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| Birth Name(s) : Greg Norman |
Date of Birth: N/A |
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Full Greg Norman Biography
Norman was born in Mount Isa, Queensland, Australia. He began his career as a trainee in the Royal Queensland golf shop for the famed Charlie Earp, earning AUD 28 a week. The first professional tournament he won was the 1976 Westlakes Classic in his home country, and he soon moved on to success on the European Tour and later the PGA Tour.
Norman won The Open Championship twice, in 1986 and 1993, and also won The Players Championship in 1994 in record-setting fashion (averaging 68.81 per round for the year). Despite his huge success on the U.S. PGA Tour and his many wins around the world, Norman will be forever regarded as an underachiever (given his talents), a characterization fueled by his myriad near-misses in The Masters, the U.S. Open, and the PGA Championship. He was equally a victim of his own bad luck and good luck on the part of his fellow golfers in major championships. He infamously lost a near-certain PGA Championship in 1986 after Bob Tway holed a greenside bunker shot (though Norman himself shot a 76 that day), and lost The Masters the following year in a playoff on an even more miraculous 45-yard chip shot by Larry Mize on the second play-off hole.
But not all of Norman's Major woes have been at the hands of others. Many times he has failed to perform in the final round of a tournament, whether it be a final-round 78 in the Masters (see below), a 73 in the 1995 US Open where even-par 70 would have won the tournament, or the 76 in the '86 PGA that set him up to be defeated by Bob Tway's bunker shot. Several of Norman's infamous "chokes" occurred when his wobble-prone putting got the better of him. In 1986, he led all four majors after the third round but won only the British Open. (This is jokingly referred to as the "Norman Slam" or the "Saturday Slam," as in he was leading after the third round on Saturday but lost in the final round on Sunday). He is one of only two players to have competed in - and, like Craig Wood, to have lost - play-offs in all four of the major championships. But perhaps the most embarrassing Norman meltdown of all occurred at The Masters in 1996, where he blew a six-stroke lead in the final round and lost the tournament to Nick Faldo by five strokes, shooting a Sunday 78 to Faldo's 67. ESPN, as part of their "ESPN25" 25th-anniversary celebration, ranked Norman's 1996 Masters mishap as the third-biggest sports choke of the last 25 years. Despite the losses, though, Norman still has twenty nine top-ten finishes in the majors.Greg Norman on the USS John F. Kennedy.
Norman won the PGA Tour of Australia's Order of Merit six times: 1978, 1980, 1983, 1984, 1986, and 1988. He won the European Tour's Order of Merit in 1982, and topped the PGA Tour's Money List in 1986, 1990, and 1995. He won the Vardon Trophy for lowest scoring average on the PGA Tour three times: 1989, 1990, and 1994; and was inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame in 2001. His dominance over his peers (despite his comparative lack of success in the majors) was probably best expressed in the Official World Golf Rankings: Norman finished the season on top of the ranking list on seven occasions, in 1986, 1987, 1989, 1990, 1995, 1996 and 1997, and was second at the end of 1988, 1993 and 1994.
Norman married an American named Laura in 1981 and they have two children Morgan Leigh, and Gregory. The family lived in Hobe Sound, Florida. His daughter attended Boston College, and for a short while dated Sergio García. In May 2006 he announced that he would be getting divorced. He refused to comment on the reasons for this, other than to say there was no third party involved. Greg Norman's net worth is estimated at $500 million.
Norman and his wife commissioned the 228 ft luxury yacht "Aussie Rules", built by Australia ferry builder Austal/Oceanfast. The boat held four sports boats, including a 60ft custom sportfisherman, along with stowage for related gear: 200 rods. Built of aluminium, she could cruise at 15 knots with a range of 8,000 Nm . The boat cost $70 million, but resulted in Austal making an AUS$18 million loss. The boat was quickly sold by Norman in 2004 for a rumored $77 million to the founder of Blockbuster Video, Wayne Huizenga . She is now renamed M/Y Floridian, and available for charter at $400 000 per week or sale.
Norman was also an early customer for the Boeing Business Jet, which he had ordered with custom fitted bedroom and office. However, the downturn in the Asian markets adversely affected his golf course design business, and he latterly cancelled the order after acting as an ambassador for Boeing He eventually retained his Gulfstream V.
Seve Ballesteros | Fred Couples | David Duval | Ernie Els | Nick Faldo | Bernhard Langer | Tom Lehman | Greg Norman | Nick Price | Vijay Singh | Tiger Woods †| Ian Woosnam |
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