Johnnie Walker Classic

Johnnie Walker Classic
Tournament information
Location Perth, Australia
Established 1990
Course(s) The Vines Resort and Country Club
Par 72
Length 7,104 yards
Tour(s) European Tour
Asian Tour
PGA Tour of Australasia
Format Stroke play
Prize fund £1,250,000
Month played February
Final year 2009
Tournament record score
Aggregate 259 Ernie Els (2003)
To par −29 (as above)
Final champion
New Zealand Danny Lee

The Johnnie Walker Classic was a European Tour golf tournament which is played in the Asia Pacific region. Johnnie Walker is a brand name and the owners have a long history of tournament sponsorship. They also sponsor the Johnnie Walker Championship at Gleneagles which is a European Tour event played in Scotland. Before the present tournament was introduced there was an entirely separate tournament of the same name in Australia, and the two actually overlapped by a year or two, but at the point the current event was called the Johnnie Walker Asian Classic.

In 1989 Johnnie Walker sponsored the Hong Kong Open, and it was decided to establish an additional tournament which it would sponsor on an ongoing basis. This tournament was called the Johnnie Walker Asian Classic, and was first staged in Hong Kong in 1990. Subsequently it became a touring event, essentially used by its sponsor as a marketing exercise in the Asia Pacific region. In 1992 it became the first event to be sanctioned by the European Tour in East Asia (the Dubai Desert Classic was the first in Asia as a whole). In 1993 the word Asian was dropped from the title. In 2005 the tournament was held in China for the first time, as part of the European Tour's push into China, which saw four events held in mainland China and one in Hong Kong in the 2005 season. The location of the tournament changes every year.

In 2005 the event was tri-sanctioned by the Asian, European and Australasian tours and the field comprised 60 European Tour players, 60 Asian Tour players, 28 PGA Tour of Australasia players, and 8 sponsors' invitees. The prize fund was £1,250,000. This amount is large by Asian and Australasian Tour standards, but not by European Tour or PGA Tour standards. However the tournament attracts a number of the World's leading players each year by paying them large appearance fees. Nine of the first fourteen editions were won by players who have topped the Official World Golf Ranking at some point in their career (Faldo, Els and Woods twice each; Woosnam, Norman and Couples once each).

Winners

YearWinnerCountryVenueLocationScoreTo parMargin
of victory
Runner(s)-up
2009 Danny Lee (amateur)  New Zealand The Vines Resort and Country Club Perth, Australia 271 −17 1 stroke Chile Felipe Aguilar
Japan Hiroyuki Fujita
England Ross McGowan
2008 Mark Brown  New Zealand DLF Golf and Country Club Gurgaon, India 270 −18 3 strokes Australia Greg Chalmers
Japan Taichiro Kiyota
Australia Scott Strange
2007 Anton Haig  South Africa Blue Canyon Country Club Phuket, Thailand 275 −13 Playoff South Africa Richard Sterne
England Oliver Wilson
2006 Kevin Stadler  United States The Vines Resort and Country Club Perth, Australia 268 −20 2 strokes Australia Nick O'Hern
2005 Adam Scott  Australia Pine Valley Golf Resort and Country Club Beijing, China 270 −18 3 strokes South Africa Retief Goosen
2004 Miguel Ángel Jiménez  Spain Alpine Golf and Sports Club Bangkok, Thailand 271 −17 2 strokes Denmark Thomas Bjørn
India Jyoti Randhawa
2003 Ernie Els (2)  South Africa Lake Karrinyup Country Club Perth, Australia 259 −29 10 strokes Australia Stephen Leaney
Australia Andre Stolz
2002 Retief Goosen  South Africa Lake Karrinyup Country Club Perth, Australia 274 −14 8 strokes Sweden Pierre Fulke
2001 No tournament due to rescheduling from November to January
2000
(2001)
Tiger Woods (2)  United States Alpine Golf and Sports Club Bangkok, Thailand 263 −25 3 strokes Australia Geoff Ogilvy
1999
(2000)
Michael Campbell  New Zealand Westin Resort Ta Shee Taipei, Taiwan 276 −12 1 stroke Australia Geoff Ogilvy
1998 Tiger Woods  United States Blue Canyon Country Club Phuket, Thailand 279 −9 Playoff South Africa Ernie Els
1997 Ernie Els  South Africa Hope Island Resort Queensland, Australia 278 −10 1 stroke Australia Peter Lonard
New Zealand Michael Long
1996 Ian Woosnam  Wales Tanah Merah Country Club Tanah Merah, Singapore 272 −16 Playoff Scotland Andrew Coltart
1995 Fred Couples  United States The Orchard Golf and Country Club Manila, Philippines 277 −11 2 strokes Zimbabwe Nick Price
1994 Greg Norman  Australia Blue Canyon Country Club Phuket, Thailand 277 −11 1 stroke United States Fred Couples
1993 Nick Faldo  England Singapore Island Country Club Singapore 269 −11 1 stroke Scotland Colin Montgomerie
1992 Ian Palmer  South Africa Pinehurst Golf and Country Club Bangkok, Thailand 268 −20 1 stroke Germany Bernhard Langer
Australia Brett Ogle
Northern Ireland Ronan Rafferty

The years in brackets represent the European Tour seasons. In 2000 and 2001, the Johnnie Walker Classic was held in November, and as such, it fell into the following year's European season.

Prior to European Tour co-sanctioning
YearWinnerCountryVenueScore
1991 No tournament
1990 Nick Faldo  England Royal Hong Kong Golf Club,
Hong Kong
270 (−14)

External links

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