Every sport has its own achievement that is an incredible accomplishment. English football has the quadruple, for example, which Liverpool came the closest to completing in the 2021-2022 season, whilst tennis has a Grand Slam of its own.

For golfers, the dream is to complete the Grand Slam, which involves winning each of the Majors of the sport. Across the history of golf, only six players have managed it in the open era and only one managed to hold all four titles at the same time.

That is a sign of just how difficult it is to pull off, which is also why Rory McIlroy managing it was such a big deal.

What is the Grand Slam?

Golf boasts four Majors. They are the Masters Tournament, the PGA Championship, the US Open and the Open Championship. It hasn’t always been that way.

Prior to the creation of the Masters, the amateur players that won the championships in the United Kingdom and the United States of America were considered the Major winners, during which time the Grand Slam was thought of as being someone that had won consecutive victories at the US Amateur, the Amateur Championship, the US Open and the Open Championship. Bobby Jones achieved this in 1930, being the only player to do so.

Nowadays, the Masters Tournament is the first competition that a player can win. It tends to take place in a manner that allows the final day to be played on the second Sunday in April. After that, the PGA Championship comes next, finishing on the third Sunday in May.

Whereas the Masters is always held at Augusta National Golf Club, all of the other Majors take place at alternating golf courses. The US Open is normally organised to end on the third Sunday in June, whilst the Open Championship, occasionally erroneously referred to as the British Open, contains the third Friday in July.

The Golfers

Having explained what a Grand Slam is, it is worth now having a closer look at the golfers that have achieved it during their careers. With the exception of Tiger Woods, who completed what became known as the ‘Tiger Slam’, these players all won the ‘Career Slam’.

That means that they won the Grand Slam during the course of their career by winning each of the Majors at least once.

Gene Sarazen

Born Eugenio Saraceni in early February 1902 in New York, Gene Sarazen began caddying as a ten-year-old at local golf clubs before taking up the sport himself. His skills developed over time, essentially being a self-taught player and using an interlocking grip when holding the clubs, which was novel at the time. His first time playing the US Open came when he was just 18 years old, having made a double eagle in the final round of sectional qualifiers at the 15th of Hororata Golf Club, where a plaque in his honour can now be seen at the spot where he hit his shot, 195 yards out.

@chrislambertgolf #golflegend 14 #genesarazen ♬ Folg whos_moe und 2021 wird dein Jahr – .

He claimed that he invented the club that we now consider to be the sand wedge, using it for the first time at the Open Championship in 1932. He scored another double eagle during his first Masters win at Augusta National, also on the 15th hole. That was in 1935, seeing him become the first player to win a career Grand Slam. That is because he had already won the US Open twice, the PGA Championship three times and the Open Championship once. Here is the order in which he won his Majors:

• US Open – 1922, 1932
• PGA Championship – 1922, 1923, 1933
• Open Championship – 1932
• Masters Tournament – 1935

Ben Hogan

Born on the 13th of August 1912 in Stephenville, Texas, Ben Hogan is generally thought of as one of the best players that the sport of golf has ever seen. Known for an assiduous attention to detail and regular practice, his swing became the go-to swing for golfers to copy even decades after his death, to the point that golf.com said that ‘nobody has been copied more than Ben Hogan’. That is at least partly due to the fact that he wrote a book on the mechanics of a swing, which is read by both professional and amateur golfers even now. His association with golf came when he began caddying at the age of 11.

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The Ryder Cup used to mean we were sending Ben Hogan and Arnold Palmer out there with lung darts to kick your candy ass.

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— Mark Taylor (@emarktaylor.bsky.social) Feb 17, 2024 at 22:36

He won his first Major in 1946 when he won the PGA Championship, going on to win it again two years later. In 1948 he won the US Open for the first time, winning that again two years later, developing something of a habit. By the time he retired, he had another two US Opens to his name, winning it in 1951 and 1953 to add to his two previous successes. His first Masters win came in 1951, winning it again – you guessed it – in 1953, with the Open Championship being the only Major he won just once. That took his Majors tally to nine, with the order of them being as follows:

• US Open – 1948, 1950, 1951, 1953
• PGA Championship – 1946, 1948
• Masters Tournament – 1951, 1953
• Open Championship – 1953

Gary Player

The first non-American to win the Grand Slam was Gary Player, who was born in the South African city of Johannesburg on the first of November 1935. He turned professional at the age of 17, marrying Vivienne Verwey four years later. The pair had six children together: Jennifer, Marc, Wayne, Michele, Theresa and Amanda, and during the early days of his career, he would travel between the tournaments with all of them in tow, along with a tutor and nanny for the kids. Vivienne died of cancer in the August of 2021, whilst his eldest son operates The Player Group, representing Gary’s commercial interests.

Along with Arnold Palmer and Jack Nicklaus, Player formed part of what became known as the ‘Big Three’. His first Major win was the Open Championship, which came in 1959; then he won his green jacket thanks to a Masters win two years later. A year on and he won the PGA Championship, then in 1965, he completed the career Grand Slam when he won the US Open. A second Open Championship three years later, getting his second PGA Championship in 1972, a second Masters in 1974 and his third Open Championship in the same year. Four years later came his third Masters, which was his final Major.

• US Open – 1965
• PGA Championship – 1962, 1972
• Masters Tournament – 1961, 1974, 1978
• Open Championship – 1959, 1968, 1974

Jack Nicklaus

It is fair to say that all of the players on the list of Grand Slam winners are considered amongst the best to ever play the game, but Jack Nicklaus might well be the one who genuinely deserves the title of the greatest of all time. Known as ‘the Golden Bear’, he won 117 professional tournaments across the course of his career as well as 18 Majors, which is three more than the next closest in Tiger Woods. Born in Columbus, Ohio on the 21st of January 1940, his father was a skilled all-round athlete and a scratch golfer, getting his son into the sport when he was ten years old.

Jack Nicklaus bouncing a 1 iron off the flag during the 1972 U.S. Open on his way to victory. One of the all time great shots in U.S. Open history. pic.twitter.com/ifgMEgwDL5

— Tour Pro 🏌️‍♂️ (@OfficialTourPro) June 7, 2025

Having officially turned professional towards the end of 1961, Nicklaus began his PGA Tour career the following year and won his first Major with US Open success in 1962. The Masters and PGA Championship followed a year on, then he won his second and third Masters in 1965 and 1966. The latter year also saw him win the Open Championship for the first time, winning his second US Open a year later. There was then a three-year gap to his second Open Championship, then his second PGA Championship a year after that. Another Masters came in 1972, along with his third PGA Championship.

In 1975, Nicklaus won his fifth Masters and his fourth PGA Championship title, which took his total number of Majors up to 14; five clear of his nearest challengers in Hogan and Player. His third Open Championship win came in 1978, whilst two years on from that he won his fourth US Open. He wasn’t done there, however. Nicklaus proved his ability well into the latter years of his career, winning his fifth PGA Championship in the same year as the US Open. He then picked up his final Major in the form of his sixth Masters Tournament win in 1986, which remains a record to this day.

• US Open – 1962, 1967, 1972, 1980
• PGA Championship – 1963, 1971, 1973, 1975, 1980
• Masters Tournament – 1963, 1965, 1966, 1972, 1975, 1986
• Open Championship – 1966, 1970, 1978

Tiger Woods

There is only one player that has even come close to rivalling Jack Nicklaus’s incredible haul of Major wins, which is Tiger Woods. Born Eldrick Tont Woods in the Californian town of Cypress on the 30th of December 1975, the man that became known by his nickname of ‘Tiger’ was a child prodigy and was introduced to the sport of golf before he’d turned two. He had actually dreamed of becoming a baseball player, following in his father’s footsteps, but he tore his rotator cuff and that ended that desire. He shot a 48 over nine holes as a three-year-old, breaking 80 for the first time when he was eight.

@golf_on_tiktok TIGER WOODS BEST SHOT #tigerwoods #golftiktok #edit #golfedit #golf #ae #aftereffects ♬ original sound – Golf on TikTok

Unsurprisingly, colleges were desperate to persuade him to attend them and he went to Stanford University on a golf scholarship. He turned professional in the August of 1996 when he was 20 years old, signing lucrative advertising deals with Nike and Titleist. He won his first Major less than a year later when he enjoyed success in the Masters Tournament, then two years after that, he won the PGA Championship for the first time. In 2000, Woods won the US Open, the Open Championship and the PGA Championship, then he won the Masters again in 2001.

That meant that he held all of the Majors at the same time, completing the ‘Tiger Slam’ and being the only person to do so. His third Masters in 2002 was joined by his second US Open, then there was a three-year gap to his fourth Masters and second Open Championship. He won that again in 2006, when he also won the PGA Championship for the third time, picking up his fourth a year on. In 2008, Woods won the US Open for the third time and it looked like that would be his final Major. He proved the doubters wrong, however, when he won his fifth Masters in 2019, one of sport’s greatest comebacks.

• US Open – 2000, 2002, 2008
• PGA Championship – 1999, 2000, 2006, 2007
• Masters Tournament – 1997, 2001, 2002, 2005, 2019
• Open Championship – 2000, 2005, 2006

Rory McIlroy

Born in County Down, Northern Ireland, on the fourth of May 1989, there was a point at which it looked like Rory McIlroy had the world at his feet. He was introduced to golf at a young age by his father, getting a set of plastic clubs when he was a two-year-old. His father, Gerry, had been a scratch golfer himself at one point, which is why McIlroy begged him to take him to the local course, gaining attention when he could drive it 40 yards aged three. After enjoying a successful amateur career, he turned professional on the 18th of September 2007, winning his first Major four years later.

Just delighted to see Rory McIlroy don the green jacket. I’ve never been so entertained by a golf telecast. Congrats Rory! #TheMasters

— Sean W (@seannyr.bsky.social) Apr 14, 2025 at 0:47

That was in the US Open, which he followed up the following year by winning the PGA Championship. When he won the Open Championship for the first time at Royal Liverpool in Hoylake in the July of 2014, it looked like it would only be a matter of time before he completed the career Grand Slam. Instead, he won the PGA Championship for the second time later that year, but the Masters continued to elude him. In the end, it took him another 11 years before he joined the ranks of the game’s greats, eventually becoming the first European to win the Grand Slam when he won the Masters in 2025.

• US Open – 2011
• PGA Championship – 2012, 2014
• Masters Tournament – 2025
• Open Championship – 2014