2005 British Open Golf Championship

2005 British Open Golf Championship - St Andrews, Scotland.

Farewell to Jack Nicklaus, the greatest champion the game has known, ending his competitive career on Friday by missing the cut at the British Open.

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14th - 18th July

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Tiger Woods and Ernie Els, the latest tournament winners on the US and European tours, have both submitted entries for The Open at St Andrews in July. Woods birdied the 17th hole at Doral to beat Phil Mickelson by a single shot with a last round of 66 to win the Ford Championship, while in the Dubai Desert Classic Els eagled the final hole to overtake Miguel Angel Jimenez and Stephen Dodd. Woods' victory returned him to the top of the Official World Golf Ranking, ending the six-month reign of Vijay Singh as number one. Els remains in third place. Woods was the winner of The Open when it was last played at St Andrews in 2000, establishing a record 19-under-par score of 269, one shot better than the previous bench-mark set by Nick Faldo when he claimed the title over the Old Course 10 years earlier. Woods had rounds of 67-66-67-69 to finish eight shots ahead of Els and Thomas Bjorn. Els won the title in 2002 after a four-man play-off at Muirfield. Both Stuart Appleby and Steve Elkington of Australia were eliminated after four holes, but Els had to play one more hole of sudden-death before defeating Thomas Levet of France. Els record in The Open also includes three runner-up spots and a third place. In the five years from the Millennium Open he has finished second, third, first and second. Woods was third in 1998 at Royal Birkdale and fourth at Royal St George's in 2003 St Andrews is the venue for the 2005 BRITISH OPEN GOLF CHAMPIONSHIP. Records show that this Royal Burgh has been associated with the development of golf since the 15th century.

During July 2005 The British Open Golf Championship will once again be played at the Birth Place of Golf, bringing an entourage of golfing enthusiasts to the city, enjoying Scottish hospitality.

The Golf Trophy, now referred to as the Claret Jug, was made by Mackay Cunningham & Company of Edinburgh in 1873. The first Open Champion to receive the trophy was Tom Kidd, but Tom Morris Junior?s name was the first to be engraved on it as the 1872 winner.

In 1920 all responsibility was handed over to The Royal and Ancient Golf Club. Following the 1927 Open, which was won at St Andrews by Bobby Jones, the club?s Championship Committee took the decision to retain the Claret Jug in future years and to present the winner with a replica. In 1928, Walter Hagen won the third of his four Open titles and accepted the replica Claret Jug, having already been presented with the original in 1922 and 1924. During the half-century in which the original Claret Jug was used, twenty-eight different players held it aloft, including Harry Vardon on a record six occasions.

In 1990 a further replica was made for display in the new British Golf Museum at St Andrews and in 2000 a third was made for use in travelling exhibitions, and a fourth was created in 2003 for the same purpose.

The original Golf Champion Trophy is on permanent display in The Royal and Ancient Golf Clubhouse. It sits alongside the original first prize, the Challenge Belt, which was donated to the club in 1908 by the grandchildren of Tom Morris Senior.

St Andrews Links Trust, an organization created by an Act of Parliament in 1974, oversees the management and preservation of the links for and on behalf of the townspeople.

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