1976 Masters Tournament

1976 Masters Tournament

Front cover of the 1976 Masters Guide
Tournament information
Dates	April 8–11, 1976
Location	Augusta, Georgia 33.503°N 82.020°W / 33.503; -82.020
Course(s)	Augusta National Golf Club
Organized by	Augusta National Golf Club
Tour(s)	PGA Tour
Statistics
Par	72
Length	7,030 yards (6,428 m)[1]
Field	72 players, 47 after cut
Cut	150 (+6)
Winner's share	$40,000
Champion
Raymond Floyd
271 (−17)
Location map
Augusta National Location in the United States Show map of the United States Augusta National Location in Georgia Show map of Georgia

The 1976 Masters Tournament was the 40th Masters Tournament, held April 8–11 at Augusta National Golf Club in Augusta, Georgia.

Raymond Floyd won his only Masters title, eight strokes ahead of runner-up Ben Crenshaw.^[2] He shot a 131 (−13) over the first two rounds,^[3] then posted two rounds of 70 on the weekend to tie Jack Nicklaus' record of 271 (−17), set in 1965.^[1] In the first three rounds, Floyd was under-par on every par-5, with eleven birdies and an eagle, and his 54-hole total of 201 (−15) was the lowest ever. Defending champion Nicklaus was the nearest pursuer, eight shots back at 209.^[4] It was the second of Floyd's four major titles. Tiger Woods broke the 72-hole record by a stroke 21 years later in 1997 with 270 (−18), which was tied by Jordan Spieth in 2015.

Beginning with this Masters, a sudden-death playoff format was introduced, and originally planned to start at the first hole.^[5] After three years without use, it was changed to begin on the 10th hole in 1979;^[6] used for the first time that year, it ended on the eleventh green. In 2004, the playoff was changed to start on the 18th hole and then alternate with the adjacent 10th hole.^[7] Prior to 1976, playoffs were full 18-hole rounds on Monday, and the last was won by Billy Casper in 1970. The first playoff in 1935 was the exception at 36 holes.

Floyd was the fourth wire-to-wire winner in Masters history, following Craig Wood in 1941, Arnold Palmer in 1960, and Nicklaus in 1972. The next was Jordan Spieth, 39 years later, in 2015.

Field

1. Masters champions

Tommy Aaron, George Archer, Gay Brewer, Billy Casper (8,10,11,12), Charles Coody, Doug Ford, Bob Goalby, Jack Nicklaus (2,4,8,9,10,11,12), Arnold Palmer (8,9), Gary Player (3,4), Sam Snead, Art Wall Jr. (8,11)

• Jack Burke Jr., Jimmy Demaret, Ralph Guldahl, Claude Harmon, Ben Hogan, Herman Keiser, Cary Middlecoff, Byron Nelson, Henry Picard, and Gene Sarazen did not play.

The following categories only apply to Americans

2. U.S. Open champions (last five years)

Lou Graham (9,12), Hale Irwin (8,9,10,11,12), Johnny Miller (8,11,12), Lee Trevino (3,4,8,12)

3. The Open champions (last five years)

Tom Watson (8,9,11), Tom Weiskopf (8,10,11,12)

4. PGA champions (last five years)

5. 1975 U.S. Amateur semi-finalists

Henri DeLozier (a), Keith Fergus (a), Fred Ridley (6,a)

• Andy Bean forfeited his exemption by turning professional.

6. Previous two U.S. Amateur and Amateur champions

Vinny Giles (7,a)

• Jerry Pate (7) forfeited his exemption by turning professional.

7. Members of the 1975 U.S. Walker Cup team

William C. Campbell (a), John Grace (a), Jay Haas (a), Dick Siderowf (a), Curtis Strange (a)

• George Burns, Gary Koch, and Craig Stadler forfeited their exemptions by turning professional.

8. Top 24 players and ties from the 1975 Masters Tournament

Buddy Allin, Rod Curl, Pat Fitzsimons (9), Hubert Green (11), Dave Hill (10,11), Ralph Johnston, Tom Kite, Gene Littler (10,11,12), Allen Miller, Bobby Nichols, J. C. Snead (11,12), Larry Ziegler

9. Top 16 players and ties from the 1975 U.S. Open

Frank Beard, Ben Crenshaw (11), Joe Inman, John Mahaffey, Rik Massengale (11), Bob Murphy (12), Eddie Pearce, Jim Wiechers

10. Top eight players and ties from 1975 PGA Championship

Andy North

11. Winners of PGA Tour events since the previous Masters

Don Bies, Jim Colbert, Raymond Floyd (12), Al Geiberger (12), Bob Gilder, Don Iverson, Don January, Tom Jenkins, Roger Maltbie, Jerry McGee, Dean Refram

12. Members of the U.S. 1975 Ryder Cup team

13. Foreign invitations

Hugh Baiocchi (8), Maurice Bembridge, Bobby Cole (8), Bruce Crampton (10,11), Bruce Devlin (8), Priscillo Diniz (a), Dale Hayes, Graham Marsh (8), Takashi Murakami, Jack Newton, Peter Oosterhuis (9), Masashi Ozaki, Bob Shearer

• Numbers in brackets indicate categories that the player would have qualified under had they been American.

Round summaries

First round

Thursday, April 8, 1976

Place	Player	Score	To par
1	Raymond Floyd	65	−7
2	Andy North	66	−6
T3	Jack Nicklaus	67	−5
	Larry Ziegler
5	Lou Graham	68	−4
T6	Bud Allin	69	−3
	Dave Hill
T8	Ben Crenshaw	70	−2
	Rod Curl
	Rik Massengale

Source:^[8]

Second round

Friday, April 9, 1976

Place	Player	Score	To par
1	Raymond Floyd	65-66=131	−13
2	Jack Nicklaus	67-69=136	−8
3	Hubert Green	71-66=137	−7
4	Larry Ziegler	67-71=138	−6
T5	Ben Crenshaw	70-70=140	−4
	Tom Kite	73-67=140
T7	Charles Coody	72-69=141	−3
	Lou Graham	68-73=141
	Graham Marsh	73-68=141
T10	Dave Hill	69-73=142	−2
	Rik Massengale	70-72=142
	Eddie Pearce	71-71=142

Source:^[3][9]

Third round

Saturday, April 10, 1976

Place	Player	Score	To par
1	Raymond Floyd	65-66-70=201	−15
2	Jack Nicklaus	67-69-73=209	−7
3	Larry Ziegler	67-71-72=210	−6
4	Charles Coody	72-69-70=211	−5
T5	Ben Crenshaw	70-70-72=212	−4
	Tom Kite	73-67-72=212
7	Lou Graham	68-73-72=213	−3
8	Tom Weiskopf	73-71-70=214	−2
T9	Hubert Green	71-66-78=215	−1
	Hale Irwin	71-77-67=215

Source:^[4]

Final round

Sunday, April 11, 1976

Final leaderboard

Champion

Silver Cup winner (low amateur)

(a) = amateur

(c) = past champion

Top 10

Place	Player	Score	To par	Money (US$)
1	Raymond Floyd	65-66-70-70=271	−17	40,000
2	Ben Crenshaw	70-70-72-67=279	−9	25,000
T3	Jack Nicklaus (c)	67-69-73-73=282	−6	16,250
	Larry Ziegler	67-71-72-72=282
T5	Charles Coody (c)	72-69-70-74=285	−3	11,167
	Hale Irwin	71-77-67-70=285
	Tom Kite	73-67-72-73=285
8	Billy Casper (c)	71-76-71-69=287	−1	8,000
T9	Roger Maltbie	72-75-70-71=288	E	6,000
	Graham Marsh	73-68-75-72=288
	Tom Weiskopf	73-71-70-74=288

Leaderboard below the top 10
Place	Player	Score	To par	Money ($)
T12	Jim Colbert	71-72-74-72=289	+1	3,567
	Lou Graham	68-73-72-76=289
	Gene Littler	71-72-74-72=289
T15	Al Geiberger	75-70-73-73=291	+3	2,950
	Dave Hill	69-73-76-73=291
	Jerry McGee	71-73-72-75=291
	Curtis Strange (a)	71-76-73-71=291		0
T19	Buddy Allin	69-76-72-75=292	+4	2,550
	Bruce Devlin	77-69-72-74=292
	Hubert Green	71-66-78-77=292
	Dale Hayes	75-74-73-70=292
T23	Gay Brewer (c)	75-74-71-73=293	+5	2,225
	Rik Massengale	70-72-78-73=293
	Johnny Miller	71-73-74-75=293
	Peter Oosterhuis	76-74-75-68=293
27	Bruce Crampton	74-76-71-73=294	+6	2,000
T28	Bob Murphy	72-74-76-73=295	+7	1,950
	Eddie Pearce	71-71-79-74=295
	Gary Player (c)	73-73-70-79=295
	Lee Trevino	75-75-69-76=295
	Art Wall Jr. (c)	74-71-75-75=295
T33	Don January	73-74-76-73=296	+8	1,900
	Masashi Ozaki	72-75-75-74=296
	Tom Watson	77-73-76-70=296
36	Joe Inman	74-75-71-77=297	+9	1,850
T37	Takashi Murakami	74-71-80-73=298	+10	1,800
	Andy North	66-81-75-76=298
T39	Bob Gilder	71-75-76-77=299	+11	1,750
	John Mahaffey	72-74-78-75=299
	Bob Shearer	73-75-76-75=299
42	Tommy Aaron (c)	73-76-77-74=300	+12	1,700
T43	Frank Beard	74-75-78-74=301	+13	1,650
	J. C. Snead	72-77-76-76=301
45	Pat Fitzsimons	71-79-77-76=303	+15	1,600
46	Dick Siderowf (a)	76-73-77-81=307	+19	0
47	Bobby Cole	75-74-78-82=309	+21	1,500
CUT	Bob Goalby (c)	76-75=151	+7
	Sam Snead (c)	72-79=151
	Rod Curl	70-82=152	+8
	George Archer (c)	74-79=153	+9
	Don Bies	76-77=153
	Keith Fergus (a)	76-77=153
	Jay Haas (a)	76-77=153
	Don Iverson	73-80=153
	Jim Wiechers	74-79=153
	Hugh Baiocchi	78-76=154	+10
	Doug Ford (c)	74-80=154
	John Grace (a)	75-79=154
	Tom Jenkins	75-79=154
	Henri DeLozier (a)	75-80=155	+11
	Priscillo Diniz (a)	78-77=155
	Bobby Nichols	78-77=155
	Arnold Palmer (c)	74-81=155
	Allen Miller	79-77=156	+12
	Dean Refram	77-79=156
	William C. Campbell (a)	78-80=158	+14
	Fred Ridley (a)	77-81=158
	Ralph Johnston	76-83=159	+15
	Jack Newton	76-83=159
	Maurice Bembridge	78-86=164	+20
	Vinny Giles (a)	83-81=164

Sources:^[10][11]

Scorecard

Hole	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18
Par	4	5	4	3	4	3	4	5	4	4	4	3	5	4	5	3	4	4
Floyd	−15	−15	−15	−14	−15	−15	−15	−15	−15	−15	−15	−16	−16	−16	−17	−17	−17	−17
Crenshaw	−3	−3	−4	−4	−4	−4	−5	−6	−6	−6	−6	−6	−8	−9	−9	−9	−9	−9
Nicklaus	−7	−7	−6	−6	−6	−6	−6	−7	−6	−6	−6	−6	−7	−7	−7	−6	−6	−6
Ziegler	−6	−6	−6	−6	−7	−7	−7	−7	−7	−7	−6	−6	−7	−7	−7	−7	−6	−6

Cumulative tournament scores, relative to par

Eagle

Birdie

Bogey

References

1. Parascenzo, Marino (April 12, 1976). "Floyd enjoys a Sunday stroll". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. p. 16.
2. Jenkins, Dan (April 16, 1977). "It was Ray all the way". Sports Illustrated. p. 18.
3. "Ray Floyd's 5-wood strangling Masters". Eugene Register-Guard. Oregon. Associated Press. April 10, 1976. p. 1B.
4. "Eight ahead, Floyd looks like a safe bet". Eugene Register-Guard. Oregon. UPI. April 11, 1976. p. 1C.
5. "Masters goes to sudden death". Sarasota Herald-Tribune. Florida. Associated Press. February 6, 1976. p. 2E.
6. "In sudden death, Masters playoff shifts to no. 10". Observer-Reporter. Washington, Pennsylvania. Associated Press. April 11, 1979. p. D2.
7. "Masters playoff format is changed". CNN.com. April 7, 2004. Retrieved April 7, 2013.
8. "Floyd a new man with Masters lead". Milwaukee Sentinel. Associated Press. April 9, 1976. p. 1, part 2.
9. "Golf: Masters, at Augusta". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. April 10, 1976. p. 10.
10. "Masters – Past Winners & Results". Augusta National Inc. Retrieved April 20, 2021.
11. "Past results – Masters tournament". PGA Tour. Retrieved April 20, 2021.

External links

• Masters.com – past winners and results
• Augusta.com – 1976 Masters leaderboard and scorecards