Rory McIlroy sixth player in history to secure golf's career grand slam - Times-Standard
Rory McIlroy’s history-making victory Sunday in the Masters made him the sixth player to complete golf’s career grand slam.
A look at the members of the exclusive club:
Gene Sarazen
1935 at age 33.
Clinched career grand slam with victory in second year of the Masters, then called the Augusta National Invitation Tournament.
His final round included the “shot heard ‘round the world,” holing out from 235 yards on the par-5 15th hole for double eagle. That enabled Sarazen to tie Craig Wood in regulation. He won by five strokes in a 36-hole playoff.
1935
1922, 1923, 1933
1922, 1932
1932
Ben Hogan
1953 at age 40.
Four years after a near-fatal car accident in 1949 when he collided head-on with a Greyhound bus, Hogan completed the slam with a four-stroke victory in the British Open at the Carnoustie Golf Links in Carnoustie, Angus, Scotland.
It capped a year In which he won three of the four majors, but most impressive was that it was the only time Hogan ever played the British Open.
1951, 1953
1946, 1948
1948, 1950, 1951, 1953
1953
Gary Player
1965 at age 29.
While he won the other three legs of the slam multiple times, Player completed the slam with his only U.S. Open victory. It required beating Australia’s Kel Nagle in an 18-hole playoff, making him the first foreign-born winner of the U.S. Open in 38 years.
1961, 1974, 1978
1962, 1972
1965
1959, 1968, 1974
Jack Nicklaus
1966 at age 26.
He won three of the four legs within two years of turning pro, but needed three more years to complete the task by winning the British Open. Key to that victory at Murfield in Scotland was keeping his driver in the bag. Nicklaus used it only 17 times because of very heavy rough and challenging weather conditions.
He would complete the career slam two more times on the way to a record 18 major championship titles.
1963, 1965, 1966, 1972, 1975, 1986
1963, 1971, 1973, 1975, 1980
1962, 1967, 1972, 1980
1966, 1970, 1978
Tiger Woods
2000 at age 24.
The youngest to complete the slam, Woods accomplished it with an eight-stroke victory over Thomas Bjorn and Ernie Els on the Old Course in St. Andrews, Scotland.
When he won the 2001 Masters, Woods held all four major titles at the same time, a feat which became known as the “Tiger Slam.”
Like Nicklaus, he went on to complete the career slam two more times while capturing 15 major championships.
1997, 2001, 2002, 2005, 2019
1999, 2000, 2006, 2007
2000, 2002, 2008
2000, 2005, 2006
Rory McIlroy
2025 at age 35.
All this drama could have been avoided had McIlroy not collapsed during the 2011 Masters, when he took a four-shot lead into the final round and shot 8-over 80 to finish tied for 15th, 10 strokes behind winner Charl Schwartzel.
Instead, McIlroy, who completed the other three legs by 2014, had to wait another 11 years to clinch the slam.
“This was my 17th time here, and I started to wonder if it would ever be my time,” he said moments before putting on the green jacket.
It was McIlroy’s time, but not before a playoff victory over Justin Rose. It came after appropriate amounts of angst and agony Sunday that made the accomplishment all the more compelling.
2025
2012, 2014
2011
2014
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