Who’s Who in 2022, Sport: Cameron Smith

In eight months this year, Cameron Smith rose from 22 to number 2 in the world, broke records and won the fifth major, the Players Championship.

But the best was yet to come.

The former Pine Rivers State High School student won the oldest and most prestigious tournament in the world, the 150^th Open Championship at the home of golf, St Andrews - and joined the LIV golf tour.

It has been a remarkable year for the Redcliffe-born, former Bray Park resident who learned to play golf with his dad Des at Wantima Country Club in Brendale.

He started with a PGA Tour record breaking 34-under par total to win the Tournament of Champions in Hawaii in January.

Then, with a sensational final round of 66, Smith secured The Players Championship (dubbed the fifth major) and was closing in on the world’s top ranked players.

A similar finale saw him win the oldest and most prestigious tournament in the world – The Open Championship on its 150^th anniversary at St Andrews, the home of golf.

Trailing by four shots entering the final nine holes, Smith had five successive birdies from the 10^th to win by one shot and lift the famous claret jug.

Weeks later Smith, now ranked second in the world, was announced as the biggest signing by LIV, a breakaway golf tour and won his first tournament in just his second start on that tour.

Back in Australia for the first time in three years, Smith recently won the Australian PGA title, for a third time, by three shots.

About Cameron Smith

Cameron Smith’s golfing career started on the fairways of Wantima Country Club in Brendale, where he is still a member, playing with his father Des.

At the age of 12, Cameron first beat his dad and set off on an amateur and professional career which has soared this year.

Born in August 1993 and growing up in Bray Park, Smith won the Australian Stroke Play Championship, Australian Boys Amateur and Victorian Junior Masters.

He retained Australian Amateur Stroke Play Championship in 2012 and added the Australian Amateur Championship in 2013 before turning professional on the Australian PGA Tour.

In a stunning debut season on the Asian Tour, Smith had seven top 10 finishes including tied fourth on the CIMB Classic, co-sanctioned by the PGA Tour.

With sponsors’ exemptions, his career on the US tour began and in 2015 Smith qualified for the US Open where he finished tied fourth, which earned Special Temporary Membership for the rest of the year and to the 2016 Masters.

It was in 2017 when Smith hit the headlines winning his first US PGA Tour event, the Zurich Classic of New Orleans, with Jonas Blixt, sinking the winning putt in a play-off.

The same year, Wantima Country Club hosted the first Cameron Smith Junior Classic which, in 2022, has expanded to a two-day event with an additional nine-hole challenge.

His first individual win came at the Australian PGA Championship, beating Jordan Zunic in a play-off and again the following year, this time beating Marc Leishman by two strokes.

Now one of Australia’s leading players, Smith beat former world number one Justin Thomas 2&1 in the 2019 Presidents Cup to establish himself as a top match play golfer.

The 2020 Sony Open had Smith’s name added to its list of winners in another play-off and three months later he tied for second at the Masters becoming the first player to shoot four rounds in the 60s (67, 68, 69, 69).

A second Zurich Cup win followed, this time with Leishman who he also partnered as the Australian men’s team at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics Games, which were delayed by COVID until last year.