Ryo Ishikawa

Ryo Ishikawa
石川 遼
— Golfer —
Personal information
Full name Ryo Ishikawa
Nickname Hanikami Ōji
Born 17 September 1991
Matsubushi, Saitama, Japan
Height 1.75 m (5 ft 9 in)
Weight 72 kg (159 lb)
Nationality  Japan
Residence Matsubushi, Saitama, Japan
Career
Turned professional 2008
Current tour(s) Japan Golf Tour (joined 2008)
PGA Tour (joined 2012)
Professional wins 12
Number of wins by tour
Japan Golf Tour 11
Other 1
Best results in major championships
Masters Tournament T20: 2011
U.S. Open T30: 2011
The Open Championship T27: 2010
PGA Championship T29: 2013
Achievements and awards
Japan Golf Tour
leading money winner		 2009

Ryo Ishikawa (石川 遼 Ishikawa Ryō, born 17 September 1991), also known by the nickname "Hanikami Ōji" (literally, "Bashful Prince"), is a Japanese professional golfer.

Amateur career

On 20 May 2007, Ishikawa became the youngest winner ever of a men's regular tournament on the Japan Golf Tour by winning[1] the Munsingwear Open KSB Cup at the age 15 years and 8 months.[2] He competed as an amateur and it was Ishikawa's first tour appearance. He finished one shot ahead of Japan's 9th top ranked player at the time, Katsumasa Miyamoto. The highest ranked player on the Official World Golf Ranking who took part in the event was Toru Taniguchi who finished T13, 6 shots shy of Ishikawa. Taniguchi ranked number 86 in the world after the event.[3]

Professional career

Ishikawa turned professional in 2008[4] and won another Japan Golf Tour tournament, the mynavi ABC Championship. By the close of 2008 he had become the youngest ever player to reach the top 100 of the Official World Golf Rankings.

Ishikawa played in PGA Tour tournaments for the first time in 2009. He was cut from the Northern Trust Open, the Arnold Palmer Invitational and the 2009 Masters Tournament. He finished 71st at the Transitions Championship.

On 28 June 2009, Ishikawa won the Gateway to the Open Mizuno Open Yomiuri Classic on the Japan Golf Tour to qualify for the 2009 Open Championship, the first major event he has qualified for without receiving a special exemption.

With four wins on the Japan Golf Tour in 2009, in September, Ishikawa became the youngest golfer ever to reach the top 50 of the Official World Golf Rankings.[5]

Ishikawa dominated the Japan Golf Tour for much of the 2009 season and has been the top-ranked Japanese player in the World Rankings. On 18 October, he tied for second at the Japan Open, losing to Ryuichi Oda on the second hole of a playoff. He finished the season as the money list leader on the Japan Golf Tour with ¥ 183.52 million.[6]

At the Japan GTO awards, held in December 2009, Ishikawa earned 9 titles. In addition to top money earner, he was named MVP, best scoring average (69.93), best putting average (1.724), highest birdie haul (4.42), etc.[6]

On 2 May 2010, in the final round of The Crowns, he shot a 12-under-par 58 to win the tournament by five strokes. The 58 was the lowest score ever carded in a Japan Golf Tour event, eclipsing a 59 achieved in the first round of 2003 Acom International by Masahiro Kuramoto, and lowest ever on any major golf tour.[7] His round consisted of 12 birdies and six pars.[7] However, because the course was a par-70 (versus the par-72 courses where some players shot 59), the record is not the lowest in relation to par.

Ishikawa caught the attention of American golf fans at the 2010 U.S. Open. Wearing a bright bubblegum pink outfit, he played under par on the first day and was tied for second after the second day before falling back over the weekend.[8]

On 30 March 2011 Ishikawa announced that he will be donating all of his 2011 tour earnings, plus an additional ¥ 100,000 for every birdie he makes during the year, to the Japan earthquake relief efforts.[9]

On 11 March 2012, the one-year anniversary of the Japan earthquake, Ishikawa finished runner-up to George McNeill in the Puerto Rico Open, his highest PGA Tour finish thus far. Just over a week later, Ishikawa became a member of the PGA Tour.[10] The second place finish earned Special Temporary Membership by exceeding $411,943, or 150th on the PGA Tour's 2011 money list.

Ishikawa played on the PGA Tour in 2013.[11] He made 13 cuts in 23 events, finishing 149th on the money list and missing the FedEx Cup playoffs (ranked 141st). He played the Web.com Tour Finals and finished 13th to retain his PGA Tour card for 2014.

Ishikawa got nine top-25s and made 14 cuts during the 2014 season, including a second place finish at the Shriners Hospitals for Children Open and a T-5 at the unofficial ISPS Handa World Cup of Golf.

Professional wins (12)

Japan Golf Tour wins (11)

No. Date Tournament Winning score Margin of
victory		 Runner(s)-up
1 23 May 2007 Munsingwear Open KSB Cup (as an amateur) −12 (72-69-69-66=276) 1 stroke Japan Katsumasa Miyamoto
2 2 Nov 2008 mynavi ABC Championship −9 (70-70-70-69=279) 1 stroke Japan Keiichiro Fukabori
3 28 Jun 2009 Gateway to the Open Mizuno Open Yomiuri Classic −13 (69-65-68-73=275) 3 strokes New Zealand David Smail
4 2 Aug 2009 Sun Chlorella Classic −17 (65-68-71-67=271) 1 stroke Australia Brendan Jones
5 6 Sep 2009 Fujisankei Classic −12 (69-65-68-70=272) 5 strokes Japan Daisuke Maruyama
6 4 Oct 2009 Coca-Cola Tokai Classic −14 (71-68-66-69=274) 1 stroke Japan Takeshi Kajikawa
7 2 May 2010 The Crowns −13 (68-70-71-58=267) 5 strokes Japan Hiroyuki Fujita, Australia Paul Sheehan
8 5 Sep 2010 Fujisankei Classic −9 (66-71-68-70=275) Playoff Japan Shunsuke Sonoda
9 13 Nov 2010 Mitsui Sumitomo VISA Taiheiyo Masters −14 (70-72-65-67=274) 2 strokes Australia Brendan Jones
10 11 Nov 2012 Mitsui Sumitomo VISA Taiheiyo Masters −15 (67-69-69-68=273) 1 stroke Japan Michio Matsumura
11 6 Jul 2014 Nagashima Shigeo Invitational Sega Sammy Cup −10 (69-71-67-67=274) Playoff Japan Koumei Oda

Other wins (1)

Results in major championships

Tournament 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014
Masters Tournament CUT CUT T20 CUT T38 DNP
U.S. Open DNP T33 T30 CUT DNP DNP
The Open Championship CUT T27 CUT CUT DNP CUT
PGA Championship T56 CUT CUT T59 T29 CUT

DNP = Did not play
CUT = missed the half-way cut
"T" indicates a tie for a place
Yellow background for top-10

Summary

Tournament Wins 2nd 3rd Top-5 Top-10 Top-25 Events Cuts made
Masters Tournament 0 0 0 0 0 1 5 2
U.S. Open 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 2
The Open Championship 0 0 0 0 0 0 5 1
PGA Championship 0 0 0 0 0 0 6 3
Totals 0 0 0 0 0 1 19 8

Results in World Golf Championships

Tournament20092010201120122013
Accenture Match Play Championship DNP R16 R64 R32 DNP
Cadillac Championship DNP DNP T42 DNP DNP
Bridgestone Invitational DNP T53 T4 T50 DNP
HSBC Champions T17 T41 DNP DNP T66

Team appearances

Professional

See also

References

  1. ↑ Munsingwear Open KSB Cup 2007
  2. ↑ "Reuters: Golf-Japan hails schoolboy as world record breaker". Reuters. Retrieved 26 October 2014.
  3. ↑ Official World Golf Ranking – 20 May 2007
  4. ↑ "Sjoholm moves into top 10 as Ishikawa turns pro – 16 Jan 2008". OWGR. Retrieved 26 October 2014.
  5. ↑ "Week 36 – Steve Stricker is the New World Number Two after Victory at the Deutsche Bank Championship". OWGR. Retrieved 26 October 2014.
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 The Daily Yomiuri, 8 December 2009, p. 18
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 "Ishikawa's 58 sets major-tour record". Associated Press. 2 May 2010.
  8. ↑ Ryo Ishikawa Shines at Pebble in Bubblegum Pink Golfblips, 17 June 2010
  9. ↑ "Ryo Ishikawa to give 2011 golf earnings to Japan disaster victims". The Guardian. UK. 31 March 2011. Retrieved 9 April 2011.
  10. ↑ "Ishikawa becomes member for 2012". PGA Tour. 19 March 2012. Retrieved 19 March 2012.
  11. ↑ "Five internationals join Tour for 2013". PGA Tour. 20 November 2012. Retrieved 20 November 2012.

External links

Preceded by
Urawa Red Diamonds		 Japan Professional Sports Grand Prize Winner
2008, 2009 		Succeeded by
Hakuhō Shō