''Shell's Wonderful World of Golf'' was a televised series of

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

matches which began in the 1960s. The program was sponsored by

Shell Oil Shell plc is a British multinational oil and gas company headquartered in London, England. Shell is a public limited company with a primary listing on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) and secondary listings on Euronext Amsterdam and the New ...

. It was a part of the tradition of "challenge matches" between pairs of

professional golfer A professional golfer is somebody who receives payments or financial rewards in the sport of golf that are directly related to their skill or reputation. A person who earns money by teaching or playing golf is traditionally considered a "golf pr ...

s, which were the earliest form of professional golf competition, but have now been almost entirely replaced by large field tournaments. On a few occasions, three players competed (see table). No matches were staged between 1970 and 1994, when the show was restarted by Jack Nicklaus Productions and hosted by Gary Player. Each contest was played as a

stroke play Stroke play, also known as medal play, is a scoring system in the sport of golf in which the total number of strokes is counted over one or more rounds of 18 holes. In stroke play, the winner is the player who has taken the fewest strokes over the ...

match, rather than

match play Match play is a scoring system for golf in which a player, or team, earns a point for each hole in which they have bested their opponents; as opposed to stroke play, in which the total number of strokes is counted over one or more rounds of 18 h ...

. It began as a pre-recorded one-hour program on Sunday afternoons, and was notable for also including information about the host country for that week's show. It also included some of the conversations between the contestants between the shots. As such, it allowed the audience to feel they were part of a foursome traveling with the competitors and host, as opposed to being just a spectator in the gallery.

Matches through 2003

* (a) denotes amateur

References

{{Golf on television Golf on television Golf Channel original programming 1961 American television series debuts 1970 American television series endings 1994 American television series debuts 2000s American television series 2010s American television series American television series revived after cancellation