Even before Jon Rahm was born, the crème de la crème of golf, such as Tiger Woods and Fred Couples, were already well-known names. Nevertheless, Jon Rahm has managed to achieve his own success. He has stepped up to the plate and left no doubt about his potential. It cannot be denied that Jon has a long and successful career ahead of him.
Jon Rahm Biography
Although Jon Rahm lives his dream in the United States, he was born on 10 November 1994 in Barrika in the Spanish Basque Country. Rahm moved to the USA for his college education. Here he attended Arizona State University. There he played for the school’s golf team, the Arizona State Sun Devils. Here the young Rahm began to make a name for himself. He set a college golf record and won 11 tournaments. A record that was only beaten by Phil Mickelson’s 16 college tournament wins.
In the 2014 edition of the Eisenhower Trophy, he was the individual winner. Perhaps the greatest distinction in Jon Rahm’s amateur career is that he is the only golfer ever to have spent 60 weeks at the top of the amateur world golf rankings. His first stint began on April 1, 2015, and lasted 25 weeks. Later he lost the top spot, regained it, and kept it for another 35 weeks.
In 2015 and 2016 Jon Rahm also won the Ben Hogan Award two years in a row. No player before him had won the award more than once. Unfortunately, he would lose to Derek Bard in the quarter-finals if he became a US amateur in 2015. By winning the Pac 12 Championship, he ended his college career at a high point. In the same year, he also secured the regional NCAA championship and advanced to the national championship, where he finished third.
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Jon Rahm turns professional
Rahm became a professional in 2016. His first event as a professional was the Quicken Loans National. He finished the event in third place with a draw. Third place was enough to rejoin the US Open, from which he had been exempted before the Quicken Loans National. He also competed in the RBC Canadian Open, where he received a temporary special membership for the rest of the season. By the end of 2016, he had accumulated enough points to receive a PGA Tour card for the following year.
By then, Rahm had established himself as a talent to look out for. He began 2017 with a bang. In January, he won the Farmers Insurance Open title, his first title on the PGA Tour. With this, he rose from 137th place to 46th place in the official golf world rankings. This victory also opened the door for him to participate in other important championships such as the US Masters, the PGA Championship, and the World Golf Championship. Jon opened his World Golf Championship event card by finishing two shots behind winner Dustin Johnson.
Three weeks later, he met Johnson again in the Dell Technology sponsored WGC Match Play. He had to beat Kevin Campbell, Shane Lowry, Sergio Garcia, Charles Howell III, Soren Kjeldsen, and Bill Haas on his way to a championship rematch with Dustin Johnson. Unfortunately, he became runner-up, but his efforts so far have taken him to a career-promising 14th place in the world rankings.
Rahm continues to have an excellent 2017, finishing 27th at his first US Masters tournament, 4th at the Wells-Fargo Championship, and also runner-up at the Dean & DeLuca Invitational. These results brought him into the top 10 of the world ranking list.
Next, Jon took part in his first European Tour, which started with the Open de France, where he finished in 10th place. His performances in the other Tour events – the Dubai Duty-Free Irish Open, the FedEx Cup Playoffs, and the DP World Tour Championship in Dubai – earned him the European Tour Rookie of the Year.
In 2018 Jon Rahm picked up where he left off. At the Sentry Tournament of Champions in Hawaii, he revived his rivalry on the course with Johnson. Here he finished second again, eight shots behind his rival. Later that month, however, he secured victory in his second career on the PGA Tour by winning the CareerBuilder Challenge in a sudden-death playoff with Andrew Landry.
This victory meant two things for young Rahm. It put him in second place in the world rankings. It also meant that he had secured four wins in only 38 professional starts – a ratio that was only second to Tiger Wood’s record.
Jon Rahm’s Girlfriend, Wife, Family
Jon’s family still lives in Spain, where he grew up. His father Edorta Rahm, his mother, Angela Rahm, and his brother Eriz Rahm still support Jon. He still takes time to visit them occasionally between tournaments.
There is no information about Jon’s dating history before Kelley Cahill. The duo met when Jon was still at Arizona State University and they have been a couple ever since. According to the golf pro, Kelley is more than just a pretty face. He says that she accounts for a large part of his success on the golf course.
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Kelley helped Rahm fix his diet. She had him perform a series of medical tests to help him identify and cut out the unimportant parts of his diet. In the end, he cut out things like sugar, gluten, dairy products, olive oil, etc.
Rahm is not worried about whether Kelley knows what she is doing; after all, she knows her way around athletics. Kelley was a javelin thrower when she was at Arizona State University. Jon has also openly praised her cooking skills in interviews.
Quick Facts about Jon Rahm
Jon is close friends with Tim Mickelson
Tim is the younger brother of professional golfer Phil Mickelson. During his time in Arizona, Tim was the head coach of the Arizona State Men’s Golf Team, a position he left to manage Jon Rahm’s career. However, he later left Jon to work full-time as a caddie for his older brother Phil Mickelson.
Jon learned English through rap music
Jon talked at length about his love of hip-hop. He names Eminem and Kendrick Lamar as his favorites. But rap played a more critical role in his assimilation into the USA. Rahm says he memorized rap songs to learn to pronounce certain words, not necessarily to learn new words. He said this exercise also trained him to communicate faster in English without pausing.
Rahm credits his father for pushing him to pursue his dream
Jon’s father, Edorta Rahm, was the one who pushed Rahm to make the decision to move to the United States. Before his father’s contribution, he was undecided. Edorta Rahm had the foresight to tell his son that the future of golf lay in the United States and that this was the only place where he could reach his full potential.