January

Rory McIlroy got 2023 off to the perfect start, going head-to-head with Patrick Reed at the Dubai Desert Classic and emerging triumphant. Eight months later he top-scored at the Ryder Cup for the first time but, in-between, his major championship drought stretched to nearly 10 years. The good news? His fourth, and last, major triumph came in the PGA Championship at Valhalla and it returns there in 2024.

February

Reviewing the first two years of her professional career, Lilia Vu admitted: “I was dead last at almost every event.” She contemplated quitting, but her mum wouldn’t hear of it, insisting that her daughter “could be the best”. Vu ended 2020 ranked 1330th in the world, rebuilt her career on the second tier, claimed a first LPGA win this February, claimed two majors in the summer and closed the year as the World No. 1. Mum knows best.

March

Jon Rahm entered March off a run of 10 straight top-10s, five of them wins and he opened the Arnold Palmer Invitational with a 65 for a two-shot lead. Then it all went wrong. He finished that week T39th, withdrew from The Players Championship, didn’t make the knockout stages of the WGC Match Play and four-putted the first green at the Masters. In a match-bet for what jacket he’d end that week in, a straight one was favourite yet he turned it all around in magnificent style to wear green. (Oh, and he also became somewhat newsworthy in December…)

April

Brooks Koepka started Sunday at the Masters with a four-shot lead through 42 holes and ended it four shots back after 72. “I tried,” he said afterwards. “I gave it my all so I can sleep at night.” Turns out, however, that he didn’t. A month later, following redemptive victory in the PGA Championship, he said of his Augusta experience: “Spent the whole night thinking about it. I learned and I knew I was never going to do that again.”

May

Koepka won his fifth major by withstanding the final round challenge of Viktor Hovland. It was the third major in a row the Norwegian had threatened to win, prompting him to say: “It sucks right now.” How did he respond? Two weeks later he won the Memorial Tournament, by season’s end he was the FedEx Cup winner, by summer’s end he’d been instrumental at the Ryder Cup and he ends the year on the shoulders of the world’s top three.

June

Ahead of May every time Wyndham Clark had entered a weekend in the top six on the PGA Tour he’d gone backwards by Sunday teatime. The trend ended with victory in the Wells Fargo Championship and he conceded: “I didn’t think I’d ever win.” In June he was at it again, denying McIlroy with an accomplished final round performance that claimed victory in the US Open.

July

Brian Harman mused in mid-June that: “I’ve been playing well where I’m supposed to play well, at Colonial, Harbour Town, places like that.” He then finished top 12 in his next three starts, each of them yet more courses he’d have expected to play well on. Perhaps he was thinking, after finishing T19th and a fast-finishing sixth in the 2021 and 2022 editions, that he ought to play well in July’s Open, as well. Whatever, that’s exactly what he did. In fact, his victory was a procession.

August

On the last day of the month, Ludvig Åberg carded a 64 to sit one shot off the lead in the European Masters. Three days later he added another 64 to win for the first time as a professional, just weeks after leaving college. A month later he was a star at the Ryder Cup, in November he won on the PGA Tour and a veteran of the latter is said to have uttered: “I hadn’t heard of him and then, after playing six holes with him, I thought he was the next f**king Tiger Woods.”

September

Spain’s Carlota Ciganda was disqualified for slow play at the Evian Championship, crashed out of the AIG Women’s Open with a 77, knew that, after going 3-0-0 on Solheim Cup debut, she had gone 1-8-4 since, and, when she made a belated introduction to September’s match on home soil, Europe was trailing 4-0. Not great preparation but she then won all four of her matches and the last of those points retained the Cup amid dramatic scenes. One of the great turnarounds.

October

Back in 2021, a significant period of US dominance in the Ryder Cup seemed inevitable. But LIV Golf weakened the US team, cleared Europe of an ageing golden generation, and it also led to Henrik Stenson being replaced by Luke Donald. The Englishman proved to be astute and flint-eyed in completing his Italian Job and, now reinstated, he’ll now hope to plot a fairytale in New York (maybe not – whatever happens at a raucous Bethpage Black is unlikely to be bedtime reading-worthy).

November

Camilo Villegas was a star of the game who lost the knack of scoring and a father who endured the pain of his daughter dying at a young age. At last month’s Bermuda Championship he won again and said: “I love this game. It has given me so many great things, but in the process it kicks your butt. Life has given me so many great things and in the process it kicks my butt, too.” He composed himself and added: “My little one is up there watching, smiling. She’s where she needs to be after a long fight.”

December

When Scottie Scheffler retained the Phoenix Open and won THE PLAYERS Championship few would have predicted that he wouldn’t win again until his final start of the year, at December’s Hero World Challenge. His putting couldn’t keep up with his long game heroics and, eventually, he couldn’t ignore the chatter about his flat-stick. But he worked hard on the greens between his tears at the Ryder Cup and the Hero and, if that victory is any guide, he will be a major threat again in 2024.