Harold Varner III

Returns for a second Open Championship five years after his last appearance when he grabbed one of the four Open Qualifying Series spots on offer at the Quicken Loans National.

This time Varner, the first African-American to be promoted to the PGA Tour through the Web.com circuit, was called in as a reserve for Hideki Matsuyama on July 11.

After attending East Carolina University he turned professional in 2012, qualified for the following year’s U.S. Open and grabbed the 25th and final graduating spot on the 2015 Web.com Tour.

His one professional victory to date came at the 2016 Australian PGA Championship, co-sanctioned by the European and Australasian circuits. It came a year after he lost a play-off to Nathan Holman in the same event.

Varner reached a career-high 73rd in the world when he was joint runner-up behind Stewart Cink at this April’s RBC Heritage. He had another near-miss at the 2019 Northern Trust, where he tied for third two strokes behind Patrick Reed.

Three months before that he was joint second with a round to go in the PGA Championship, but playing partner Brooks Koepka was the one to go on to glory.