\u201cMoney was never my goal when I started playing golf. My goal was to do the best I could and to see where I could reach in competitive situations.\u201d
\u2014 Jos\u00e9 Mar\u00eda Olaz\u00e1bal<\/p>\n
In an individual sport, Olaz\u00e1bal is notable for being couth not uncouth, cautious not grasping, modest not immodest, a singular man as solid as the Rock of Gibraltar that is visible from Valderrama. You would trust your grandson or granddaughter to his care with complete equanimity.<\/p>\n
His favourite subject at school was physics. He speaks five languages which are, in order of importance, Basque (his native language), Spanish, English, French and Italian. He bore the vicissitudes of a debilitating injury that kept him pretty much off his feet and entirely out of the game from September 1995 to March 1997 with dignity. (First diagnosed as rheumatoid arthritis, it was later discovered to be nerve pressure in his lower back.) And then when he returned to the game, he won the third tournament he played in. \u201cI hadn\u2019t played for a year and a half and when I won I cried,\u201d he remembered.<\/p>\n
\u201cMoney is of no importance to Jos\u00e9 Maria,\u201d Sergio Gomez, his late manager, once said. \u201cHe did a clinic for junior golfers and his fee was a sausage sandwich and a glass of milk. He returned a large cheque from a sponsor saying he had not played all season therefore he could not accept their money. He knows he will not carry his money to his grave. Other golfers have their objective in life to build a financial empire or gain respectability through the supposed power you get through money. He could do many company days at $50,000 or $60,000 but he does not want to. That is not the way Jos\u00e9 Maria thinks about things. For him money is an instrument not a target.\u201d<\/p>\n
Olaz\u00e1bal nods on hearing Gomez\u2019s words. \u201cI have enough money to do a normal life,\u201d he said. \u201cMoney helps you in many ways nowadays where everything is money, money, money. Money was never my goal when I started playing golf. My goal was to do the best I could and to see where I could reach in competitive situations. For me it was more important to win more than the amount of money that victory brought me. I got that from my father. My mother had a different view. She knew you had to have enough money to get things, to put food on the table.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Olazabal-Garcia-and-Rahm.jpg\")
Jos\u00e9 Mar\u00eda Olaz\u00e1bal, with Sergio Garcia (left) at the 1999 Masters and Jon Rahm at the 2025 Ryder Cup, has been influencing Spanish golfers for more than 30 years. Timothy A. Clary, AFP via Getty Images; Carl Recine, Getty Images<\/p>\n
His life and his lifestyle, though not ascetic, is certainly modest. It would be completely out of character for him to live in a large house, or two, have several cars, a yacht perhaps and live a life that shrieks \u201clook at me. I have money.\u201d It is almost unnecessary to say he eschews ostentatiousness.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are people who invest my money for me and when the year is done I hope the money that I have saved increases a little bit,\u201d Olaz\u00e1bal said. \u201cMy nephew is turning professional and obviously if he needs anything he is going to have it. My niece is studying and I pay part of her studies. I try to provide for family members. If they need anything I try to help them with money. My hobbies? I go shooting with my father so I invest some money in a property [southwest of and 45 minutes from Madrid]. It\u2019s not extremely big but it is big enough for the two of us to shoot some wood pigeon, rabbit, hares.\u201d<\/p>\n
He drives a car, provided by BMW, big enough to contain his golf clubs, the dogs, guns and cartridges and the luggage when he and his father go hunting. His watch is not flashy. You would not expect it to be. Many of the clothes he wears are provided for him by his sponsors. The most expensive thing he has ever spent money on was building the house that he shares with his parents, mother Julia, 77, and father Gaspar, 82.<\/p>\n
It is there, in this big house, barely 25 years old, where chickens still roam around outside because his parents have always had chickens, that the family gathers for Sunday lunch. \u201cWe love fish, hake or salmon,\u201d he said. \u201cThere is often a chicken in the oven with a little sauce, garlic. It is simple food but we enjoy it.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Olazabal-vertical.jpg\")
Jos\u00e9 Mar\u00eda Olaz\u00e1bal Michael Reaves, PGA of America via Getty Images<\/p>\n
\u201cMy mother cooks, I don\u2019t cook,\u201d he added, laughing at the improbability of that. \u201cI am terrible. I have been spoiled in that regard. To be honest my mum and sister cook really well. I travel a lot and every time I came home my mum had cooked and so she is the one who takes care of that.\u201d<\/p>\n
More words from Gomez. \u201cJos\u00e9 Maria is egalitarian, socially aware, intensely loyal and quite private, a good hearer [meaning listener].\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cListening is something I learned through time,\u201d Olaz\u00e1bal explained. \u201cI still believe I am a little shy person but not as I used to be. Through time I have learned that you can be better prepared if you are a good listener, take time to think about it, and make a picture of the situation. I would always listen, listen and listen and try to think about what I had heard and what I was told and then I would make an opinion. That is my mother\u2019s influence.\u201d<\/p>\n
On this morning at Valderrama, Olaz\u00e1bal talked as he walked, not about golf but about affairs in the world. \u201cI started travelling when I was 15 years old. I travelled around Europe, to the States, to different parts of the world and I was always treated well. I really appreciate that. Ideally I would love a world with no frontiers where everybody would understand each other and live together in peace. At the end of the day we are all human beings. It does not matter what colour you are. Just try to be good to the guy next to you and I think the world would be a better place. That would be like a utopia.<\/p>\n
\u201cNow we are in a bad situation,\u201d he continued, a frown on his face. \u201cI don\u2019t like what I see. I am starting to believe that politicians don\u2019t do what is needed to improve the lives of regular people. I think they are more interested in staying in power. The whole society, or at least the politicians, are extremely polarised. It is either black or white. There is nothing in between. In the past they used to sit down and try to get agreements but nowadays it is what I say or nothing at all.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t mind if they come from the left [of the political spectrum] or the right. What they do has to reach people in general. In the macro economy Spain is doing great but if you go down to a normal life a lot of families are struggling to reach the end of the month. You have Ukraine, Russia, Israel, Palestine.\u201d He exhaled loudly. \u201cI don\u2019t know. Sometimes listening to the news is just depressing.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI have lived a wonderful life. \u2026 I consider myself a very fortunate guy. I am at peace with myself and will always be in debt to this game.\u201d
\u2014 Jos\u00e9 Mar\u00eda Olaz\u00e1bal<\/p>\n
After their nine holes, the two men went to a local restaurant in the town where Quiros was born, a few miles from Valderrama. It was the sort of restaurant the locals knew was good and tourists wouldn\u2019t give a second glance. Welcomed by the owner, they quickly made their way to their favourite table and ordered plates of Scolymus hispanicus (oyster cardillo). As they ate, they talked.<\/p>\n
Quiros began a conversation about the difficulties for the wife of a travelling professional golfer. \u201cYou\u2019re away for three weeks, then you come home for a few days and then you\u2019re off again,\u201d he said. \u201cYour wife has to be very understanding to put up with that.\u201d<\/p>\n
At that Olaz\u00e1bal nodded. \u201cI agree. I never wanted to put a woman through that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Olaz\u00e1bal\u2019s face, topped by a thatch of luxuriant black hair, looks oval in shape but when he laughs, he throws his head back, and his face splits wide open as an ear-to-ear smile appears on it.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t complain that I should have won more major championships,\u201d Olaz\u00e1bal said. \u201cI am very proud of it. Who knows? If I had a better technique maybe I wouldn\u2019t have had that fighting spirit. Every time I look in the mirror and say \u2018did I give my best?\u2019 I say \u2018yes.\u2019 I cannot ask for more.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have lived a wonderful life. I have had my health issues, true, but I have dedicated my life to a game that I love, a game that has given me everything that I have now.\u201d At this his voice cracks and tears form in his eyes. \u201cI consider myself a very fortunate guy. I am at peace with myself and will always be in debt to this game.\u201d<\/p>\n
And how the game is in debt to him, too, this proud Spaniard, who is such a singular man. Gracias Chema, gracias.<\/p>\n
Top: Jos\u00e9 Mar\u00eda Olaz\u00e1bal\u00a0 in his role as vice captain for the European team at the 2025 Ryder Cup. Richard Heathcote, Getty Images
\nPhoto credits: 2025 Ryder Cup, Mike Egerton, PA Images via Getty Images; 2025 Masters, Harry How, Getty Images
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