Jim Furyk

Jim Furyk Biography

Furyk was born in West Chester, Pennsylvania. His early years were spent in the Pittsburgh suburbs learning the game from his father, who was head pro at Uniontown Country Club near Pittsburgh. He graduated from Manheim Township High School in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania in 1988 where he was a standout basketball player in addition to being a state champion golfer. He attended the University of Arizona and turned professional in 1992.

Furyk at the 2004 Ryder CupFuryk won at least one tournament each year on the PGA Tour between 1998 and 2003. At the time, this was the second best streak of winning seasons behind Tiger Woods and he made the top ten in the Official World Golf Rankings. Furyk's biggest win to date came on June 16, 2003, when he tied the record for the lowest 72-hole score in U.S. Open history to win his first major championship.

In 2004 he only played in fourteen events after missing three months due to surgery to repair cartilage damage in his wrist and he fell out of the top hundred on the money list, but he returned to good form in 2005 and regained his top ten ranking, winning a PGA Tour event in that year and two in 2006.

In the 2006 season, he finished a career-high second on the money list and won the Vardon Trophy for the first time. He also had a career-best thirteen top-10 finishes, including nine top-3s, four second-place finishes, and two victories.

The only instructor he has ever used is his dad, Mike Furyk, which may account for his unusual swing. His caddy is Mike Fluff Cowan, who was Tiger Woods' caddy for Woods' first two years as a professional.

During the 2003 Buick Open on-course commentator Mike Hulbert interviewed Furyk from what appeared to be a snack bar during a rain delay while covering the early rounds on USA Network. Other players (who were not visible, nor identified) were in the room at the time of Furyk's interview and proceeded to throw popcorn at them from off camera as the interview progressed. At one point Furyk even held up a golf towel to block the popcorn as it got worse, and he stated that: It looks like it's pick on Hubby day!

Jim Furyk's trademark looping golf swing begins with a setup that has the ball at the heel of the club instead of the center, or even out at the toe. This moves his 6'2 frame in so close that his hands are virtually touching his thighs. Most golfers would have a difficult time with a golf club from such a starting point. Compare Furyk's setup to the more textbook setup of Tiger Woods, who begins with his hands 8 inches or so away from his body, a position that promotes a take-away that will put the golf club over his right shoulder at the top, and keep his right elbow tucked against his body. For a human being, this is the classic launch position. Since the beginning of time it has been used to throw a stone, a spear, a baseball, or swing a club. The big muscles of the bodythe back, shoulders and thighsare in control, not the weaker ones in the hands and wrists. The athlete (or hunter in early times) is said to be loaded. His entire body is poised in the optimum power position.

Jim Furyk, by contrast, takes the club away in the manner of a basketball player shooting a hook shot. His arms move back vertically, and at the top his right elbow flies away from his body. Tall players tend toward more upright swings. While this manner of beginning doesn't promote power, it is an early step to facilitate accurate ball-striking. The club's shaft is nearly vertical, like a putter. It moves straight back and straight up, keeping it on path longer, which tends to reinforce in the mind the route along which to bring it back into the ball. At the top of the backswing, Furyk is in the same position as Jack Nicklaus would beclub shaft parallel to the intended line of flight, elbow flying off to who-knows-where. Starting the downswing, Furyk then corrects for his unconventional takeaway by dropping his right elbow into the slot where it needs to be, a move that brings the golf club onto the proper swing path to achieve sound results. It's this downswing beginning that produces the idiosyncratic loop in his swing.

As Mike Furyk describes in a Golf Digest issue in 2001, Jim Furyk's hips underturn during the backswing and overturn coming down. On the downswing, he draws the club in a large arc behind his body (viewing from his right hand side), then pastes his elbow against his right hip at impact. The commentator David Feherty memorably described Furyk's swing as an octopus falling out of a tree.

This move was controversial during Jim Furyk's early career; however, his father never forced him to change what came naturally to him. Jim Furyk's well-known ball-striking precision is now serving him well on the professional tour.

Furyk, however, isn't the first professional golfer to show us that a swing that defies conventionand countless books and articles on golfcan be successful. Nicklaus' swing was upright, with a flying elbowand one of the biggest loopers of all time was Lee Trevino.

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