PALM BEACH GARDENS, Fla. — Former U.S. Open champion Gary Woodland was honored Wednesday with the PGA Tour Courage Award as the 40-year-old American golfer comes back from brain surgery to remove a lesion that was causing him to have unfounded thoughts that he was dying.
Woodland, whose four PGA Tour victories include the 2019 U.S. Open at Pebble Beach Golf Links, had a hole the size of a baseball removed from his head so doctors could remove the lesion in a September 2023 surgery.
He returned to competition last year and continues to make strides toward restoring his game and his life at home with wife Gabby and his three children.
“Receiving this is a testament to the people around me because there’s no way, one, I’d be back playing or no way I’d be sitting here today if it wasn’t for them,” Woodland said at PGA National, where he is playing the Cognizant Classic that tees off Thursday.
“It means everything for me to receive it, but it really belongs to the people around me.”