Jack Nicklaus began play in his final major championship appearance on July 14, 2005, choosing the Old Course at St. Andrews—where he won two of his three Open Championships—as the venue to say goodbye to championship golf.
“The Old Course is just a very special place. When you think of all of the people who played at St. Andrews over the years, and how the game got its start there but is still a competitive challenge to the golfers of today… I’m kind of a sentimentalist, I suppose. It sort of got me every time I went there. I was over there two months before my final Open, and I just walked out on the 18th, looked at the round over there and while I was sitting there, I got welled up. And nobody’s there. It’s just because of what it is, what it has meant to the game of golf, and what it has meant to me.”
Watch the Golden Bear and other past champions in this video talk about their affections for the Old Course.
