The Sony Open in Hawaii is a professional

golf Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various Golf club, clubs to hit a Golf ball, ball into a series of holes on a golf course, course in as few strokes as possible. Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standa ...

tournament on the

PGA Tour The PGA Tour (stylized as PGA TOUR by its officials) is the organizer of professional golf tours in North America. It organizes most of the events on the flagship annual series of tournaments also known as the PGA Tour, the PGA Tour Champion ...

, and is part of the tour's FedEx Cup Series. It has been contested at the

Waialae Country Club Waialae Country Club is a private country club in East Honolulu, Hawaii. Founded in 1927 and designed by Seth Raynor, it is a par 72 championship course at from the Championship tees. From the Members tees at , the course rating is 71.8 with ...

Honolulu Honolulu ( ; ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Hawaii, located in the Pacific Ocean. It is the county seat of the Consolidated city-county, consolidated City and County of Honol ...

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; ) is an island U.S. state, state of the United States, in the Pacific Ocean about southwest of the U.S. mainland. One of the two Non-contiguous United States, non-contiguous U.S. states (along with Alaska), it is the only sta ...

, since the event's modern-day inception as the Hawaiian Open in November

1965 Events January–February * January 14 – The First Minister of Northern Ireland and the Taoiseach of the Republic of Ireland meet for the first time in 43 years. * January 20 ** Lyndon B. Johnson is Second inauguration of Lynd ...

. In addition to the usual PGA Tour eligibility criteria, the Sony Open may invite up to three professional golfers from emerging markets.

History

Originally a mid-autumn event for its first five editions, it was skipped in

1970 Events January * January 1 – Unix time epoch reached at 00:00:00 UTC. * January 5 – The 7.1 1970 Tonghai earthquake, Tonghai earthquake shakes Tonghai County, Yunnan province, China, with a maximum Mercalli intensity scale, Mercalli ...

as it moved to its winter slot in early February

1971 * The year 1971 had three partial solar eclipses (Solar eclipse of February 25, 1971, February 25, Solar eclipse of July 22, 1971, July 22 and Solar eclipse of August 20, 1971, August 20) and two total lunar eclipses (February 1971 lunar eclip ...

. Currently, it is held in mid-January and is the first full-field event of the calendar year, following the

Tournament of Champions A tournament is a competition involving at least three competitors, all participating in a sport or game. More specifically, the term may be used in either of two overlapping senses: # One or more competitions held at a single venue and concentr ...

Maui Maui (; Hawaiian language, Hawaiian: ) is the second largest island in the Hawaiian archipelago, at 727.2 square miles (1,883 km2). It is the List of islands of the United States by area, 17th-largest in the United States. Maui is one of ...

. The front and back nines of Waialae are switched for the PGA Tour event, finishing at the dogleg ninth hole. The first lead sponsor was

United Airlines United Airlines, Inc. is a Major airlines of the United States, major airline in the United States headquartered in Chicago, Chicago, Illinois that operates an extensive domestic and international route network across the United States and six ...

1991 It was the final year of the Cold War, which had begun in 1947. During the year, the Soviet Union Dissolution of the Soviet Union, collapsed, leaving Post-soviet states, fifteen sovereign republics and the Commonwealth of Independent State ...

, succeeded by current sponsor

Sony is a Japanese multinational conglomerate (company), conglomerate headquartered at Sony City in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. The Sony Group encompasses various businesses, including Sony Corporation (electronics), Sony Semiconductor Solutions (i ...

1999 1999 was designated as the International Year of Older Persons. Events January * January 1 – The euro currency is established and the European Central Bank assumes its full powers. * January 3 – The Mars Polar Lander is launc ...

. There have been five multiple winners of the tournament, all two-time champions:

Hubert Green Hubert Myatt Green (December 28, 1946 – June 19, 2018) was an American professional golfer. Green won 19 PGA Tour events including two major championships: the 1977 U.S. Open and the 1985 PGA Championship. He was inducted into the World Go ...

Corey Pavin Corey Allen Pavin (born November 16, 1959) is an American professional golfer. In 1982, Pavin turned professional but failed at PGA Tour Qualifying School. The following year, he turned to overseas where he had much success, winning South Africa' ...

Lanny Wadkins Jerry Lanston "Lanny" Wadkins Jr. (born December 5, 1949) is an American professional golfer. He won 21 tournaments on the PGA Tour, including one Men's major golf championships, major, the 1977 PGA Championship. He ranked in the top 10 of the Of ...

Ernie Els Theodore Ernest Els (; born 17 October 1969) is a South African professional golfer. A former , he is nicknamed "the Big Easy" due to his physical stature along with his fluid golf swing. Among his more than 70 career victories are four major ...

, and

Jimmy Walker James John Walker (June 19, 1881November 18, 1946), known colloquially as Jimmy Walker and Beau James, was an American attorney, lyricist, and Democratic Party politician who served as the 97th mayor of New York City from 1926 until his resign ...

. All have won major championships. The tournament is currently organized by Friends of Hawaii Charities. In

1983 1983 saw both the official beginning of the Internet and the first mobile cellular telephone call. Events January * January 1 – The migration of the ARPANET to TCP/IP is officially completed (this is considered to be the beginning of the ...

, forty-year-old

Isao Aoki is a Japanese professional golfer. He was elected to the World Golf Hall of Fame in 2004. Early life Aoki was born in Abiko, Chiba, Japan. He was introduced to golf while caddying at the Abiko Golf Club as a schoolboy. Professional career I ...

became

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

's first winner on the PGA Tour. He holed out a wedge shot for an eagle-3 on the 72nd hole to beat Jack Renner by a stroke. In 1998,

John Huston John Marcellus Huston ( ; August 5, 1906 – August 28, 1987) was an American film director, screenwriter and actor. He wrote the screenplays for most of the 37 feature films he directed, many of which are today considered classics. He rec ...

broke the then PGA Tour scoring record to par. He shot 28 under par, beating

Ben Hogan William Ben Hogan (August 13, 1912 – July 25, 1997) was an American professional golfer who is generally considered to be one of the greatest players in the history of the game. He is notable for his profound influence on golf swing theory, hi ...

's record originally set in 1945. The Sony Open gained attention for granting four consecutive sponsor invitations
PGA Tour Exemption #11
to

Michelle Wie Michelle Sung Wie West (; born October 11, 1989) is an American professional golfer who plays on the LPGA Tour. At age 10, she became the youngest player to qualify for a USGA amateur championship. Wie also became the youngest winner of the ...

, the first in

2004 2004 was designated as an International Year of Rice by the United Nations, and the International Year to Commemorate the Struggle Against Slavery and Its Abolition (by UNESCO). Events January * January 3 – Flash Airlines Flight 60 ...

when she was age 14. She missed the cut in all four appearances, and did not receive one of the four available sponsor exemptions in 2008. One of the invitations went to Alex Ching, a 17-year-old former high school classmate of Wie. In 2007, amateur

Tadd Fujikawa Tadd Fujikawa (born January 8, 1991) is an American professional golfer. Playing as an amateur at age 15, he qualified for the 2006 U.S. Open, the youngest golfer ever to do so. In 2007, at age 16 and 4 days, he made the cut in a PGA Tour event ...

become the second youngest player ever (16 years, 4 days) to make a 36-hole cut in an official

event. His achievement was highlighted by a eagle putt on his 36th hole, Waialae's 551-yard par-5 18th. Incidentally, the PGA Tour's 2006 media guide shows that the youngest player ever to make a 36-hole cut in an official Tour event was Bob Panasik (15 years, 8 months, and 20 days) in 1957 at the Canadian Open, 3 months younger than Fujikawa. Preparations for the 2018 Sony Open were briefly disrupted by a false emergency alert stating that a

ballistic missile A ballistic missile is a type of missile that uses projectile motion to deliver warheads on a target. These weapons are powered only during relatively brief periods—most of the flight is unpowered. Short-range ballistic missiles (SRBM) typic ...

had been launched toward

. Staff members reportedly attempted to take shelter in the players' locker room, the media center was ordered to evacuate, and several players posted messages on social media about the erroneous alert, which was sent to all smartphones in the state. The alert was ultimately determined to have been sent in error. Before the final round, Golf Channel cameramen also staged a walkout.

Winners

''Note: Green highlight indicates scoring records.'' ;Previous incarnations recognized by PGA Tour

Records

*Tournament record: 253 (

Justin Thomas Justin Louis Thomas (born April 29, 1993) is an American professional golfer who plays on the PGA Tour and is a former List of World Number One male golfers, world number one. In 2017, Thomas experienced a breakout year, winning five PGA Tour e ...

, 2017) *54-hole record: 188 (

, 2017) *36-hole record: 123 (

, 2017) *18-hole record: 59 (

, 2017)

References

Notes

External links

*
Coverage on the PGA Tour's official site
{{coord, 21.272, -157.775, display=t, type:event PGA Tour events Golf tournaments in Hawaii Sports in Honolulu Sony Recurring sporting events established in 1965 1965 establishments in Hawaii