Генри Вардон: Легенда гольфа из Джерси

Jersey professional golfer (1870–1937)

Henry William Vardon (9 May 1870 – 20 March 1937) was a professional golfer from Jersey. He was a member of the Great Triumvirate with John Henry Taylor and James Braid. Vardon won The Open Championship a record six times, and also won the 1900 U. S. Open.

Born in Grouville, Jersey, Channel Islands, Vardon, whose mother was French and father English, did not play much golf as a youngster, but showed natural talent for the sport as a young caddie in his teens. Harry and his brother Tom Vardon, younger by two years and also interested in golf, were very close. Their golf development was held back by poor family circumstances and their father was not supportive of his sons' golf interest. Tom moved from Jersey to England first, to pursue a golf career. Harry went to England in the spring of 1890, taking a job as greenkeeper at age 20, at Studley Royal Golf Club, Ripon, Yorks. A year later he became club professional at Bury Golf Club, and in 1896 the club professional at Ganton Golf Club, in Yorkshire. By his early 20s, Harry developed a demanding practice program, the most ambitious seen to that time. He was the first professional golfer to play in knickerbockers – discarding the "proper" dress of an Englishman in an uncomfortable shirt and tie with a buttoned jacket. In 1896, Vardon won the first of his six Open Championships (a record that still stands today). Vardon had rivalries with James Braid and J. H. Taylor, who each won five Open Championships; together the three formed the 'Great Triumvirate', and dominated worldwide golf from the mid 1890s to the mid 1910s. These rivalries increased the public's interest in golf.

In 1898 Harry Vardon won his second Open Championship at Prestwick Golf Club, beating Willie Park, Jnr by a single stroke. Park missed a makeable putt on the 18th green to take the match to a play off. So aggrieved was Park that he immediately offered a challenge to Vardon to play him over 72 holes, 36 holes at his home course of Musselburgh and 36 holes at a golf course of Vardon's choosing, for a wager of £100 per side. Park had offered similar challenges before; some years earlier he had met and defeated Ben Sayers at Musselburgh and North Berwick, and in 1897 Park defeated J. H. Taylor over two venues, also for £100 per side. Vardon refused Park's challenge; besides the £100 per side, Vardon had nothing to gain from such a match, and he most certainly was not going to play Park at Musselburgh, where fan partisanship was less than courteous to rival players. Eventually Park conceded to play his home leg at North Berwick Golf Club instead of Musselburgh, and Vardon chose his home course of Ganton, Yorkshire. Golf Week magazine acted as both promoter and stakeholder, and the match took place in July 1899, by which time Vardon had won his third Open Championship. The British press billed the encounter as the greatest golf competition of all time. Such was the interest that 10,000 Scottish fans attended the match at North Berwick, and that on a day when the Prince of Wales (later King Edward VII) was making a State visit to nearby Edinburgh. Special trains were laid on to ferry fans from Edinburgh and other nearby towns. The format of the competition was match play. The first 36 holes at North Berwick ended with Vardon holding a two hole lead. The second leg took place two weeks later at Ganton, and Vardon completed the rout, winning 11 up with ten holes to play, collecting the £200 prize and the glory.

During his career, Harry Vardon made three visits to North America, in 1900, 1913 and 1920. During all three trips he competed in the U. S. Open finishing 1st, 2nd and tied 2nd. He became golf's first international celebrity in 1900 when he toured the United States and Canada. John Henry Taylor, the 1900 Open Champion and member of the Great Triumvirate, also traveled to the USA on a mini tour in 1900. Vardon played in more than 90 matches and capped it off with a victory in the U. S. Open, where Taylor was second. Vardon wrote that while on this tour, he lost only two matches while playing head to head against a single opponent, and both were against the Boston professional Bernard (Ben) Nicholls, older brother of Gilbert Nicholls; the Nicholls brothers had recently emigrated from the British Isles. In 1913, accompanied by Ted Ray, Vardon played in 45 exhibition matches winning 36 of them, and in 1920 at age 50, again accompanied by Ray, he played from July to the beginning of November in nearly 100 exhibition/challenge matches against the likes of Walter Hagen, Jim Barnes, Francis Ouimet and Bobby Jones.

Vardon was the runner up, after a playoff loss to the 20 year old Ouimet, at his next U. S. Open in 1913, an event portrayed in the film The Greatest Game Ever Played. He toured North America with Ted Ray that year, as he did once more in 1920. At the age of 50, Vardon was again tied runner up in his third and final U. S. Open appearance, in 1920; he was leading with a few holes to play.

During his career, Vardon won 48 tournaments and 21 team events; that was the most titles won by a single player to that juncture in golf history. He won the German Open in 1911 and the British PGA Matchplay Championship in 1912. Between 1898 and 1899 Vardon played in 17 tournaments, winning 14 and coming 2nd in the other three. Vardon popularised the overlapping grip that bears his name, one still used by over 90 percent of golfers; this grip had been originated by Johnny Laidlay a few years before Vardon adopted it. In his later years, he became a golf course architect, designing several courses in Britain, Llandrindod Wells Golf Club, Woodhall Spa and Radcliffe on Trent being notable examples.

Following a bout with tuberculosis in 1903, Vardon struggled with health problems for years, but turned to coaching and writing golf instruction and inspirational books.

After his comeback to the game following a prolonged absence while recovering from tuberculosis, he experienced serious problems with his short range putting as a result of nerve damage to his right hand, and several commentators claim that he could have added to his list of majors had this disability not afflicted him. Vardon died in 1937 at the age 66, of pleurisy or possibly lung cancer, and is buried in St. Andrew's Church cemetery in Totteridge after a funeral service on 24 March. That year, the PGA of America created the Vardon Trophy, now awarded annually to the player on the PGA Tour with the year's lowest adjusted scoring average. The British PGA also created the Harry Vardon Trophy which now serves as the award for the winner of the European Tour's Race to Dubai. In 1974, Vardon was chosen as one of the initial group of inductees into the World Golf Hall of Fame. His most prestigious medals, including those from his six British Open Championships, are on display in a tribute to him at the Jersey Museum. In the annals of golf, he is considered one of the greats of the game. In 2000, Vardon was ranked as the 13th best golfer of all time by Golf Digest magazine. Vardon is often called "The Stylist", "Mr. Golf" and "The Icon of Golfing"; another nickname attached to him was "Greyhound".

A biography of Vardon, published in 1991 and authored by his daughter in law, Audrey Howell, provides much intimate detail about the life of this champion. English actor Stephen Dillane portrayed Vardon in director Bill Paxton's 2005 film The Greatest Game Ever Played. A book of the same name (upon which the movie was based), written by Mark Frost, goes into great detail depicting Vardon's life. Irish American actor Aidan Quinn portrayed Vardon in the 2004 film Bobby Jones: Stroke of Genius. Harry Vardon authored a golf instruction book, The Gist of Golf. A career record of Vardon, published in 2015 and authored by Bill Williams, provides a definitive list of the tournaments he played in and where he finished in the field. Bill Williams authored in 2016 a second book about Vardon, and his three trips to North America in 1900, 1913 and 1920. The book traces the beginnings of golf in America, the influence Vardon had in popularizing the game and his role in bringing about the Ryder Cup.

Major championships are shown in bold.