The Zone Interactive Golf Magazine (UK) The Zone Issue 26 | Page 21

FEATURE
MOST golfers who compete on
the Seniors Tour and Champions
Tour look every day of their 50plus years. For the majority it is
because they have spent so much
of their lives in the sun, and
that exposure has taken its toll.
For the rest, it is because, erm,
they haven’t, erm, looked after
themselves as they might have
done.
For every Gary Player (“my body
is a temple”), there is a John Daly
(“my body is a pub”).
Miguel Angel Jimenez already
holds the record for being
the oldest ever winner on the
European Tour and he almost
broke his own record at the KLM
Dutch Open, losing in a playoff to
Joost Luiten, a local hero.
To be brutally honest, Jimenez has
looked at least 10 years older than
he is for the vast majority of his
career. He is overweight, he enjoys
a glass or two of red wine and
he loves a cigar – a HUGE cigar.
His warm-up routine involves
bending over while holding a golf
club for support and smoking a
cigar.
Tiger Woods spends hours in the
gym, and it shows. Miguel has
spent his entire life avoiding the
gym – and it shows.
Speak to any member of the
European Tour, however, and
you will hear only good things
about the Spaniard. He is fun
to be around. He is honest and
genuine and always makes time
to speak with spectators and sign
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autographs. Everybody wants to
be his friend. He pretends not
to have much of a grasp of the
English language – trust me, he
understands every word that is
said to him.
Like Vijay Singh and Steve
Stricker, Miguel has enjoyed huge
success since turning 40. He has
won 19 times on the European
Tour, and 12 of those victories
have come since he had his 40th
birthday. Throw in eight top 10
finishes in the majors and four
Ryder Cup appearances, and you
quickly understand that, despite
a golf swing that at best could be
described as idiosyncratic, the
Spaniard is a world-class golfer.
And that’s the point. He turns 50
in January, but can still compete
and hold his own with the best
of them. The comfortable option
for Miguel would be to announce
that he is throwing his lot in with
the Champions Tour in America
(perish the thought that he should
even contemplate joining the
European Seniors Tour), but he is
too good to do so.
I get the feeling that this is a man
who could quite easily continue
to hold his own with the big boys
until he is 55.
Jimenez never was a long hitter,
so he has had little distance to
lose. Modern equipment allows
him to strike the
ball as far as he
ever has. He is and
always has been a
great iron player,
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