Everyone had written Jack Nicklaus off at 46 — he shot the back nine in 30 on Sunday at Augusta and won the Masters in the greatest comeback in golf history.
By 1986, most people in golf assumed Jack Nicklaus was finished. He hadn't won a major in six years. A newspaper column published during Masters week called him 'done, washed up, through.' He was 46 years old — an age when most Tour pros have long since retired. He would spend that Sunday proving every word of it wrong.
The 1986 Masters featured one of the most chaotic and thrilling final rounds the sport has ever seen. Five different players held the lead on Sunday. Seve Ballesteros, Greg Norman, Tom Kite, Nick Price, and Nicklaus all had real chances to win. Augusta's back nine in April became a pressure cooker unlike anything the galleries had witnessed.
Nicklaus began his Sunday charge with a birdie on the 9th hole, then kept coming. He birdied 10, 11, eagled 15, and birdied 16 — going on a stretch of golf so brilliant that the roars from the Augusta galleries rolled back to players on earlier holes like thunder. He played the back nine in 30 strokes, matching the course record.
Seve Ballesteros, considered the likely winner, was charging with his own eagle on the 8th hole. Then on the 15th — the same par-5 Nicklaus had eagled — Ballesteros hit his second shot into the water. The mistake effectively ended his chance. Greg Norman made a miraculous recovery shot on 17 but couldn't force a playoff.
Nicklaus finished at 9-under par, one stroke ahead of Tom Kite and Greg Norman. His final round 65 remains one of the most celebrated rounds in Masters history. He was the oldest Masters champion ever — a record that still stands nearly four decades later.
The victory was Nicklaus's 18th major championship — a record that Tiger Woods spent two decades chasing and has not yet broken. It was also his sixth green jacket, another record. For many who witnessed it, the 1986 Masters remains the single greatest performance in the history of professional golf.