David Howell (golfer)

David Howell
Personal information
Full nameDavid Alexander Howell
Born (1975-06-23) 23 June 1975 (age 48)
Swindon, Wiltshire, England
Height6 ft 1 in (1.85 m)
Weight175 lb (79 kg; 12.5 st)
Sporting nationality England
ResidenceVirginia Water, Surrey, England
Dubai, UAE
SpouseEmily
Children3[1]
Career
Turned professional1995
Current tour(s)European Tour (joined 1996)
Former tour(s)PGA Tour (2006–07)
Professional wins7
Highest ranking9 (11 June 2006)[2]
Number of wins by tour
European Tour5
PGA Tour of Australasia1
Other1
Best results in major championships
Masters TournamentT11: 2005
PGA ChampionshipT45: 2004
U.S. OpenT16: 2006
The Open ChampionshipT7: 2008

David Alexander Howell (born 23 June 1975) is an English professional golfer. His career peaked in 2006, when he won the BMW Championship and was ranked in the top 10 of the Official World Golf Ranking for a short time.[3] He played in the Ryder Cup in 2004 and 2006.

Career[edit]

After training and competing at Broome Manor Golf Club, he became a professional golfer in 1995. He won the 1998 Australian PGA Championship, and the 1999 Dubai Desert Classic. He had no further wins for six years, but his form was nonetheless on a general upwards curve. He was tenth on the European Tour Order of Merit in 2004 and 2005 proved to be even better. In the spring he had back to back second places in The Daily Telegraph Dunlop Masters and the Nissan Irish Open, and in August, won the BMW International Open. By the autumn he reached the top 20 in the world rankings.

In November 2005, he won the inaugural HSBC Champions tournament, the first event of the 2006 European Tour season. The win took him to a career high of number 13 in the Official World Golf Ranking, making him the highest-ranked British player and the second highest-ranked European at that time. In May 2006, he won the BMW Championship and moved into the world top ten for the first time. In June he moved to a new high of ninth. After leading the Order of Merit for most of the 2006 season, he eventually finished in 3rd place; a back injury caused his form to suffer in the latter half of the season and limited his appearances through 2007.

In 2013, Howell had his first European Tour win in seven years at the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship, beating American Peter Uihlein in a playoff. Howell had previously gone 0–4 in European Tour playoffs.

In 2014, Howell became the second youngest player in history to reach 500 appearances on European Tour when he played at the Open de France.[4]

Howell won the Beko Classic, a tournament sanctioned by the PGAs of Europe, by 5 shots after rounds of 70, 69 and 67 at the Montgomerie Maxx Royal in Turkey in 2015.[5]

The season 2017 proved to be Howell's most disappointing on tour and, speaking in December, said it had been 'two years of hell'.[6] His season was ravaged by back and wrist injuries and he made only five halfway cuts from 20 events, the fewest he has ever made in a whole season resulting in his worst ever Order of Merit ranking.

He suffered another injury setback in January 2018 with a shoulder injury forcing him to retire from the BMW South African Open.[7]

At the Nordea Masters in August 2018, Howell became just the tenth player in the European Tour's history to reach 600 career appearances.[8]

Howell was a member of the winning European Ryder Cup teams in 2004 and 2006. As a member of the Great Britain & Ireland team in the Seve Trophy he was on the losing side in 2000, but a winner in 2003. He has also represented Europe at the Royal Trophy twice in 2006 and 2013 and has been on the winning side on both occasions. He came from 3 down with 4 to play to win his singles match in 2013 against Kim Hyung-sung as Europe pulled off an impressive fightback.

In 2014, Howell was named as part of a five-man selection panel deciding Europe's 2016 Ryder Cup captain.[9] The panel unanimously appointed Darren Clarke to the role.

In January 2017, it was announced that Howell had been voted unanimously to succeed Thomas Bjørn as chairman of the European Tour's Tournament Committee.[10]

In August 2022 at the Cazoo Classic, Howell became just the third player, after Sam Torrence and Miguel Angel Jimenez, to reach 700 career appearances on the European Tour and the youngest to ever do so.[11]

Howell is represented by Octagon.

He also occasionally works for Sky Sports as a commentator and analyst as well as writing regular columns for The Golf Paper and Worldwide Golf. He is sponsored by Titleist and plays with the Titleist ProV1x ball. He was sponsored by Adams Golf for three years from May 2013 but has since returned to TaylorMade.

Amateur wins[edit]

Professional wins (7)[edit]

European Tour wins (5)[edit]

Legend
Flagship events (1)
Other European Tour (4)
No. Date Tournament Winning score Margin of
victory		 Runner(s)-up
1 14 Feb 1999 Dubai Desert Classic −13 (69-68-71-67=275) 4 strokes England Lee Westwood
2 28 Aug 2005 BMW International Open −23 (66-68-66-65=265) 1 stroke United States John Daly, Australia Brett Rumford
3 13 Nov 2005
(2006 season) 		HSBC Champions1 −20 (65-67-68-68=268) 3 strokes United States Tiger Woods
4 28 May 2006 BMW Championship −17 (68-65-69-69=271) 5 strokes England Simon Khan
5 29 Sep 2013 Alfred Dunhill Links Championship −23 (67-68-63-67=265) Playoff United States Peter Uihlein

1Co-sanctioned by the Asian Tour, Sunshine Tour and PGA Tour of Australasia, but unofficial money event.

European Tour playoff record (1–4)

No. Year Tournament Opponent(s) Result
1 2001 Victor Chandler British Masters Sweden Mathias Grönberg, Sweden Robert Karlsson,
France Thomas Levet 		Levet won with birdie on third extra hole
Howell and Karlsson eliminated by par on first hole
2 2005 Daily Telegraph Dunlop Masters Denmark Thomas Bjørn, England Brian Davis Bjørn won with par on second extra hole
Davis eliminated by par on first hole
3 2005 Nissan Irish Open Wales Stephen Dodd Lost to birdie on first extra hole
4 2008 Estoril Open de Portugal France Grégory Bourdy, Scotland Alastair Forsyth Bourdy won with birdie on third extra hole
Forsyth eliminated by par on second hole
5 2013 Alfred Dunhill Links Championship United States Peter Uihlein Won with birdie on second extra hole

PGA Tour of Australasia wins (1)[edit]

No. Date Tournament Winning score Margin of
victory		 Runner-up
1 22 Nov 1998 MasterCard Australian PGA Championship −13 (69-66-72-68=275) 7 strokes Trinidad and Tobago Stephen Ames, Australia Terry Price

Other wins (1)[edit]

No. Date Tournament Winning score Margin of
victory		 Runners-up
1 6 Dec 2015 Beko Classic −11 (70-68-67=205) 5 strokes England Jamie Elson, Sweden Pontus Widegren

Results in major championships[edit]

Tournament 1997 1998 1999
Masters Tournament
U.S. Open
The Open Championship CUT T44 T45
PGA Championship
Tournament 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009
Masters Tournament T11 T19 T44
U.S. Open CUT WD T16
The Open Championship CUT CUT CUT CUT CUT T53 T7 T52
PGA Championship T45 CUT 67 CUT
Tournament 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016
Masters Tournament
U.S. Open CUT T65
The Open Championship T15 T49 T22
PGA Championship CUT
  Top 10
  Did not play

CUT = missed the halfway cut
WD = withdrew
"T" indicates a tie for a place.

Summary[edit]

Tournament Wins 2nd 3rd Top-5 Top-10 Top-25 Events Cuts made
Masters Tournament 0 0 0 0 0 2 3 3
U.S. Open 0 0 0 0 0 1 5 2
The Open Championship 0 0 0 0 1 3 14 8
PGA Championship 0 0 0 0 0 0 5 2
Totals 0 0 0 0 1 6 27 15
  • Most consecutive cuts made – 3 (twice)
  • Longest streak of top-10s – 1

Results in The Players Championship[edit]

Tournament 2005 2006 2007
The Players Championship CUT T38 WD

CUT = missed the halfway cut
WD = withdrew
"T" indicates a tie for a place

Results in World Golf Championships[edit]

Tournament 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015
Match Play R32 QF R64
Championship T28 3 T6 T13 T55
Invitational T6 T59 T61 T73 T52
Champions 70 T30
  Top 10
  Did not play

QF, R16, R32, R64 = Round in which player lost in match play
"T" = tied
Note that the HSBC Champions did not become a WGC event until 2009.

Team appearances[edit]

Amateur

Professional

References[edit]

  1. ^ "It's been a while!". Davidhowellgolf.com. 23 January 2015.
  2. ^ "Week 23 2006 Ending 11 Jun 2006" (pdf). OWGR. Retrieved 20 December 2018.
  3. ^ "69 Players Who Have Reached The Top-10 In World Ranking". OWGR. Archived from the original (PDF) on 17 October 2015. Retrieved 15 July 2011.
  4. ^ "Youthful Howell hits the 500 mark". PGA European Tour. 3 July 2014.
  5. ^ "Beko Classic 2015 – Leaderboard". PGAs of Europe.
  6. ^ Inglis, Martin (21 December 2017). "David Howell opens up on 'two years of hell'". bunkered.
  7. ^ "New injury agony for Swindon golfer David Howell". 11 January 2018.
  8. ^ "David Howell: 600 and counting". 17 August 2018.
  9. ^ "Howell completes Ryder Cup captaincy selection panel". PGA European Tour. 8 October 2014.
  10. ^ "Changes made to Membership criteria and 2018 Ryder Cup qualification process". PGA European Tour. 18 January 2017.
  11. ^ "David Howell Joins the 700 Club at Celtic Manor". 4 August 2022.
  12. ^ "EGA Events, Results, European Team Championships, European Youths' Team Championship". European Golf Association. Retrieved 13 January 2023.

External links[edit]

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