2010: An unforgettable year for Matt Kuchar
The 2010 PGA season ended with the Children’s Classic this weekend and has left some players in the spotlight. Matt Kuchar surely had an unforgettable year by winning the Arnold Palmer Award and the Byron Nelson Award. Growing up, Kuchar wanted to be a tennis
star. He was good at the sport and seeing his father captain the Tennis team at Stetson University, Kuchar wanted to be a tennis star. With his father playing the sport, it was obvious that Matt wanted to follow in his footsteps in tennis.
When he was one, Matt was only twelve years old, his mom upgraded their membership for golf at the Heathrow country Club as a present for Matt’s dad. At that time, Kuchar thought playing golf was a very silly thing and was only meant for old people. Little
did young Matt know that one day he’d be making millions by playing such a ‘silly’ sport.
Once he started playing golf, he got a hang of it. Kuchar says that it was his mom who introduced him to golf and led him this opportunity. Kuchar graduated from Georgia Tech where he was on the All-American golf team. Having great amateur years, he won
the U.S Amateur in 1997 and won the Fred Haskins Award for the nation’s top collegiate golfer in 1998. Kuchar was the low amateur at both The U.S Open and The Masters in 1998.
Turning professional in 2000, his first win on the PGA Tour came in 2002 when he won the Honda Classic. By 2006, however, Kuchar was playing for the Nationwide Tour since he didn’t have enough money to qualify for the PGA Tour. In an interview, Kuchar said
golf is like life with its ups and downs. He thought that with 2002 being so great, professional golf would be a smooth ride but he was wrong. One has to keep struggling and working hard to retain their form in golf.
Even though not on the PGA Tour, Kuchar still played good golf Nationwide. He won the Nationwide Tour’s 2006 Henrico County Open and finished 10th on the money list. His great finish hence earned him his 2007 PGA Tour Card. After that, Kuchar
has been able to retain his place in the PGA circuit. His second win on Tour came in 2009 when he won the Turning Stone Resort Championship in a playoff over Vaughn Taylor.
In his career so far, 2010 has been an amazing year. On August 15th, Kuchar was awarded the honour of appearing in his first Ryder Cup team. He got this privilege by earning enough points to take the 8th and last position. He had accumulated
enough points thanks to his top ten finishes that year. His first win of 2010 came on August 29th when he won The Barclays Cup. Kuchar beat Martin Laird on the first hole of a sudden hole playoff.
Overall, this year Matt has had 11 top ten finishes in the twenty six tournaments he played. He tied for second place in the Bob Hope Classic. He came in third place at the Hyundai Tournament Champions. Kuchar tied for this in the World Golf Championship
and the BMW Championship.
Kuchar won all the awards that Tiger Woods won last year. Being a model of consistency, Kuchar has topped the money list with total earnings of $4,910,477 and earned The Arnold Palmer Award. Kuchar beat fellow American Steve Stricker by only .05 to win the
Byron Nelson Award for the lowest scoring average. Kuchar, with a scoring average of 69.61, outshone all the other players on Tour.
"It will be tough to follow this year up. You can go out and shoot a 62 but it's hard to follow up that 62 the next day with another great round. That's how I'm looking at next year. It will be quite a challenge,” said Matt Kuchar.
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