Padraig Harrington

Padraig Harrington is one of Ireland’s most successful golfers with an elite history of titles behind him, a wealth of knowledge of the game with more than a handful of tips and tactics. The successes of Harrington are wide varied and very impressive. Harrington began his professional career in 1995; this last part of the nineties brought a lot of success for Harrington. He first participated in the Ryder cup in 1999; he then participated in this tournament for the next four times. The European team was successful in three out of these five years. This is just one of the tournaments Harrington has played for Ireland.
 
He also appeared in the Dunhill cup for five years from 1996 – 2000. Another Irish event that Harrington participated in was the world cup; he won this tournament in 1997 with Paul McGinley. He had made 11 appearances in this event from 1996 - 2006. Harrington won his first Irish title in 1998 at the Irish PGA championships.

The new millennium saw a new era of titles for the Irish golfer, again he was a constant feature in the leader boards of the US masters and US Open. He was successful at the Brazil Sao Paulo 500 Years Open taking the top spot in 2000. Harrington also won the BBVA Open Turespana Master de Madrid. He was then successful in 2002 with the European team in the Ryder cup challenge as the team picked up the trophy. In this year he had a big win against Tiger Woods at the Target World Challenge. 2004 saw Harrington and the European team pick up the Ryder cup once more. The USPGA tour was a successful run for Harrington as he won two events, the Honda Classic against VJ Singh and the Barclays Classic against Jim Furyk.

2006 was a big year for Padraig Harrington as he was the winner of the Volvo Order of Merit after 11 years Harrington was at the top of European golf. He also was again part of the winning Ryder cup team for Europe.

2008 welcomed a successful season for Harrington as he was named PGA Player of the year. His world ranking also increased to 3rd in this year. The win at the USPGA Championship was monumental as a European hasn’t won this title in over 70 years. Padraig Harrington has an impressive band of titles to his name and one of the most successful Irish Sports stars.