Barry Douglas Lane (21 June 1960 – 31 December 2022) was an English

professional golfer A professional golfer is somebody who receives payments or financial rewards in the sport of golf that are directly related to their skill or reputation. A person who earns money by teaching or playing golf is traditionally considered a "golf p ...

. He won five official

European Tour The European Tour (currently known as the DP World Tour for sponsorship reasons), legally the PGA European Tour is the leading men's professional golf tour in Europe. The organisation also operates the European Senior Tour (for players aged fi ...

events between 1988 and 2004. He played in the 1993 Ryder Cup and won the inaugural

Andersen Consulting World Championship of Golf The Andersen Consulting World Championship of Golf was a 32-man match play golf tournament played from 1995 to 1998. It was the predecessor tournament to the WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship which started in 1999. The top eight players availab ...

in late 1995. After reaching 50 he had considerable success on the

European Senior Tour The Legends Tour is the current branding of the European Senior Tour, a professional tour for male golfers aged 50 and over, run by the PGA European Tour. The tour was branded as the Staysure Tour for the 2018 and 2019 seasons after UK-based insu ...

, winning eight times between 2010 and 2019.

Early life

Lane was born in

Hayes, Middlesex Hayes is a town in west London, historically situated within the county of Middlesex, and now part of the London Borough of Hillingdon. The town's population, including its localities Hayes End, Harlington and Yeading, was recorded as 83,564 ...

but grew up in

Bracknell Bracknell () is a large town and civil parish in Berkshire, England, the westernmost area within the Greater London Urban Area and the administrative centre of the Borough of Bracknell Forest. It lies to the east of Reading, south of Maiden ...

. He only took up golf at the age of 14 but became an assistant professional at nearby Downshire Golf Club in 1976, at the age of 16. He was an assistant at Downshire for 8 years.

Professional career

Lane first played on the

in 1982, after three failed attempts at Q-School. From 1982 to 1984 he had little success on the tour, playing only a small number of events, and failed to qualify for the tour in 1985. He did have some success in non-tour events, winning the 1983

PGA Assistants' Championship The PGA Assistants' Championship is a golf tournament for golf club assistant professionals. It is held by the British PGA. The first championship was held in 1930 but earlier national tournaments for assistant professionals had been held since ...

at Coombe Hill. The win earned him a place in the World Assistants' Championship in

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and ...

in December, which he won by 6 strokes. Lane qualified for the European Tour again in 1986 and, playing 20 events, finished 71st in the Order of Merit. He improved again in 1987, finishing 27th in the Order of Merit with five top-10 finishes. In October 1987 he also had his biggest prize to date, £20,000, for winning the inaugural Equity & Law Challenge, an unofficial money event on the tour. Lane won the 36-hole event, in which points were gained for birdies and eagles, with a score of 15, one ahead of Bill Malley. Lane played 26 successive seasons, from 1986 to 2011, on the European Tour. Lane's best years came in the early to mid-nineties, when he made the top ten of the Order of Merit three times, with a best of fifth in 1992. He won four European Tour events between 1988 and 1994. He had a relatively bad period in his later thirties, but after the turn of the millennium his form improved again and he picked up his fifth win on the Tour at the 2004 Daily Telegraph Damovo British Masters. Lane won several professional tournaments not on the European Tour, most lucratively the 1995

. This event was a precursor of the

WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship The WGC Match Play, currently titled as the WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play for sponsorship reasons, is a professional men's golf tournament that has been held since 1999. It is the only one of the World Golf Championships to have been contested ...

and Lane's prize was US$1,000,000, which was a rare level of prize in golf at that time. Lane made his only

Ryder Cup The Ryder Cup is a biennial men's golf competition between teams from Europe and the United States. The competition is contested every two years with the venue alternating between courses in the United States and Europe. The Ryder Cup is named af ...

appearance in Europe's home defeat at

The Belfry The Belfry is a golf resort and hotel in Wishaw, Warwickshire, close to Sutton Coldfield, England, located approximately 8 miles from the centre of Birmingham. It was acquired by KSL Capital Partners in August 2012. The resort has three golf ...

in 1993, losing all three of his matches. He represented England in the

World Cup A world cup is a global sporting competition in which the participant entities – usually international teams or individuals representing their countries – compete for the title of world champion. The event most associated with the concept i ...

and the

Alfred Dunhill Cup The Alfred Dunhill Cup was a team golf tournament which ran from 1985 to 2000, sponsored by Alfred Dunhill Ltd. It was for three-man teams of professional golfers, one team representing each country, and was promoted as the "World Team Championshi ...

several times and played for the Rest of the World Team in the

UBS Cup The UBS Cup was a team golf tournament contested by the United States and a team representing the "Rest of the World" which ran from 2001 to 2004. In 2001 and 2002 it was called the UBS Warburg Cup. Six golfers on each side had to be 50 or over, and ...

three times. On turning 50 in June 2010, Lane joined the

. He quickly claimed his first win at the Cleveland Golf/Srixon Scottish Senior Open that August. Lane continued his good form in 2011, playing a mixture of regular and senior European Tour events, and winning twice more on the senior tour. Subsequently he enjoyed further wins on the 2012, 2016, 2017 tours and twice on 2019 circuit.

Death

Lane died of cancer on 31 December 2022, at the age of 62.

Professional wins (20)

European Tour wins (5)

European Tour playoff record (0–3)

Other wins (6)

*1983 Footjoy PGA Assistants' Championship, Jamaica Open, Footjoy World Assistants' Championship *1987 Equity & Law Challenge *1995

*2015 Farmfoods British Par 3 Championship

European Senior Tour wins (8)

European Senior Tour playoff record (1–1)

Japan PGA Senior Tour wins (1)

*2018 Fujifilm Senior Championship

Results in major championships

CUT = missed the halfway cut
"T" indicates a tie for a place. Source:

Summary

*Most consecutive cuts made – 6 (1991 Open Championship – 1993 PGA) *Longest streak of top-10s – 0

Results in World Golf Championships

"T" = Tied

Team appearances

Dunhill Cup The Alfred Dunhill Cup was a team golf tournament which ran from 1985 to 2000, sponsored by Alfred Dunhill Ltd. It was for three-man teams of professional golfers, one team representing each country, and was promoted as the "World Team Championshi ...

(representing England):

1988 File:1988 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The oil platform Piper Alpha explodes and collapses in the North Sea, killing 165 workers; The USS Vincennes (CG-49) mistakenly shoots down Iran Air Flight 655; Australia celebrates its Bicenten ...

1994 File:1994 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 1994 Winter Olympics are held in Lillehammer, Norway; The Kaiser Permanente building after the 1994 Northridge earthquake; A model of the MS Estonia, which sank in the Baltic Sea; Nels ...

1995 File:1995 Events Collage V2.png, From left, clockwise: O.J. Simpson is acquitted of the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman from the year prior in "The Trial of the Century" in the United States; The Great Hanshin earthquake str ...

1996 File:1996 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: A bomb explodes at Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta, set off by a radical anti-abortionist; The center fuel tank explodes on TWA Flight 800, causing the plane to crash and killing everyone o ...

(representing England):

(representing Europe):

1993 File:1993 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The Oslo I Accord is signed in an attempt to resolve the Israeli–Palestinian conflict; The Russian White House is shelled during the 1993 Russian constitutional crisis; Czechoslovakia is peacefu ...

(representing the Rest of the World): 2002, 2003 (tie), 2004

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Lane, Barry English male golfers European Tour golfers European Senior Tour golfers PGA Tour Champions golfers Ryder Cup competitors for Europe People from Hayes, Hillingdon 1960 births 2022 deaths