Retief Goosen

Retief Goosen (born February 3, 1969) is a South African professional golfer who has been in the top ten in the Official World Golf Rankings for over 250 weeks since 2001. [ [http://dps.twiihosting.net/wgr/doc/content/2007%20Stats/86TO0810.pdf 69 Players Who Have Reached The Top-10 In World Ranking] ] His main achievements have been two U.S. Open wins (in 2001 and 2004), and heading the European Tour Order of Merit (money list) in 2001 and 2002.

Early life

Goosen was born in Pietersburg (now Polokwane), South Africa. He is the son of Theo Goosen, a local real estate agent and amateur golfer. He introduced the game of golf to Retief at an early age. Theo took a strict approach to parenting. "Look, I never made life easy for my kids," said Theo "We never spoiled them. We never pleasurized them." Goosen even admits that his father put pressure on him. [ [http://thesandtrap.com/columns/profiles/retief_goosen Goosen isn't the chattiest Tour player. Most of the time he lets his game do the talking] Jeff Smith, thesandtrap.com] When Goosen was fifteen he was golfing with his friend Henri Potgieter at Pietersburg Golf Club. They were playing through a small drizzle when lightning struck. Henri was knocked from his feet and when he stood back up saw Retief lying on the ground on his back. Henri retold the story to "Golf World" "I wanted to know his reaction. What I did see was his golf clubs and his golf bag. Then I saw him lying on his back. His tongue was down his throat and his eyes were backward, and he was breathing weird. He had no clothes on; they'd been burned from his body. I remember picking up his spectacles. I didn't know what to do. It looked like he was dead. I was screaming for help. Fortunately, there were guys teeing off on the 12th hole. They came running toward us. From then on, I can't remember much. They picked him up and put him in a car." Goosen's shoes had disintegrated from his feet, his underwear and watch band had melted to his body. He was unable to put his shoes on for weeks afterwards. He recovered enough to grab another set of clubs and take up the game a few weeks later. Goosen doesn't remember the events that happened, but his father took his son's survival as a sign from God as good things to come. [ [http://sports.jrank.org/pages/1684/Goosen-Retief-Lightning-Strikes.html Retief Goosen - Lightning Strikes] ]

Career summary

Goosen turned professional in 1990, following a win in the South African Amateur Championship of the same year. He won the European Tour's qualifying school in 1992 and enjoyed success on the European Tour between 1992-2000, but it wasn't until 2001 where he made his name in America with a U.S. Open win on a very tough Southern Hills Country Club course. Goosen nearly lost his chance at victory after three putting from 12 ft missing a two foot put on the final green but managed to recover to make a play-off with the 1996 PGA Championship winner Mark Brooks. Goosen dominated the next day's 18-hole playoff winning by two shots. NBC Sports released a videotape of coverage of Goosen's major victory, the cover of which is illustrated above and to the right. He finished 2001 with three wins, 11 top-tens and the European Tour Order of Merit and followed it up with another in 2002. After his third win of the 2001 season, Goosen rose to a career-high 11th in the world.

Goosen's second major championship and second U.S. Open title came in 2004 at Shinnecock Hills Golf Club. The USGA had prepared extremely tough conditions which were later argued by players as "unfair." [ [http://www.golftoday.co.uk/tours/2004/usopen/round4report2.html Players unhappy with USGA over course setup] golftoday.co.uk] Goosen won the U.S. Open by two strokes over fan favorite Phil Mickelson. Goosen had 24 putts in the final round and 11 one-putts. 2004 was the start of the "Big Five Era" which is used in describing the era in golf where Tiger Woods, Vijay Singh, Ernie Els, Retief Goosen, and Phil Mickelson dominated the game of golf. The five switched up and down the top five positions in the World Golf Ranking; most notably Vijay Singh's derailing of Tiger Woods as the best golfer in the world. The five stayed, for the most part in the top five spots from 2004 till the start of 2007. Nine majors where won between them many fighting against each other head to head.

In 2005 Goosen was in pursuit of his third U.S. Open and his second in a row. Goosen led by three strokes after three rounds of golf at the Pinehurst No. 2 course. However, Goosen disappeared in the final round with a score of 81 and he ended up finishing in 11th place. In an interview after his round Goosen said "I messed up badly. I obviously threw this one away." [ [http://www.usopen.com/2005/news/goosen_sun.html Goosen Takes His Loss In Stride] , Ken Klavon, usopen.com]

Goosen has been a consistent player: he has won internationally every year since 1995, and also won a PGA Tour event every year from 2001 to 2005. Additionally, he has spent a long period of time in the top 5 of the Official World Golf Rankings, and in 2006 reached a career-best third place, but since late 2006 he has had a dip in performance.

2007 was an average season for Goosen's standards. A victory at the Qatar Masters in January - when he finished birdie-eagle for the win, looked to be a sign of things to come along with being the European Tour player of the month in January. Goosen posed a threat on the final day at The Masters. He held the lead till a bogey on the par-three twelve, Goosen failed to rebound paring each of his six remaining holes including two short par-fives. He finished tied for second, two behind Zach Johnson. However after this Goosen's best finish throughout the rest of the year was a tie for 15th at the BMW Asian Open, and he ended 2007 having slumped down to 26th in the world rankings.

At the start of 2008 Goosen withdrew from the Qatar Masters as defending champion due to problems with his vision after undergoing corrective laser surgey ten days before the tournament began. He was forced to return to his home in London, England for further treatment. In March, Goosen showed a form that had left him for almost a year. Hard work with coach Gregor Jamison awarded Goosen with an impressive tie for second at the WGC-CA Championship Goosen putted exceptionally well thanks to his old "Yes!" putter he won both his U.S. Open titles with and named "Tracy" after his wife. Before the tournament Goosen was ranked 40th in the world the lowest he had been ranked since June 10, 2001 (A week before the U.S. Open). In June of 2008 Goosen made controversial comments about fellow golfer Tiger Woods, alleging that Woods was faking the severity of his injuries at the 2008 U.S. Open [http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/golf/7460588.stm] . After winning the tournament, Woods announced he would need to take the rest of the year off to undergo surgery on his left knee's anterior cruciate ligament which was torn. He had also played the tournament with a double stress fracture. [http://sports.yahoo.com/golf/pga/news?slug=ap-woodsfuture&prov=ap&type=lgns/ ]

Goosen is known for his extremely calm demeanor, a trait that has earned him the nickname "The Iceman" on the PGA Tour. He is also affectionately called "The Goose." [ http://www.southafrica.info/ess_info/sa_glance/sports/greats/goosen.htm Retief Goosen] Brad Morgan southafrica.info] The term unflappable is a term commonly connect with Retief because of his attitude on the course. [ [http://www.worldgolf.com/features/retief-goosen-pga-championship-baltusrol-1104.htm Goosen only one not counting on lightning to get him through the PGA at Baltusrol G.C.] Chris Baldwin, Senior Writer, Golf Publisher Syndications] Goosen's mother attributes her son's calm demeanor because of the effects left on Goosen after he was struck by lightning. [ [http://thesandtrap.com/columns/profiles/retief_goosen Goosen isn't the chattiest Tour player. Most of the time he lets his game do the talking] Jeff Smith, thesandtrap.com]

He is now married with a son and daughter, and has homes in Ascot, Berkshire, England and Orlando, Florida, U.S. as well as retaining residence in Polokwane, South Africafact|date=December 2007

PGA Tour wins (6)

*2001 (1) U.S. Open
*2002 (1) BellSouth Classic
*2003 (1) Chrysler Championship
*2004 (2) U.S. Open, The Tour Championship
*2005 (1) The International

Major championships are shown in bold.

European Tour wins (14)

* "As of September 28, 2008"

These figures are from the respective tour's official sites. Note that there is double counting of money earned (and wins) in the majors and World Golf Championships since they became official events on both tours.

Team appearances

*Alfred Dunhill Cup (representing South Africa): 1995, 1996, 1997 (winners), 1998 (winners), 1999, 2000
*World Cup (representing South Africa): 1993, 1995, 2000, 2001 (winners), 2007
*Presidents Cup (International team): 2000, 2003 (Draw), 2005, 2007

ee also

*Golfers with most PGA Tour wins
*Golfers with most European Tour wins
*2001 U.S. Open Golf Championship
*2004 U.S. Open Golf Championship{| class="wikitable"

References

External links

* [http://www.retiefgoosen.com/ Retief Goosen's website]
* [http://www.europeantour.com/publish.sps?syndicatorguid=&rmasiteinstanceguid=&pagegid=%7B20E6AA6B-0225-4C71-BD89-2ACBEE615D69%7D&playerid=9601 Profile on European Tour's official site]
* [http://www.pgatour.com/players/02/01/57/ Profile on PGA Tour's official site]
* [http://www.sunshinetour.info/profiles/GOO001.htm Profile on Sunshine Tour's official site]
* [http://www.officialworldgolfranking.com/players/bio.sps?ID=4884 Results in ranking events for the last two years from the Official World Golf Rankings site]
* [http://retief-goosen-news.newslib.com/ Articles from around the world on Retief Goosen]