Thank you for listening to the Success is a Choice podcast network. This week is the Open Championship at Royal St. George’s Golf Club in England. It is the last major of the PGA season. It also marks the 18th anniversary of Ben Curtis winning the Open Championship at this same course. The open championship rotates courses each year and Royal St. George’s has only hosted the Open Championship one time since that Curtis win back in 2003. When Ben Curtis hoisted the claret jug, it was the first time he had ever played in a major and it was his first-ever tournament at a links-style course. He also was a late add to the field and his wife barely made it over to England since she didn’t have a passport. Anyway, this was an interesting episode that we did a couple of years ago but wanted to replay it since the Open Championship returns to the site of this 300-to-1 longshot Ben Curtis shocking the world. Lastly, I am biased when it comes to Ben Curtis because he is doing a lot of great things in our area for kids in need. I highly recommend checking out his website at bencurtisfoundation.org.
Ben Curtis won the 2003 Open Championship at Royal St. George’s as a rookie in only his 16th start on the PGA Tour. He became the first golfer in 90 years to win a major championship in his first try. He would go on to win a total of four PGA events. Curtis also was the runnerup at the 2012 PLAYERS Championship and a member of the 2008 Ryder Cup Championship Team. Prior to his professional career, he was formerly the world’s number one ranked amateur after winning three Ohio Amateur titles, earning NCAA All-American honors three times at Kent State University, and reaching the semifinals of the 1999 of the prestigious U.S. Amateur at Pebble Beach. He retired from professional golf in 2017. He now leads the Ben Curtis Golf Academy, as well as the Ben Curtis Family Foundation which seeks to alleviate childhood hunger in Northeast Ohio.