Last Major Championship Victory by an Amateur Golfer: When?
Winning professional golf tournaments as an amateur is a rare feat, to say the least. In the PGA Tour's history, only 11 tournaments have been won by amateurs, while the LPGA Tour has seen just six such victories.
Moving on, let's take a look at some of the notable figures who've managed to pull off this immensely challenging task. Nick Dunlap, for instance, succeeded Phil Mickelson as the most recent amateur PGA Tour champion at the 2024 American Express, a remarkable accomplishment that came 33 years after Mickelson's triumph.
If we flip the gender spectrum, Lydia Ko stands out as the latest female amateur to win a tournament on the LPGA Tour. She clinched the 2012 Canadian Women's Open at the tender age of 15, making her the LPGA Tour's youngest champion ever. She repeated this performance the next year, further cementing her reputation.
Barring a few exceptions like Ko, amateurs haven't had much luck in the Major championships. In golf's history, Majors have been won by male amateurs 14 times, with Bobby Jones leading the pack with seven victories – four US Opens and three Open Championships. Jones' last win came in 1930, three years before Johnny Goodman, the Omaha insurance salesman, claimed the 1933 US Open at North Shore Country Club.
Goodman started off poorly, opening with a three-over 75, but he stormed back with a championship record six-under 66 in the second round. A two-under third round, marked by only 28 putts, gave him a six-shot advantage going into the final round. In the end, Goodman held on to win by one stroke, despite a four-foot par putt miss by Ralph Guldahl at the last, which would've forced a playoff.
When it comes to female amateurs winning Major championships, the story is a bit peculiar. Catherine Lacoste is currently the last to achieve this, having won the 1967 US Women's Open. Despite the now-defunct Titleholders Championship, which ran from 1937-66 and again in 1972, only one woman has won a Major since the LPGA Tour's inception in 1950.
Lacoste led by five strokes after 36 and 54 holes but had a shaky final round, carding a closing 79 to win by just two strokes over Susie Maxwell and Beth Stone. Her remarkable amateur career didn't end there. In 1969, she became the third woman to win both the US Women's Amateur and the British Ladies Amateur in the same year.
At the age of 25, Lacoste retired from tournament golf and never turned professional. She represented France occasionally at the Espirito Santo Trophy and the European Ladies Team Championship. With the rising number of talented female amateurs, it remains to be seen whether Lacoste's record will stand the test of time. For now, however, she holds a unique piece of golfing history.
The sports-analysis of tournaments won by amateurs in professional golf reveals that Nick Dunlap, as a male amateur, recently replicated Phil Mickelson's PGA Tour champion feat at the 2024 American Express. Meanwhile, Lydia Ko, an exceptional female amateur, managed to win the 2012 Canadian Women's Open on the LPGA Tour at the young age of 15, breaking age-related records.
