Virginia golfers have won 16 "major" championships and almost 200 PGA-sanctioned events. They have played in almost 30 Ryder Cups, nine Walker Cups and two Solheim Cups.

Six resorts rank among America’s top 100. Dozens of its courses, crafted by world-famous designers, are part of every list of the country’s finest places to play.

Arnold Palmer and Kathy Whitworth won the last tournaments of brilliant careers on Virginia soil. One of the greatest sudden-death playoffs in women’s golf – Nancy Lopez, Juli Inkster, Betsy King, and Rosie Jones – took place in Virginia. Annika Sorenstam also won her last career tournament in Virginia at Michelob ULTRA Open at Kingsmill, widely considered one of the LPGA's top five events.

Sam Snead rolled down the mountain from Hot springs just when the game was looking for an idol to follow Bobby Jones. Snead, who taught himself the game using a "club" he whittled himself, won 81 tournaments, more than any man ever.

When no one seemed capable of duplicating Ben Hogan’s consecutive U.S. Open victories, along came Curtis Strange of Virginia Beach to win America’s greatest championship in 1988 and ’89.

Richmond’s Lanny Wadkins won the first major decided in a sudden-death playoff, the 1977 PGA. Seven years earlier, Wadkins became the first Virginian to capture the U.S. Amateur.

In the first tournament ever televised, Lew Worsham of Newport News gave the world something to remember. The 1947 U.S. Open winner holed a shot from the fairway to beat fellow Virginian Chandler Harper of Portsmouth at the 1953 All-American tournament in Chicago.

Harper, who won the 1950 PGA Championship, came back the next year at the Texas Open to shoot back-to-back 63s. It’s the lowest 54-hole total ever.

Bill Battle of Charlottesville and Richmond’s Harry Easterly served as presidents of the U.S. Golf Association. Tim Finchem of Virginia Beach is the commissioner of the PGA Tour.