British Open: Ranking the 25 most dominant performances of all time
By Bill Felber
9. Arnold Palmer, 1962, -3.15
The 1962 British Open was a battle between the last two Champion Golfers. Across sun-baked and wind-swept Royal Troon, Arnold Palmer, the 1961 champion at Royal Birkdale, battled Kel Nagle, the Australian who had spoiled Palmer’s 1960 Open debut.
Through two rounds, Palmer led Nagle by two strokes, with nobody else closer than five. On the morning of that final day, Palmer gave the enthralled Scottish throng exactly what they hoped for. At the famously demanding par 5 11th along the railroad tracks, he followed a 1-iron tee shot with a 2-iron to within 14 feet. Palmer then holed the putt for an eagle.
He shot 67 to extend his lead to five, and that afternoon punctuated his 69 with a birdie on the final hole to beat Nagle by six. The Australian was the only competitor to stay within 13 strokes of Palmer, whose score of 276 broke the tournament record by two strokes.
The victory probably marked the apex of Palmer’s career, coming just three months after his win at the Masters and just one month after his playoff defeat to Jack Nicklaus at the U.S. Open. It was his seventh of an eventual eight victories that year. He became only the second player after Ben Hogan in 1953 to win the Masters and The Open in the same season.