee shot on the 16th into a temporary car park, he received a free drop and hit his approach to 15 feet and a birdie putt.
-1983 Ryder Cup, PGA National Golf Club
Ballesteros saved his match against Fuzzy Zoeller with an extraordinary 245-yard three wood from under the lip of a bunker to the front of the green. Zoeller said: “They say great golfers make great shots, but that one made me blink.”
-1984 Open Championship, St Andrews
A 20ft putt on the 18th which denied Tom Watson what would have been a record-equalling sixth title was not spectacular. But Ballesteros himself picked it as his favourite and his celebrations are part of Open folklore.
-1988 Open Championship, Royal Lytham
Ballesteros denied Nick Price the Claret Jug with one of the greatest rounds in Open history. Returning to the 16th, scene of his famous car park shot, Ballesteros hit a perfect one iron from the tee before hitting a nine iron approach just three inches from the hole.
-1993 European Masters, Crans-Sur-Sierre
Close to miraculous. Ballesteros was directly behind a swimming pool wall, but hit a pitching wedge over the wall and between overhanging branches to the fringe of the last green and chipped in for birdie. The shot can never be repeated as a granite marker has been erected to celebrate the achievement.