00:00Famous for being one of the most prolific golfers of his generation, many of you may
00:04now only know Greg Norman as the CEO of a controversial breakaway golf league. Whether
00:10you know him for his golf or his LIV golf exploits, let's get to know more about the
00:16career and life of Greg Norman. Born in Queensland, Australia, Norman played rugby and cricket
00:23in his youth while he aspired to be a professional surfer. His mother, Tony, was a single figure
00:28handicapper and taught Greg how to play golf when he was just 15. Within 18 months of that,
00:34Norman went from a 27 handicapper to scratch. He would then turn pro six years later in 1976.
00:41Norman joined the European Tour in 1977, securing his first win in his debut season. After much
00:47success, he joined the PGA Tour in 1983 and won his first event over there in 1984. Throughout
00:54his decorated career, Norman would go on to claim 88 professional titles, including two majors,
01:00a players' championship, 20 PGA Tour wins and 14 European Tour wins.
01:05So let's dig a little deeper into those two major wins I just mentioned.
01:09Norman's first major win was at the 1986 Open Championship at Turnberry and his second came,
01:15also at the Open Championship, in 1993 at Royal St George's. However,
01:19Norman could never quite get over the line in the other three majors. He had a whopping 28 top 10
01:25finishes in the rest of the major championships combined and came runner-up eight times. At the
01:301996 Masters, he relinquished a six-shot lead on the final day to finish second to Nick Faldo.
01:37Shall we dig a little bit deeper again into that 1996 Masters, probably the most infamous moment of
01:43Norman's career. In the first round, he shot only the second ever 63 recorded at the Masters,
01:49birdieing nine at the final 12 holes Augusta National. He followed that up with solid rounds
01:54of 69 and 71 to hold a six-shot lead over Nick Faldo heading into the final round.
02:00Norman still maintained a four-shot lead after seven holes on the final day,
02:04but proceeded to lose five shots over the next five holes to hand the tournament on a plate to Faldo.
02:10In the end, Faldo shot 67 on the Sunday while Norman shot 78 and he finished in second place,
02:16five shots behind Sir Nick. To this day, it is one of the greatest collapses in major championship
02:22history. It is also the largest ever lead blown in a PGA tournament, a record that has yet to be
02:28broken. His nickname is the Great White Shark, which he picked up at the 1981 Masters while he was
02:34introducing himself to the press. Norman, who led the event after the second day, was a relatively
02:39unknown player at the time. But when asked by one of the media where he was from, he said,
02:44I grew up in Queensland, Australia. I grew up on the Great Barrier Reef. I've dived with sharks and
02:51that was what I did as a kid. The next day, the local paper at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution
02:56had the Great White Shark in their headline. Despite his relative lack of success in the major
03:02championships, Norman is still regarded as one of the greatest talents of his generation. His dominance over
03:08the world of golf in the 1980s and the 1990s is probably best expressed via the official world
03:14golf rankings. He finished the year on top of the rankings on seven separate occasions and spent 331
03:21weeks as the world's number one golfer. This haul of ranking points is second only to Tiger Woods
03:26and Norman was also the first person in tour history to surpass $10 million in career earnings.
03:32So let's move away from his exploits on the golf course and start to learn more about Greg Norman,
03:37the Entrepreneur. He founded Great White Shark Enterprises in 1993 after leaving his previous
03:43management group. Starting with course design and apparel in the late 1980s and early 1990s,
03:48the larger company now represents over a dozen smaller companies. They include things like real estate,
03:55eyewear, golf carts, wakeboarding complexes, beef products, restaurants, investments and wine.
04:03The company, which is now simply known as Greg Norman Company, reports hundreds of millions of dollars
04:09in revenue annually. Norman is the CEO of LIV Golf Investments. Funded entirely by the Sovereign
04:16Wealth Fund of Saudi Arabia, LIV Golf Investments launched the Live Golf Invitational Series in June 2022.
04:23Thanks to the huge spending power of the Saudi Public Investment Fund, the series has attracted the likes of
04:28Phil Mickelson, Dustin Johnson and Brooks Koepka away from the PGA Tour. The LIV Tour is one of the
04:34clearest examples of sports washing that can currently be seen in the industry. Sports washing is the
04:40practice of a government using sport to improve a tarnished reputation. It's used to try and direct
04:45attention away from poor human rights records and corruption within the government of a nation state.
04:51Saudi Arabia has been using sport in this way for a number of years now to cover up its appalling
04:56human
04:56rights record with F1 Grand Prix, boxing matches and one-off football matches being hosted in the
05:03country. As well as recently buying Newcastle United Football Club, the Public Investment Fund has turned
05:08its sights onto golf and Greg Norman is, at the time of recording, the current mouthpiece for the Saudi
05:14regime funding this breakaway series. Moving away from his highly controversial involvement with LIV Golf,
05:20Norman had a very brief broadcasting career. In 2014, Fox Sports announced that Norman would join Joe
05:26Buck as part of its coverage of USGA championships. Following plenty of criticism after his on-air
05:32performance at the 2015 US Open, Norman was let go from his role at Fox Sports in January 2016.
05:39Norman has been married to interior designer Kirsten Kuttner since 2010. His first wife was American
05:44flight attendant Laura Andrassi and the pair were together from 1981 until 2006. They had two children
05:51together as well called Greg Jr. and Morgan Lee. He was also married to former world number one tennis
05:57player Chris Everett, but the pair's marriage only lasted 15 months. Greg Norman has led quite the life
06:04on and off the course. If you hadn't heard of him prior to his LIV Golf exploits, hopefully you've learned
06:10a little bit about how good he was on the course prior to his extensive entrepreneurial endeavours. If you want
06:17to
06:17hear more about the LIV Golf series or find out more about some of golf's greatest players, check out the
06:22news and tour sections on the Golf Monthly website.
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