Major Moments

Seve Ballesteros

Wilson Staff Tour Blade JR II Sand Wedge

1979

Roberto di Vicenzo helped the 22 year-old Severiano Ballesteros plot his strategy around Royal Lytham & St Annes back in 1979. The Argentinean suggested that the long-hitting Spaniard hit his drives as far as possible and not bother trying to keep the ball in the fairway. After all, he said, the rough close to the green had been mown short.

Ballesteros listened. During his final round he managed to find the fairway just once.

On the par-four 16th, Ballesteros found himself among some parked cars after another long, if not entirely accurate drive, left him just 100 yards from the green. Taking advantage of a free drop, Ballesteros selected his Wilson Staff Tour Blade JR II sand wedge and knocked the ball 18 feet from the pin. He sank the birdie putt and ended up defeating Ben Crenshaw and Jack Nicklaus by two shots.

The so-called “Car Park Champion” became the first winner from continental Europe since Frenchman Arnaud Massy in 1907 and the youngest winner since Willie Auchterlonie in 1893. Later R&A official Colin Maclaine would say that Seve “chose not to use [the course] but preferred his own, which mainly consisted of hay fields, car parks, grandstands and dropping zones.”