There are moments in golf when you just scratch your head and wonder.
While the likes of the Bryson DeChambeaus and Viktor Hovlands of the world ripple muscles on the DP World and PGA tours, defying logic with country-mile drives and nimble flicks with the wedge and putter to claim the biggest crowns in the game, there is a little puff of smoke and a smirk in the background telling us that the old ways still work just as well.
Welcome to the world of Miguel Angel Jimenez.
If you were not already aware of this enigma in the world of golfers looking more like track athletes or bodybuilders, here is a pot-bellied, cigar-smoking, 58-year-old Spaniard who only knows how to smile and defy logic with tile after title — and an uncanny knack for holes-in-one.
He already has two titles to his name in three starts this season on the Champions Tour for veterans of the game.
Jimenez astonishingly hit his second ace of the week to claim a four-shot victory in the Cologuard Classic at Tucson, Arizona on Sunday, leaving all others trailing.
As he addressed the ball on the 14th during the final round, he cocked his head, gave a trademark smirk and 198 yards were gobbled up for a record 13th professional hole-in-one, only two days after his most recent. The Spaniard also had an ace on Friday at the par-3 seventh.
“I have 13 aces in tournaments already, but this is first time I have two in the same tournament,” Jimenez chuckled after his 12th Champions Tour victory, to go with more than 40 titles during his ‘heyday’, going all the way back to 1992. Ever coy and modest, he added: “You never think about it. You want to hit a good shot and hit it as close as possible.”
He banged in a record 10 par-3 eagles during his time on the European Tour, and he keeps up the tradition of his little salsa dance each time. The fans in Tuscon were treated to two shimmies this week from the man who — at 5ft 10ins — is sometimes overshadowed by the younger crop of gymnasium-shackled athletes on tour. But not today, not this week and not any time soon. He is still head and shoulders above them all.
