José María Olazábal "Chema" was born in Fuenterrabia, in the Basque Region of Gipuzkoa (Guipuzcoa) in Northern Spain.
As a junior Olazábal won The (British) Amateur Championship aged eighteen and in his rookie professional season of 1986, he finished second on the European Tour Order of Merit aged just twenty.
In his first nine seasons Chema finished in the top 10 every year except two, including another second place in 1989, and was a regular member of the top ten of the Official World Golf Rankings (over 300 weeks). In fact had Olazábal beaten Ian Woosnam at The Masters in 1991 -where he finished second - then the Basque native would have become the World Number One.
Due to a foot injury he was unable to play in 1996 however recovered to record further top ten placings in the Order of Merit in 1997, 1999 and 2000 gathering more than twenty career titles.
Olazábal's two wins at The Masters in 1994 and 1999 making him the only winner of The Amateur Championship since World War II to have gone on to win a professional major. He has been highly placed in The Masters on a number of other occasions, he also shares the record for the lowest round in the PGA Championship (63), which he accomplished in the third round at Valhalla Golf Club in 2000.
In 2001 Olazábal began to play on the PGA Tour, while also retaining his membership of the European Tour, and won nearly two million dollars to finish twenty-fourth on the money list. He has six career PGA Tour titles, five of them won before he became a full member of the Tour. In 2006 he made a return to the top fifteen of the world rankings.
Olazábal has been a member of the European Ryder Cup team in 1987, 1989, 1991, 1993, 1997, 1999 and 2006 forming a famous partnership with fellow Spaniard, Seve Ballesteros, that spanned many of those events. In 2006 he partnered Sergio García in 2006 with equal success.
Olazábal also holds the world record distance for a completed putt which was completed during the 1999 European Ryder Cup team's Concorde flight to the United States, when he holed a putt which travelled the full length of the cabin. The ball was in motion for 26.17s, during which time the Concorde, at 1,270 mph, travelled 9.232 miles.
In doing so he beating the previous record of 8.5 miles, set in 1997 by Brad Faxon of the USA.
Olazábal was elected to the World Golf Hall of Fame in 2009.
Fact file
DOB: February 5th, 1966
Place of Birth: Fuenterrabia, Gipuzkoa
Turned Professional: 1985
