Comeback of the Year
Tiger Woods may well have won his first tournament in over two years – his own event, the limited field Chevron World Challenge – but that result, as good as it was, wasn't enough to earn him the title in this category.
Thomas Bjorn, with three European Tour wins, showed there's plenty of life left in the Great Dane, who turned 40 at the beginning of the year. Bjorn's victories – in Qatar, at the Johnnie Walker Championship at Gleneagles and the Omega European Masters in the Swiss Alps – capped a remarkable year for a player who only a few years ago was on the brink of giving up the game.
But the golfer who showed the biggest turn around in form last year was Sergio Garcia. The Spaniard, who is only 31 but seems to have been around forever, had been without a tournament victory since 2008. But a seventh place at the US Open and a ninth place at the Open Championship sandwiched a play-off loss to Pablo Larrazabal at the BMW International Championship – and for Garcia the confidence was back.
Returning to his homeland in October, Garcia put on an exhibition at the Castello Masters, where he trounced the field by 11 shots, the joint third highest margin of victory in European Tour history. The following week, Garcia again triumphed, defeating Miguel Angel Jimenez by a shot to win the Andalucía Masters, played at Valderrama, for his second consecutive victory. The two wins lifted Garcia back into the world's top 20 and he finished in eighth place in the Race to Dubai rankings.
Winner: Sergio Garcia
Notable: Thomas Bjorn
