DELRAY BEACH, Fla. – Everything you need to know about the competitive nature of Bernhard Langer can be encapsulated in this one short story. In the late 1990s, the European Tour staged a skills competition that included a long-drive contest at Wentworth Club in England ahead of the BMW PGA Championship. As Langer recounted, “I’m not the tallest, not the strongest, and I was already in my 40s, but that didn’t mean I didn’t want to win.”
But let’s be serious, Langer had virtually no chance. Even in his salad days, he lacked a cannon. Yet in the era of the long ball, Langer still managed to prosper, as he did in the contest.