Bøger af Alun Evans

Alun Evans' now annual addictive chunk of Golf Majors facts and figures covers the epic events of the 2016 Grand Slams, as well as the usual pot pourri of results and player CVs going back to 1860; comparison tables; venues; and then 40 pages of records of all kinds associated with golf's most important Championships. In 2016, all four Majors threw up a new Major Champion: the unlikely, but well-deserving Englishman, Danny Willett, won the Masters after erstwhile boy wonder Jordan Spieth blew up on Augusta's back nine; Dustin Johnson overcame some curious officiating and a post-round stroke penalty to win an overdue Major at Oakmont's US Open; the heroic battle over the links of Royal Troon in the Open Championship saw the Swede Henrik Stenson shooting a last-round 63 to repel the maverick veteran Phil Mickelson; and Jimmy Walker's long walk to fame, successful in the PGA Championship at Baltusrol, his first Major after 17 years of trying. All these events are featured in detailed reports, backed up with performance details of every player who teed off in the year's four classics; full leaderboards (including all those who missed the cut or failed to reach the end); round leaders and low scores per round. The year's events are then summarized in a league table of the best players, based on Evans' unique scoring system. Tables are provided, too, using the same technique, to compare players of different eras, and culminate in the popular, provocative 'Hall of Fame', the Top 100 players in Major Championship history. Evans, whose 'From Old Tom to the Tiger' was shortlisted for Sports Book of the Year in 2012, continues to produce record books 'par excellence', but with an engagingly light narrative to caress them into the titanic human and sporting storylines the Majors seem to create, year in, year out, without them appearing nerdy or obtrusive. Jack Nicklaus has hailed the Golf Majors series of books because he felt, 'readers and golf fans alike can easily recall their memories of the Major Championships of the world'; and Jack's greatest rival and good friend, the late, great Arnold Palmer commented, 'Alun Evans has compiled such a great summary...of the four Major Championships'. 'Alun Evans' Golf Majors Book, 2017' is a must for all golf, indeed all sports, fans. As the Daily Mail's Derek Lawrenson succinctly put it, 'When it comes to the Major Championships, look no further than Alun Evans'.

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This is Alun Evans' eighth GOLF MAJORS book. Critically acclaimed as the definitive, ongoing record of golf's premier Championships, the 2013 edition has been further extended by some 30 pages to provide more sections and greater depth to the most recent Majors, whilst still retaining the fullest historical record of these events. The natural progression and extension of the awesome From Old Tom to the Tiger (2011), Alun Evans' The Golf Majors Book, 2013 continues the story, comprehensively recounting the 2012 Championships and looking forward to those of 2013. It tells of the new American breed: the breath of fresh air that is new Masters Champion Bubba Watson; and the young star Webb Simpson, who collected the US Open title, only his third success on Tour, all coming within a 10-month period. It recalls, too, the return of the glory days for Ernie Els, an Open Champion again after a ten year period without any Majors success; and the feats of a genuine contender for the crown of Tiger Woods, Ulster's Rory McIlroy, who picked up the year's final Major, the PGA Championship at Kiawah Island, his second Major title in as many years. Packed with facts and stats, yet highly readable, this is the only book anyone would need on THE GOLF MAJORS

The world's most comprehensive source of information in print, both in paperback and Kindle ebook, on the Major Championships of Golf for over 20 years. The history, present and future of The Open Championship, inaugurated way back in 1860, and the development over 120 years of the US Open (1895), The PGA Championship (1916) and the Masters Tournament (1934), is chronicled in detailed reports and backed up by the most comprehensive statistics available on Golf's premier events. Evans, nominated for 'From Old Tom to the Tiger' in the British Sports Book Awards in 2012, provides the only regularly and accurately updated resource needed to keep abreast of these historic events. In this, the 2020 edition, he welcomes the return of Tiger Woods to Majors-winning ways when he won his fifth Masters Green Jacket - but only his first Major, since 2008; and the continuing predator-like performances of Brooks Koepka who clinically collected his fourth Major title in three seasons. He reports on the much-anticipated return of the Open to Royal Portrush in almost 70 years, and in only the second visit to the island of Ireland to hail a home-grown Champion there in Shane Lowry. He also looks forward to the Majors of 2020, welcoming back to Major Championships iconic courses like Winged Foot and Royal St George's, before returning statistically to the past glories of these, the pinnacle of all golfing events, through records and tables and information of all sorts. Every year, the author produces a mine of facts, scores, comparisons and the rest to top the previous year. A must for every golf fan, and those fans who want to read about some of the greatest achievements in any sport!

THE MOST COMPEHENSIVE SOURCE OF INFORMATION IN PRINT ON THE MAJOR CHAMPIONSHIPS OF GOLF This, the tenth in the much praised GOLF MAJORS series, follows the pattern of its predecessors in bringing the story of golf's greatest Championships and Champions up to date, and prepares new ground for the years to come. Among the now familiar, but endlessly fascinating, updated records sections, this edition, through its detailed recaps of the 2014 Majors, highlights a potential cataclysmic shift in power at the top of the men's game. For several years we have seen a decline in the performances of Tiger Woods, in everyone's book one of the top five golfers of all time - and in many eyes perhaps in the top three or even higher. A series of injuries induced by the incredible pressures he has put on his body over time has no doubt been a huge reason why he has not won a Major since 2008; and when he's been free from physical pain, he has suffered considerable mental anguish, albeit self-inflicted for the most part. During the brief interludes of liberation from personal trauma and physical stresses, Tiger had, until 2014, continued to play well in, and win, Tour events, indicating he could still be (but maybe not good enough to increase his tally of 14 Major titles?) a fiercely competitive golfer on his day. Ten years earlier that 'day' would be replicated many times during a Tiger season; now it appears less so, and not to the supreme levels in performance of yesteryear. Until the second half of 2014, the hiatus in Woods' hitherto unbroken supremacy since 2008 had been occupied by a few talented newcomers like Bubba Watson and Martin Kaymer, both multiple Major Champions after the Masters and US Open earlier in 2014. Older players, like Ernie Els (for the first time in ten years) and Darren Clarke (never) picked Major Championship trophies. It also allowed the undoubted talents of Phil Mickelson to flourish into his 40s; and the stirrings of a new force, one who showed signs of taking over where Tiger left off, in Rory McIlroy. But after success in Majors in 2011 and 2012, suddenly Rory-hype dried up amid a romantic liaison, and a not so romantic liaison: distractions of the heart combined with the bedding-in of a new sponsor and the new clubs they supplied, seemed to dampen his ardour for the game of golf. Following a 2014 Masters and US Open without Woods, recuperating yet again after back problems, and a luke-warm McIlroy, the interregnum suggested no signs of ending. Then, as we know, Rory saw his golfing path clearly again and walked off with all the spoils in the Open and PGA Championships. Within a few short weeks in the high summer of 2014, the spotlight was again on the Ulsterman, and with it premonitions and prophesies of what may be in store, with or without the return of Woods to the highest echelons of the game once more. Check out the stories as they unfolded, see how Rory's two wins have affected his position the Top 100 Hall of Fame, and get up to date with all the facts, all the stats, all the records in Alun Evans' The Golf Majors Book, 2015. THE ONLY BOOK ANYONE WOULD NEED ON THE GOLF'S MAJORS CHAMPIONSHIP.

THE MOST COMPREHENSIVE SOURCE OF INFORMATION IN PRINT ON THE MAJOR CHAMPIONSHIPS OF GOLF This is the ninth book by Alun Evans on Golf's four biggest events - the Masters, The US Open, The Open Championship and the PGA of America Championship - since the original, now comparatively scratchy, survey saw the light of day in 1998. In order to make the review as close to an annual update as possible, much material form older editions has been omitted to save space and to keep costs down. For those readers who want to know about the first 150 years of Majors in detail, ie from 1860 to 2010, you are pointed to the jam-packed 750 pages of the author's From Old Tom to the Tiger, which was nominated in 2012 for the British Sports Book of the Year. The years 2011 and 2012 are covered in depth in the author's year books of 2012 and 2013, now suitably discounted, of course. Alun Evans' Golf Majors Book, 2014 does exactly as it says on the tin. It covers in detail the Majors of 2013, when Adam Scott deservedly won his first Major at the Masters; Justin Rose became the first Englishman to win the US Open since Tony Jacklin in 1970; Phil Mickelson at last added the Old Claret Jug to his portfolio; and super-cool Jason Dufner mugged everyone at Oak Hill to collect the PGA Championship - and, like Scott and Rose, became a Major Champion for the first time. Details can be found in this edition of the golf courses to be used in the 2014 round of Majors, based on first-hand information gleaned from the host sites and/or the organizing committees of each. Particularly of interest in 2014 will be the back-to-basic topography of Donald Ross' Pinehurst No2 in the US Open after the Coore and Crenshaw overhaul. And of course, there are the Records. Fully updated stats and full players' records are to be found for those appearing in the 21st Century; plus the expected CVs of those greats of golf who became Major Champions before the change in millennium - and the Hall of Fame compiles for comparison the records of the top 100 performers in Majors.

This is the story of golf's Major Championships which began in the mid-19th century, before the formation of almost all international sport as we know it today. The (British) Open Championship was born, as an afterthought really, in 1860 when just eight odd-bods played the Prestwick links. It tells the tale of golf's struggle to grow in Scotland; of the proto-professional eking out a living from playing (and wagering) and doubling as a caddie, or greenkeeping and repairing equipment. It marks the early supremacy of 'Old Tom' Morris and then the Englishmen, Harry Vardon and JH Taylor, before recounting the evangelical enthusiasm by which America converted itself to golf. It tells of an inaugural US Open as early as 1895, within a decade of the first Club being formed, and the (US) PGA Championship following in 1916. With the Great War over, the story of Walter Hagen and Bobby Jones, one the slick pro, the other the classy amateur, is recalled as they carved up the 1920s between them, before an invitational sideshow by Jones for his chums developed into the 'The Masters Tournament'. It relates how Byron Nelson, Ben Hogan and Sam Snead fought for hegemony through the global tumult of the 1940s to segue seamlessly into the next generation, and modern times. It shows us how 'The Big Three' - Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player - then assumed the mantle; how Palmer, possessing all the pizzazz made for such an age, was generally attributed with coining the term 'Majors', just as golf became big in the booming TV age around the turn of the 1960s. It goes on to tell how Arnie and his cohorts delivered golf to the world as a major sport; and through them, the Golf Majors of The Open, US Open, PGA Championship and Masters Tournament, as an entity, became real. The story is brought up to date, after introducing new superstars like Tom Watson, Lee Trevino and Seve Ballesteros, with the Golf Majors hitting the 21st century and the wonder that is (maybe was?) 'Tiger' Woods. Here, 150 years of the phenomenon that is golf is encapsulated through its greatest events. Alun Evans' consummate one volume chronicle of golf's greatest Championships - the so-called MAJORS - is an encyclopedic package on the subject: indeed, it has no peers. From Old Tom to the Tiger is a deliberate retrospective to celebrate 150 years of Majors golf, not just a stat pack for the nerdy and needy. It is unique in its scope; nothing can compare with it in golf, indeed in sport, for its detail and accuracy. But it is as much about storytelling as facts and figures; yet it's statistically more detailed than anything seen before. The author tells the story through an engaging, lively narrative, and, not forsaking the anoraks, backs it up with complete results; a results CV for every player who started a Major; and enough records to shake a stick at. Even jam-packed with anecdotes and facts, it is still portable enough to tote around the fairways and greens of Major Championships - and just as much a stand-by in the home, next to the TV, of course.

THE MOST COMPREHENSIVE SOURCE OF INFORMATION IN PRINT ON THE MAJOR CHAMPIONSHIPS OF GOLF Alun Evans' exceptional series - now an annual - on the Major Championships, Golf's greatest prizes, progresses into 2016, and, among its many facets across almost 400 tightly-packed pages, looks back in detail on the events of 2015. In hindsight, 2015 may prove to be one of the most significant years in recent golf history. The lingering demise of Tiger Woods as a golfing phenomenon par excellence maybe reached its denouement in 2015. Certainly his three consecutive missed cuts in the Majors following a wan 17th in the Masters, when in 18 years as a professional he had previously only missed three cuts altogether, would suggest so. Added to that his comments, in the wake of two further surgical procedures towards the season's end, seemed to indicate he may not even play again should his troublesome back persist. Although far from being a golfing obituary on perhaps one of the best two or three golfers ever to walk on this planet, it must be questioned: logically, can we see the time when Tiger will win Majors again? Stalled on 14 titles since 2008, 'highly unlikely' seems an understatement. At the end of 2014, Rory McIlroy appeared to be Woods' natural heir apparent, having scooped up four Majors over a relatively short period of time by his mid-20s, and already a paid-up member of the Gang of Three (with Jack Nicklaus and Tiger), the youngest winners of three different Grand Slam titles. Two Top Ten finishes in the Masters and US Open of 2015, although not spectacular by his standards, would not have triggered any alarm bells for anyone interested in the Ulsterman's progress to the top of the World Ranking - if these opening Majors of the season hadn't been won by a comparative unknown, and one over four years younger than Rory. Jordan Spieth had announced himself in 2014, when only 20 years of age, he finished second in the Masters. Some fruits ripen more quickly than others: Spieth's maturity burst forth in rapid time to become the youngest winner of two different Majors since Gene Sarazen in 1922. While Rory was anguishing over an over-exuberant game of football which excluded him from the year's third Major, The Open at St Andrews, Jordan almost, after a late charge, made it three in a row - a feat which would have matched the performances of Ben Hogan in 1953 and Tiger Woods in 2000. His fourth place at the Home of Golf and a second at Whistling Straits in the PGA Championship in the final Major completed a marvellous season nonetheless, one unprecedented by one so young in the annals of Golf, and the Texan had amazingly usurped McIlroy's World No 1 crown. Zach Johnson, who won The Open, picked up his second Major after a period of eight years; Aussie Jason Day, a model of consistency in Majors for several years, finally received his just desserts by claiming the PGA title. So, after a tumultuous year, where some pundits were expecting a post-Tiger void, some assuming Rory would step into his shoes, a completely different vista of the future hove into view. McIlroy would now seem to have a very serious rival indeed, and there is the prospect of perhaps another fifteen years of a kind of Hogan-Snead or Nicklaus-Palmer struggle for supremacy in the sport. And, now that Jason Day has broken his Majors duck, there may even be the mouth-watering possibility of another Big Three, a Triumvirate for the 21st Century, in the making. Follow this story and golf history in the making with full reports, amazing stats - on every Major since 1860, and the players in a series of CVs - period performance charts, even a Hall of Fame Top 100 players, future Majors and 40 pages of records, only in Alun Evans' The Golf Majors Book, 2016. THE ONLY BOOK ANYONE WOULD EVER NEED ON GOLF'S MAJOR CHAMPIONSHIPS

THE MOST COMPREHENSIVE SOURCE OF INFORMATION ON THE MAJOR CHAMPIONSHIPS OF GOLF This, the 15th incarnation in one form or another, of Alun Evans' recording of golf's Major Championships, is the eighth consecutive annual edition of The Golf Majors since the author's mighty From Old Tom to the Tiger in 2011. The 2018 edition continues the greatest, most comprehensively detailed chronicle of these wonderful sporting events from the very first Open Championship in 1860 up to the present day. Through a balance of engaging narrative and apposite facts, a series of relevant and accurate charts, lists and tables, the most recent Major Championships' data has in Evans' latest book been intertwined with the rich fabric of golf's history. The complete story of the Majors of 2017 has been logged, telling of first-time Champions Sergio Garcia (whose win in the Masters ended a series of near misses going back two decades), Brooks Koepka (a result waiting to happen in the US Open), and Justin Thomas (emerging from the shadow of boyhood friend Jordan Spieth to take the PGA Championship). It relates the breaking the sequence of first-time Champions by Spieth himself, resurgent after an up-and-down period in the wake his back-to-back Majors successes in 2015, winning an absorbing Open Championship at Royal Birkdale. This, too, is now part of the vibrant tapestry that is the story of golf, as told through its most meaningful milestones. In addition, The Gold Majors 2018 is just that. An exhaustive discussion on the venues for 2018's Majors is punctuated with the most up-to-date information: changes to the courses and their yardages and pars provided by the organizers themselves; the history of the courses and past winners of Major Championships already hosted there. Add to that the support of copious facts and records which appear over the book's last 40 pages, it is easy to understand The Daily Mail's Derek Lawrenson's commenting that, 'When it come to the Major Championships, look no further than Alun Evans' Golf Majors', or John Hopkins of The Times ruefully complaining that it's '...a work you have to keep an eye on in case a colleague borrows it and forgets to return it...'. But you don't have to be a top golf journalist to appreciate Alun Evans' epic series. According to Jeff Silverman's review in Golf.com, '...it is a cornerstone of essential information'. Continuing the saga, therefore, Alun Evans' Golf Majors 2018 is an absolute must for all golf fans and serious followers of top class international sport. Packed with facts and stats, yet highly readable, this is the only book anyone would need on THE GOLF MAJORS

This, the next annual edition of Evans' 'The Golf Majors' series, brings the story of golf's greatest Championships bang up to date. Filled as it is with all the facts, results and records going back to 1860 when the first-ever Open Championship was held at Prestwick in Scotland, it still manages to hark back to last summer and provide full reports on the 2018 Majors. The emergence of Brooks Koepka as the sport's latest multiple Major Champion is chronicled in detail: so too, the return of Tiger Woods, once more a creditable force in Majors when many, the author included, felt that so deep had been his decline, such an astonishing recovery was beyond the wildest hopes of his millions of still-faithful fans. Whereas the book unashamedly pays homage to the events of yesteryear, and those that made them so often so memorable, it still finds time to deal with the future and looks in some detail into the Majors of 2019, where for many the high spot will be the return of the Open in July to the island of Ireland, and idyllic Royal Portrush, for the first time since 1951. Not satisfied to leave the reader short-changed Evans has made the end of the book the golf fan's ultimate fantasy, with page after page of Major records - all in all, it is the complete companion (and the only one of its kind) to see you through this year's Major Championships and look forward to the next.

Presents a challenge of both cryptic and quick clues about our world: its places, peoples and politics. This title contains 50 crossword puzzles, each with cryptic and quick clues - and solutions of course. It also includes a guide to solving cryptic crosswords.