Masters Tournament Par 3 Contest

The Masters Tournament Par 3 Contest is a golf competition that precedes the Masters Tournament at Augusta National Golf Club in Augusta, Georgia. The first Par 3 Contest was held before the 1960 tournament, and was won by three-time Masters champion Sam Snead.^[2] The contest takes place in a single round on a nine-hole, par-27 course in the northeast corner of the club's grounds, designed in 1958 by George Cobb and club founder Clifford Roberts.^[1][3][4]

Masters Par 3 Contest

Tournament information
Location	Augusta, Georgia, U.S.
Established	1960
Course(s)	Augusta National Golf Club
Par	27
Length	1,060 yards (970 m)[1]
Organized by	Augusta National Golf Club
Format	Stroke play
Month played	April
Tournament record score
To par	−8 Jimmy Walker (2016)
Current champion
Rickie Fowler

Traditionally, the contest participants have invited family members to caddie for them, sometimes allowing them to play shots on their behalf. Through the 2019 contest, ninety-four holes in one have been recorded, including nine in the 2016 event.^[4][5]

Snead became the contest's first multiple winner in 1974, fourteen years after his first. The most recent is Tom Watson, who won his second Par 3 Contest in 2018, 36 years after his first in 1982. Pádraig Harrington is the only one with three wins; he won his first pair in consecutive years (2003, 2004), as did Sandy Lyle (1997, 1998). Seven players have multiple wins; the other three are Isao Aoki, Jay Haas, and David Toms.

Jimmy Walker holds the course record of 19 (–8), set in 2016, which included an ace. The contest has been decided by a playoff on 21 occasions, and concluded with a tie twice. Just 14 of the 59 winners (including ties) are non-American. No winner of the Par 3 Contest has gone on to win the Masters in the same year.^[4]

Winners

Sam Snead (pictured in 1967) won the inaugural contest in 1960, and again in 1974

Vijay Singh (pictured in 2007) won in 1994

Sandy Lyle (pictured in 2006) won consecutive contests
in 1997 and 1998

Pádraig Harrington (pictured in 2007) has three contest victories;
two shared and one playoff win

Year	Winner	Country	To par[6][a]	Masters finish	Ref.
1960	Sam Snead	United States	−4	T11	[2]
1961	Deane Beman (a)	United States	−5	CUT	[7]
1962	Bruce Crampton	Australia	−5	T29	[7]
1963*	George Bayer	United States	−4	T28	[7]
1964	Labron Harris Jr. (a)	United States	−4	43	[7]
1965	Art Wall Jr.	United States	−7	T45	[8]
1966	Terry Dill	United States	−5	T17	[7]
1967*	Arnold Palmer	United States	−4	4	[7]
1968	Bob Rosburg	United States	−5	T29	[7]
1969*	Bob Lunn	United States	−4	CUT	[7]
1970	Harold Henning	South Africa	−6	CUT	[7]
1971*	Dave Stockton	United States	−4	T9	[7]
1972	Steve Melnyk	United States	−4	T12	[7]
1973	Gay Brewer	United States	−7	T10	[8]
1974*	Sam Snead (2)	United States	−5	T20	[7]
1975*	Isao Aoki	Japan	−4	CUT	[7]
1976	Jay Haas (a)	United States	−6	CUT	[7]
1977*	Tom Weiskopf	United States	−4	T14	[9]
1978*	Lou Graham	United States	−5	CUT	[7]
1979	Joe Inman	United States	−5	T23	[7]
1980	Johnny Miller	United States	−5	T38	[7]
1981	Isao Aoki (2)	Japan	−5	T45	[10]
1982*	Tom Watson	United States	−4	T5	[11]
1983	Hale Irwin	United States	−5	T6	[7]
1984	Tommy Aaron	United States	−5	CUT	[12]
1985	Hubert Green	United States	−5	CUT	[7]
1986*	Gary Koch	United States	−4	T16	[7]
1987	Ben Crenshaw	United States	−5	T4	[13]
1988	Tsuneyuki Nakajima	Japan	−3	T33	[7]
1989*	Bob Gilder	United States	−5	39	[7]
1990	Raymond Floyd	United States	−4	2	[7]
1991*	Rocco Mediate	United States	−3	T22	[7]
1992	Davis Love III	United States	−5	T25	[7]
1993	Chip Beck	United States	−6	2	[14]
1994	Vijay Singh	Fiji	−5	T27	[15]
1995*	Hal Sutton	United States	−4	CUT	[16]
1996*	Jay Haas (2)	United States	−5	T36	[17]
1997*	Sandy Lyle	Scotland	−5	T34	[18]
1998	Sandy Lyle (2)	Scotland	−3	CUT	[7]
1999	Joe Durant	United States	−5	CUT	[7]
2000*	Chris Perry	United States	−4	T14	[19]
2001	David Toms	United States	−5	T31	[20]
2002*	Nick Price	Zimbabwe	−5	T20	[21]
2003†	Pádraig Harrington David Toms (2)	Ireland  United States	−6	CUT T8	[22]
2004*	Pádraig Harrington (2)	Ireland	−4	T13	[23]
2005	Jerry Pate	United States	−5	DNP	[24]
2006	Ben Crane	United States	−4	CUT	[25]
2007	Mark O'Meara	United States	−5	CUT	[26]
2008	Rory Sabbatini	South Africa	−5	CUT	[27]
2009	Tim Clark	South Africa	−5	T13	[27]
2010	Louis Oosthuizen	South Africa	−6	CUT	[27]
2011	Luke Donald	England	−5	T4	[28]
2012†	Jonathan Byrd Pádraig Harrington (3)	United States  Ireland	−5	T27 T8	[29]
2013*	Ted Potter Jr.	United States	−4	CUT	[3]
2014	Ryan Moore	United States	−6	CUT	[30]
2015*	Kevin Streelman	United States	−5	T12	[31]
2016	Jimmy Walker	United States	−8	T29	[4]
2017	Contest canceled due to rain				[32]
2018	Tom Watson (2)	United States	−6	DNP	[33]
2019*	Matt Wallace	England	−5	CUT	[34]
2020	Contest canceled due to COVID-19 pandemic				[35]
2021
2022†	Mackenzie Hughes Mike Weir	Canada	−4	T50 CUT	[36]
2023	Tom Hoge	United States	−6	CUT	[37]
2024	Rickie Fowler	United States	−5	T30	[38]

Key

* - playoff ^[7]

† - tie ^[7]

(a) - amateur

Masters champions who also won a Par 3 Contest

Arnold Palmer (pictured in 2009) won the Par 3 Contest in 1967 having won the Masters four times between 1958 and 1964.

Champions	Par-3 wins	Masters wins[39]
Sam Snead	1960, 1974	1949, 1952, 1954
Art Wall Jr.	1965	1959
Arnold Palmer	1967	1958, 1960, 1962, 1964
Gay Brewer	1973	1967
Tom Watson	1982, 2018	1977, 1981
Tommy Aaron	1984	1973
Ben Crenshaw	1987	1984, 1995
Raymond Floyd	1990	1976
Vijay Singh	1994	2000
Sandy Lyle	1997, 1998	1988
Mark O'Meara	2007	1998
Mike Weir	2022	2003

• No player has won the Par 3 Contest and the Masters in the same year, a fact well known by the players.^[4][40]
  Raymond Floyd came the closest in the 1990 tournament, but lost in a sudden-death playoff.^[41]
• Ben Crenshaw and Vijay Singh are the only players to win a Masters after winning a Par 3 Contest.
• Tom Watson is the only player to hold both titles at once, for four days, winning the Par 3 Contest in 1982 as defending Masters champion.^[11]

Notes

• ^a Par is a predetermined number of strokes that a golfer should require to complete a hole, a round (the sum of the total pars of the played holes), or a tournament (the sum of the total pars of each round). E stands for even, which means the round was completed in the predetermined number of strokes.^[6]

References

1. "The Masters – The Par 3 Course". Golf Today. Archived from the original on November 10, 2016. Retrieved August 30, 2016.
2. Stutsman, Doug (April 6, 2016). "The day an amateur won at Augusta National". The Augusta Chronicle. Retrieved October 26, 2016.
3. "Ted Potter Jr. wins Par 3 in playoff". ESPN. April 11, 2013. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
4. "Masters 2016: Nine holes-in-one in Par 3 contest". BBC Sport. April 6, 2016. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
5. "About The Par 3 Contest". Masters Tournament. Retrieved April 17, 2020.
6. "Scoring". BBC Sport. September 16, 2005. Retrieved September 23, 2008.
7. "Historical Records & Stats – Par 3 Contest". The Masters. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
8. "Par-3 Contest offers big fun in a short round". The Augusta Chronicle. April 8, 2015. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
9. Bingham, Walter (April 18, 1977). "Down the Bobby Jones Expressway". Sports Illustrated. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
10. "Isao Aoki of Japan, noted for his unusual putting..." United Press International. April 8, 1981. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
11. "Watson takes Par-3 tournament in playoff". Gadsden Times. Alabama. Associated Press. April 8, 1982. p. 17.
12. "Tommy Aaron, winner of the Masters Championship in 1973,..." United Press International. April 11, 1984. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
13. Fowler, Bob (April 9, 1987). "Crenshaw Wins Despite Dad's Advice Left-handed Approach Leaves O'Grady Last". Orlando Sentinel. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
14. Dorman, Larry (April 8, 1993). "Kite Expects To Tee Off Despite An Aching Back". Sun-Sentinel. Archived from the original on April 26, 2016. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
15. Mayo, Michael (April 7, 1994). "Another Foreign Affair Set To Bloom At Augusta". Sun-Sentinel. Archived from the original on April 25, 2016. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
16. Dorman, Larry (April 6, 1995). "Golf; Woods Has Injury Scare on Eve of Masters". The New York Times. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
17. Mayo, Michael (April 11, 1996). "Haas wins Par-3". Sun-Sentinel. Archived from the original on April 25, 2016. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
18. "USA: Augusta: Golf: Sandy Lyle wins annual Par-3 Contest". Associated Press. October 4, 1997. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
19. "Wednesday notebook: Perry prevails". ESPN. April 6, 2000. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
20. "Wednesday notebook: Is Toms cursed?". ESPN. April 4, 2001. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
21. "Price wins par-3; Izawa has pair of aces". USA Today. April 11, 2002. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
22. "Harrington, Toms tie in Masters prelude". United Press International. April 9, 2003. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
23. Ferguson, Doug (April 7, 2015). "Tiger Woods to play in Par 3 competition at the Masters". Yahoo Sports. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
24. "Jerry Pate wins Masters par-3 tourney". United Press International. April 6, 2005. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
25. Mell, Randall (April 6, 2006). "Crane Hopes To End Par 3 Curse". Sun-Sentinel. Archived from the original on April 26, 2016. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
26. "Mark O'Meara wins the Par 3 contest". Golf Today. April 5, 2007. Archived from the original on March 14, 2016. Retrieved October 26, 2016.
27. "Louis Oosthuizen wins par-3 Contest at Augusta". BBC Sport. April 7, 2010. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
28. Fine, Larry (April 6, 2011). "Luke Donald wins Masters Par-3 Contest". Reuters. Archived from the original on April 18, 2016. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
29. McAllister, Mike (April 4, 2012). "Harrington, Byrd share Par 3 victory". PGA Tour. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
30. "The Masters: Ryan Moore wins Augusta Par 3 Contest". CNN. April 9, 2014. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
31. Ballengee, Ryan (April 8, 2015). "Kevin Streelman won Masters Par 3 Contest with special caddie". Yahoo Sports. Retrieved April 7, 2016.
32. Herrington, Ryan (April 5, 2017). "A Masters Par 3 Contest first: No winner declared after rain washes out the event". Golf Digest. Retrieved April 11, 2017.
33. Daniels, Tim (April 4, 2018). "Masters Par 3 Tournament 2018: Tom Watson Becomes Oldest Winner in History". Bleacher Report. Retrieved April 4, 2018.
34. Woodard, Adam (April 10, 2019). "Matt Wallace wins Masters Par 3 Contest, denies Sandy Lyle of historic third win". Golfweek. Retrieved April 10, 2019.
35. "2020 Masters Schedule Announced". The Masters Tournament. Augusta National Golf Club. Retrieved October 27, 2020.
36. "Mike Weir, Mackenzie Hughes share Masters Par 3 title at Augusta National". ESPN. April 6, 2022. Retrieved April 8, 2023.
37. McDonald, Patrick (April 5, 2023). "2023 Masters Par 3 Contest leaderboard, results: Tom Hoge wins, Scottie Scheffler walks off with hole-in-one". CBS Sports. Retrieved April 5, 2023.
38. McDonald, Patrick (April 10, 2024). "2024 Masters Par 3 Contest leaderboard, results: Rickie Fowler wins, Viktor Hovland drains one of five aces". CBS Sports. Retrieved April 10, 2024.
39. "The Masters – Past Winners & Runners-Up". PGA Tour. Retrieved October 29, 2016.
40. "Par 3 jinx resting on pro's shoulders". Eugene Register-Guard. Oregon. April 11, 1991. p. 6D.
41. Shearer, Ed (April 9, 1990). "Floyd devastated after late collapse". Wilmington Morning Star. North Carolina. Associated Press. p. 4B.

External links

• About Golf – The Masters Par-3 Contest winners

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