Official World Golf Rankings

The Official World Golf Rankings is a system for rating the performance level of male professional golfers. They were introduced in 1986 and are endorsed by the four major championships and the six professional tours which make up the International Federation of PGA Tours, namely the PGA Tour, the European Tour, the Asian Tour, the PGA Tour of Australasia, the Japan Golf Tour, and the Sunshine Tour. Points are also awarded for high finishes on the Canadian Tour, Nationwide Tour and Challenge Tour.

History

The initiative for the creation of the Official World Golf Rankings came from the Championship Committee of the Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews, which found in the 1980s that its system of issuing invitations to The Open Championship on a tour by tour basis was omitting an increasing number of top players because more of them were dividing their time between tours, and from preeminent sports agent Mark McCormack, who was the first chairman of the International Advisory Committee which oversees the rankings. The system used to calculate the rankings was developed from McCormack's World Golf Rankings, which were published in his "World of Professional Golf Annual" from 1968 to 1985, although these were purely unofficial and not used for any wider purpose (such as inviting players to major tournaments).

The first ranking list was published prior to the 1986 Masters Tournament. The top six ranked golfers were: Bernhard Langer, Seve Ballesteros, Sandy Lyle, Tom Watson, Mark O'Meara and Greg Norman. Thus the top three were all European, but there were thirty-one Americans in the top fifty (compared with thirteen at the end of 2006).

The method of calculation of the rankings has changed considerably over the years. Initially, the rankings were calculated over a three year period, with the current year's points multiplied by four, the previous year's points by two and the third year's points by one. Rankings were based on the total points and points awarded were restricted to integer values. All tournaments recognised by the world's professional tours, and some leading invitational events, were graded into categories ranging from major championship (whose winners would receive 50 points) to "other tournaments" (whose winners would receive a minimum of 8). In all events, other finishers received points on a diminishing scale that began with runners-up receiving 60% of the winners' points, and the number of players in the field receiving points would be the same as the points awarded to the winner. In a major, for example, all players finishing 30th to 40th would receive 2 points, and all players finishing 50th or higher, 1 point.

Beginning in April 1989, the rankings were changed to be based on the average points per event played instead of simply total points earned, subject to a minimum divisor of 60 (20 events per year). This was in order to more accurately reflect the status of some (particularly older) players, who played in far fewer events than their younger contemporaries but demonstrated in major championships that their ranking was artificially low. Tom Watson, for example, finished in the top 15 of eight major championships between 1987 and 1989, yet had a "total points" ranking of just 40th; this became 20th when the system changed to "average points". A new system for determining the "weight" of each tournament was also introduced, based on the strength of the tournament's field in terms of their pre-tournament world rankings. Major championships were guaranteed to remain at 50 points for the winners, and all other events could attain a maximum of 40 points for the winner if all of the world's top 100 were present. In practice most PGA Tour events awarded around 25 points to the winner, European Tour events around 18 and JPGA Tour events around 12.

In 1996, the three year period was reduced to two years, with the current year now counting double. Points were extended to more of the field, beginning in 2000, and were no longer restricted to integer values. Beginning in September 2001, the tapering system was changed so that instead of the points for each result being doubled if they occurred in the most recent 12 months, one eighth of the initial "multiplied up" value was deducted every 13 weeks. This change effectively meant that players could now be more simply described as being awarded 100 points (not 50) for winning a major. Beginning in 2007, the system holds the points from each event at full value for 13 weeks and then reduces them in equal weekly increments over the remainder of the two year period.

At first only the Championship Committee of the Royal and Ancient used the rankings for official purposes, but the PGA Tour recognized them in 1990, and in 1997 all five of the then principal men's golf tours did so. The rankings, which had previously been called the Sony Rankings, were renamed the Official World Golf Rankings at that time. They are run from offices in Virginia Water in Surrey, England.

Twelve players have been Official World No. 1. Seve Ballesteros took over from Bernhard Langer shortly after Langer had been the first ranking leader in 1986 and then vied with Greg Norman for the No.1 spot for three years, when Nick Faldo took over as Greg Norman’s main rival. Ian Woosnam and Fred Couples held the position at various times during 1991 and 1992 before Nick Faldo took over again until 1994, when Nick Price’s career year took him to No. 1. Greg Norman would return to the top ranking in 1995 and 1996, then after a single week at No. 1 by Tom Lehman, Tiger Woods dominated the position from 1997 to 2005 with brief interruptions from Ernie Els and David Duval. In September 2004 Vijay Singh became the twelfth World No. 1, and he and Woods swapped the position several times in 2005, but Woods eventually opened a wide lead. Woods' lead over his nearest rivals in the rankings at that point was large enough that he may still remain number one at the end of 2008, despite planning to take six months off following knee surgery - even with no further points, Woods would have an average points ranking at the end of 2008 of 11.97, more than 3 points more than his nearest rival as of October 5, 2008. Woods holds the longest consecutive streak as No. 1 at 264 weeks.

Calculation of the rankings

Points are awarded on the basis of final positions in official money events on the qualifying tours. For each tour, a minimum number of points are available for each event. For most events the actual number of points available depends on the current rankings (top 200) of the participating golfers and the ranking of the top 30 golfers entered from the "home tour". Major championships have a fixed number of 100 points for the winner. In addition, most tours have a "premier event" that is guaranteed a much higher minimum point level.

Tiger Woods set the record for the highest Points Average on June 3, 2001, when he ended the week with an average of 32.44 (1459.64 points averaged over 45 events).

Tiger Woods also achieved the largest ever lead of 19.40 average points in the rankings on May 20, 2001. His lead was over then world number two Phil Mickelson following his victory at the Deutsche Bank - SAP Open TPC of Europe.

Ernie Els holds the record for most weeks in the World Top 10, with 745. He is followed by Greg Norman (646 weeks) and Tiger Woods (600 weeks). [ [http://www.golftoday.co.uk/tours/rankings/OWGR_top_10_stats_1.html Official World Golf Ranking - Top Tens] , "Golf Today" 4 February 2007] [ [http://dps.twiihosting.net/wgr/doc/content/2007%20Stats/86TO0810.pdf 69 Players Who Have Reached the Top-10 in World Ranking] , Official World Golf Ranking official site, 31 December 2007]

Number 1 ranked golfers

*Note: The Presidents Cup was founded in 1994.

Rankings archive

Year end world number 1 ranked golfers

*1986 Greg Norman
*1987 Greg Norman (2)
*1988 Seve Ballesteros
*1989 Greg Norman (3)
*1990 Greg Norman (4)
*1991 Ian Woosnam
*1992 Nick Faldo
*1993 Nick Faldo (2)
*1994 Nick Price
*1995 Greg Norman (5)
*1996 Greg Norman (6)
*1997 Greg Norman (7)
*1998 Tiger Woods
*1999 Tiger Woods (2)
*2000 Tiger Woods (3)
*2001 Tiger Woods (4)
*2002 Tiger Woods (5)
*2003 Tiger Woods (6)
*2004 Vijay Singh
*2005 Tiger Woods (7)
*2006 Tiger Woods (8)
*2007 Tiger Woods (9)

Mark H. McCormack Award - Most weeks at number 1 during calendar year

*1998 Tiger Woods
*1999 Tiger Woods (2)
*2000 Tiger Woods (3)
*2001 Tiger Woods (4)
*2002 Tiger Woods (5)
*2003 Tiger Woods (6)
*2004 Tiger Woods (7)
*2005 Tiger Woods (8)
*2006 Tiger Woods (9)
*2007 Tiger Woods (10)
*2008 Tiger Woods (11, not yet awarded but guaranteed)

Year end world top 10 players and ranking point tallies

See History section above for notes on changes to method of calculation.

Notes and references

ee also

*List of World Number One male golfers
*Women's World Golf Rankings - for female professional golfers
*World Amateur Golf Rankings - for male amateur golfers

External links

* [http://www.owgr.com/home/default.sps Official World Golf Rankings website] (includes archive of weekly ranking lists of Top-200 from 1987 on)