Author: Tony Greer

Week 42 2024 the OWGR issued its 2000^th Ranking.

The concept of the Ranking originated in the early 1980s and launched on Sunday, April 6th, 1986, during the week of the Masters Tournament. Bernhard Langer was the first-ever World No.1. 

Over the Rankings 38 year history only twenty-five players, who have won 68 Major Championships between them, have joined the elite No.1 Club – after Bernhard Langer’s initial weeks as No.1, Seve Ballesteros and Greg Norman vied for the No.1 spot, then Nick Faldo took over as Greg Norman’s rival.  IanWoosnam and Fred Couples held the position through 1991 and 1992 before Nick Faldo was No.1 again through to 1994, then Nick Price’s burst of Majors took him to No.1. After a single week at No.1 by Tom Lehman,Tiger Woods dominated the position from 1997 with brief interruptions from Ernie Els, David Duval and Vijay Singh. However, between 2010 and 2012 first Lee Westwood, then Martin Kaymer and finally Luke Donald took over the No.1 position.  Rory McIlroy dominated the next two years before AdamScott made the No.1 spot for a few weeks. In 2016 Jordan Spieth and Jason Day joined Rory McIlroy in a close contest for the top position.From 2017 to 2020 Dustin Johnson dominated the top of the Ranking with Justin Thomas, Justin Rose (the Olympic Champion), Brooks Koepka (who won four Majors in two years) and Jon Rahm. In this very competitiveperiod, between 12 July 2020 and 23 August 2020 the Ranking had record five different No.1’s in the space of seven consecutive weeks (McIlroy 1, Rahm 2, Thomas,1, Rahm 2 and Johnson 1). This followed a unique suspension of the Ranking for twelve weeks from week ending 22 March 2020 to week ending 7 June 2020 with professional golf inactive due to the global threat posed by Coronavirus (COVID-19). On 27 March 2022, Scottie Scheffler took over the No.1 spot from John Rahm after three victories in seven weeks on the PGA Tour and is currently on a 75-week run as No.1

Tiger Woods became the youngest No.1 when he was only 21 years and 24 weeks just 42 weeks after turning professional and Vijay Singh was the oldest player to make No.1 at 41 years old and 28 weeks. Tiger Woods has the most weeks at No.1 - 683 weeks (also a record 281 consecutive weeks at No.1 between 2002 and 2010), followed by Greg Norman 331 weeks, DustinJohnson 135weeks, Rory McIlroy 122 weeks, Scottie Scheffler 110 weeks and Nick Faldo 97 weeks.

Currently, one hundred and twenty players have reached the Top-10  since the Ranking began including 61 United States players, 31 from Europe and 28 from the Rest of the World.Phil Mickelson who, although he never quite made the No.1 position in the Tiger Woods era, completed a record 25 years in the Top-50 in 2018. However, his PGA Championship victory in 2021 saw him back in the Top 50 nearly 29 years after he first entered in 1993. Phil spent a total of 774 weeks in the Top 10 behind Tiger Woods (906 weeks) and Ernie Els (788 weeks) with Rory McIlroy the current World No.3 in fourth place with 721 weeks.

The Mark H McCormack Award was inaugurated in 1998 recognising the player who had been in the No.1 position for the most weeks in each calendar year. Tiger Woods has won the award fourteen times (1998 to 2010 and 2013), Rory McIlroy three times (2012, 2014 & 2015), LukeDonald once in 2011, Jason Day once in 2016, Brooks Koepka once in 2019, Dustin Johnson three times in 2017, 2018 and 2020, Jon Rahm once in 2021 and the current No.1 ScottieScheffler will win the 2024 Award for the third consecutive year.