Why this trophy continues to surprise its winners after almost being lost for good

[ad_1] Collin Morikawa had no thought how heavy the Wanamaker Trophy was when he tried to hoist it within the air following his victory on the 2020 PGA Championship at TPC Harding Park.

The end result was a close to catastrophe.

As Morikawa grabbed the handles of the outsized silver jug and commenced to boost it above his head for a photograph alternative, the highest of the sterling silver trophy got here off and toppled to the bottom, making for one of many extra awkward, if not memorable, victory celebrations in golf historical past.

"They advised me it is heavy; they did not inform me the lid comes off," Morikawa recalled on Wednesday previous to the beginning of this yr's PGA Championship at Quail Hole.

"However it's manner heavier than you anticipate. After which they inform you to raise it over your head."

Six years earlier, Rory McIlroy had an identical expertise after successful his second PGA Championship at Valhalla.

When then-PGA Tour president Ted Bishop approached the Northern Irishman to current him the trophy for the award ceremony, the lid rolled off and McIlroy alertly snagged it in mid-air with one hand earlier than it hit the bottom, drawing an enormous roar of applause from onlookers.

The Wanamaker Trophy, which incorporates the engraved names of each PGA Championship winner, measures 75 centimetres excessive, 68.5 centimetres from deal with to deal with and weighs 12.2 kilograms, making for a considerably awkward hoist — notably after taking part in 18 holes.

McIlroy referred to as the trophy "fairly meaty".

"It is good for the photographs as a result of your biceps are often flexed," McIlroy stated on Wednesday with amusing as he prolonged his arms whereas pretending to carry up an imaginary trophy.

Wealthy Beem stated he had no challenge lifting the trophy after his victory over Tiger Woods. ( Getty Photographs: Judy Griesedieck )

"So it makes you look a bit stronger than you truly are. Nevertheless it's very cool."

Wealthy Beem did not actually discover how heavy the trophy was after he held off Tiger Woods to win in 2002 at Hazeltine, saying there was an excessive amount of adrenaline pumping by way of his veins.

"It may have weighed 100 kilos," Beem stated.

"And I in all probability may have picked it up with a pinky."

Beem stated what shocked him essentially the most was the silver trophy wasn't all that sizzling regardless of baking that afternoon within the August solar.

Since Beem received practically a quarter-century in the past, an additional base has been added to the trophy after officers ran out of house to engrave the names of winners.

The champion's identify is historically added earlier than the trophy leaves the course, with five-time winners Jack Nicklaus and Walter Hagen showing on it essentially the most.

Champions are allowed to maintain the Wanamaker Trophy for one yr after it is awarded, offering they return it for the next yr's presentation.

Typically that does not work out.

American golfer Walter Hagen has a swing on the roof of the Savoy Lodge in London in 1922. ( Getty Photographs: Topical Press Company )

Within the late Twenties, Hagen was pressured to confess to event officers that he misplaced the trophy, which was initially created across the time the event started in 1916 by Rodman Wanamaker, the son of a sportsman and inheritor to a division retailer empire and credited with serving to create the Skilled Golf Affiliation of America.

Particulars on how Hagen misplaced it stay sketchy and have change into a part of golf lore.

He reportedly advised the PGA of America that he left it in taxi whereas out celebrating one in all his 4 straight titles from 1924-27.

It resurfaced some years later, and now resides on the PGA of America headquarters in Frisco, Texas. What's used now could be the alternative that was created shortly after Hagen misplaced the unique.

What champions do with with the trophy is as much as one's personal discretion.

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"If you happen to fill it up with ice and take two bottles of Jack Daniels and a two-litre bottle of Weight-reduction plan Coke and a dozen limes, you've got obtained your self one frosty cocktail," Beem stated.

"I am not saying that is what I did."

As soon as the trophy is returned the next yr to be offered to the subsequent champion, gamers are given a duplicate — albeit one that's 10 per cent smaller — to maintain for good.

Transporting it's no simple process.

Not like the a lot lighter 2.5kg Claret Jug — a pitcher-shaped silver trophy that comes with a travel-friendly case and is given yearly to the winner of the British Open — the Wanamaker seemingly in all probability is not one thing you wish to lug across the nation.