The Swedish golfer was born in Stockholm, Sweden on this day in 1965.
As an amateur; he represented Continental Europe at the 1986 St Andrews Trophy and he represented Sweden at the 1984 and 1986 Eisenhower Trophy. Those are two of the best Amateur team golf tournaments in the world.
Parnevik turned pro in 1986 and started playing on the European Tour. He became a full member on tour in 1989 by winning the 1988 European Tour Qualifying School Tournament. Two fourth place finishes on tour in 1989 helped him finish 50th on the money list. He earned £55,538 on tour that year. He also played on minor tours early in his career and won the 1988 Ramlosa Trophy, 1998 Odensa Open (both in Sweden), 1998 Open Passing Shot (France) and the 1990 Swedish Open International Stroke Play. Parnevik finished in second at the 1994 British Open; only one stroke behind Nick Price.
He won his first European Tour tournament at the Bell's Scottish Open in 1993. He won by a margin of 5 strokes over American Payne Stewart. Parnevik picked up his second European Tour win at the Volvo Scandinavian Masters in 1995. Jesper split time between the PGA and European Tour in 1994 and 1995. Since 1996 he has played on the PGA Tour full time and only plays on the European Tour occasionally. His last two wins on the European Tour was at the 1996 Trophée Lancôme and the 1998 Volvo Scandinavian Masters. He finished 17th on the money list in 1993, 26th in 1994 and 17th in 1995.
Parnevik's great performances led to him to be selected to the European Ryder Cup team in 1997, 1999 and 2002. They won in 1997 and 2002. His overall record at the Ryder Cup is 4-4-3 (W-T-L) and he tied Tiger Woods in match play in 2002. Jesper also represented Sweden at the 1994 and 1995 World Cup as well as the 1993, 1994, 1995 and 1997 Alfred Dunhill Cup.
Parnevik has won 5 tournaments on the PGA Tour in his career. He won the 1998 Phoenix Open, 1999 Greater Greensboro Chrysler Classic, 2000 Bob Hope Chrysler Classic, 2000 GTE Byron Nelson Classic and the 2001 Honda Classic. Parnevik has spent 38 weeks in the Official World Golf Rankings Top Ten. 37 of them were in 2000 and the other was in 2001.
Jesper has earned $14,625,854 on the PGA Tour in his career making him the 41st on the list of all-time money winners (NOTE: That number can be misleading because tournament payouts have risen drastically over the years). The only European to earn more than him on the PGA Tour is Sergio García,.
Parnevik has done well in majors as well. His best finish in the Masters was T-20 in 2001 and his best finish in the U.S. Open was T-14 in 1998. He has done much better in the other two majors though. In the British his best finishes are 2nd (1994), T-2 (1997), T-4 (1998), T-10 (1999), T-9 (2001). In the PGA Championship he finished T-5 in 1996 and T-10 in 1999. But since the 2002 British Open he has only made the cut in two majors. The last major he played in was the 2006 PGA Championship but he missed the cut.
More recently Jesper lost in a playoff to Justin Leonard at the 2007 Valero Texas Open in October. He missed the cut in the PODS Championship today.
On tour Jesper is known for his odd dress choice. He is married with 4 kids. One of them is named Pebble Beach, after the famous course in California. Tiger Woods met his Swedish wife Elin Nordegren when she was babysitting Jesper's kids. By the way, I never understood this. Why would a model be a babysitter?
Jesper resides in Jupiter, Florida and his nickname on tour is Spaceman.
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