Winning the Grand Slam In Golf Makes You Part of a Super Exclusive Club

After winning the Masters on April 13, Rory McIlroy has entered an exclusive club. The golfer is now a Grand Slam winner, which means that he has entered one of the most exclusive clubs in professional golf.

Following the news that he had become a Grand Slam winner, many wondered who else had won a Grand Slam and what winning a Grand Slam actually means. Here's what we know.

The golfers who have won a Grand Slam are, perhaps unsurprisingly, some of the sport's most legendary performers. Only six people have ever done it: Gene Sarazen, Ben Hogan, Gary Player, Jack Nicklaus, Tiger Woods, and Rory McIlroy.

Winning a Grand Slam is a feat that proves you're one of the most dominant golfers not just of your era, but in the sport's long and storied history.

The traditional definition of the Grand Slam in golf is essentially the same as what the term means in tennis. It means winning all four major golfing championships in the same calendar year. That definition is not one that any golfer has actually achieved, though, at least not in the modern era. Bobby Jones accomplished the feat back in 1930, before the establishment of the Masters.

The four championships you need to win are:

• The Masters (held the second Sunday in April)
• The PGA Championship (held the third Sunday in May)
• The U.S. Open (held the third Sunday in June)
• The Open Championship (held the third Friday in July)

The Masters is the newest of these tournaments and the one that started the modern era of Grand Slams.

Tiger Woods, meanwhile, has come the closest of any modern golfer to achieving the feat, holding all four titles at the same time while not having won them in a single year.

What Rory achieved, along with the other listed golfers, is a career Grand Slam, which means winning all four major championships over the course of your career. Rory has five total championships, including his recent Masters win.

The Tiger Slam is a variation on the same idea, and it refers to holding the titles to all four major championships at the same time, even if not in a calendar year. Tiger is the only golfer to have done this, which is why it's named after him.

Although the traditional Grand Slam of winning all four majors in the same year has not yet been achieved in golf, Rory still entered a very exclusive club.

Rory has only done this a single time, but Tiger and Jack Nicklaus have each done it three times, and each of them has won 18 total times. Rory's failure to win the Masters for so long was a huge monkey on his back for years. Now that it's gone, he has proven himself to be one of the definitive greats in golf history.