Quotes By Jack Nicklaus

I might cook occasionally, but I'm not a good cook. That's not my passion.

I couldn't control Arnold Palmer, Gary Player, Tom Watson or Lee Trevino. The only person I could control was me. The only person I could prepare for events was me. And if I didn't play well, I didn't play well, and I wasn't going to compete.

This is a game. That's all it is. It's not a war.

I can barely turn on my computer!

I've been fortunate over my career to make a little history on the 16th hole at Augusta National.

In 1979, when I was 39, I had such a bad year, I thought it was all over. Thankfully it wasn't.

A perfectly straight shot with a big club is a fluke.

But if I played well and prepared myself properly, then all I had to do was control myself and put myself in a position to win.

Focus on remedies, not faults.

He has the finest, fundamentally sound golf swing I've ever seen.

I think I fail a bit less than everyone else.

Mostly I built golf courses the way I played golf, which was left-to-right. But I learned very rapidly that people wanted to see more than just the way I played golf and that I had to balance up what I was doing, right-to-left, left-to-right, etc.

The best way to cope with trouble is to stay out of it as much as possible.

I've wanted to design golf courses ever since I was a kid. I suppose it comes from the way I've played the game. To find the proper way to play any hole, I've always begun by asking myself what the architect has tried to do with it.

Naturally it is nice to be widely known for worthwhile achievements, but it forces you to do many things which you don't like to do and these things take up time you want for other things.

Don't be too proud to take lessons. I'm not.

It's hard not to play golf that's up to Jack Nicklaus standards when you are Jack Nicklaus.

The longer you play, the better chance the better player has of winning.

I think that Pebble Beach is my favorite golf course to go to. I think Augusta is my favorite place to go play golf.

I first saw Arnold Palmer when I was just a kid and he came to Columbus to play in a tournament. I watched him on the driving range hit balls that day. We went on to become great friends.

When I fly in a helicopter, I insist there be two sets of controls, one for me in case something happens to the pilot. I'm no expert, but I know enough to at least get the thing on the ground. Nothing scares me like the thought of not being in control.

Why are we building golf courses? Because we enjoy being outside, bringing man and nature together.

I like to catch fish and release them. I probably haven't killed a fish that I've caught in sport fishing for 20 years. No reason to kill it. You know, just take it and release it.

Confidence is the most important single factor in this game, and no matter how great your natural talent, there is only one way to obtain and sustain it: work.

People don't want to go to the dump and have a picnic, they want to go out to a beautiful place and enjoy their day. And so I think our job is to try to take the environment, take what the good Lord has given us, and expand upon it or enhance it, without destroying it.

Professional golf is the only sport where, if you win 20% of the time, you're the best.

Well, the biggest rival I had in my career was me.

The game is meant to be fun.

All I ever wanted to do was play competitive golf against the best players in the world.

Success depends almost entirely on how effectively you learn to manage the game's two ultimate adversaries: the course and yourself.