Knaresborough golf ace John Parry to go 'hell for leather' in pursuit of FedEx Cup play-off spot

The 39-year-old Knaresborough golf ace continued his career renaissance with a two-under par finish at The Open Championship after weekend rounds of 73 and 66.

It continues a positive first year competing regularly at the biggest events.

The Harrogate GC life member didn’t miss a cut in his rookie PGA Tour season until the end of May, and even then that run of form was punctuated by him coming 11th at the US Open – comfortably his best showing at a major and also his most lucrative, financially and points-wise.

That result moved Parry up to 87th position in the FedEx Cup rankings.

His 28th-placed finish at Royal Birkdale keeps him there, meaning the equation is simple – he has three tournaments in three weeks in Minnesota, Detroit and North Carolina to get himself into the top 70 and the first FedEx Cup play-off event.

Failing that, the former King James’ School pupil needs to garner enough points to stay within the top 100 who earn playing privileges on the PGA Tour next season.

There is a fall season from September to November in which those final spots are decided. Finish outside the top 100 and it’s back to the DP Tour. First thing’s first, though.

“I might as well just play all three, give it hell for leather the next few weeks, and fingers crossed I can get in the FedEx Cup play-offs,” said Parry.

“If not, maybe I’ll come back and have a break and play the odd time in Europe and then head back out there again for the fall season.

“It was a good week for me at the US Open. I was playing nice and steady, but if you’re finishing in the 30s most weeks you’re not getting masses of points so it was a big help and gave me a good boost going into the next few events.”

His performance at Shinnecock Hills in June steeled him for a solid week at Birkdale.

“The US Open has done a lot for my confidence,” he added. “It’s shown I can compete, and on a tough course as well.

“Playing the PGA Tour has made it so that I don’t feel as nervous or as overwhelmed when I come to an Open now.

"Admittedly, we don’t get crowds as big as this – Phoenix probably aside – but there’s a lot going on. So you get more used to it.”

At an earlier break in his schedule to attend The Match between Yorkshire’s professionals and amateurs at Ganton in April, Parry admitted that chipping had been the area of his game that he had struggled with the most as he transitioned to life on American courses.

Three months further down the line, the man who went 14 years between DP World Tour wins, is starting to make in-roads.

“I think I am with the chipping,” he said.

“The closer I looked into it, it was more chipping out of the rough. When I’m on the fairways and the tight lies I’m actually doing okay and I’m even gaining strokes around the green.

“It’s that one area in the rough where I could do with getting better. Back home you don’t get to practice on that grass.”

The last couple of seasons have seen Parry enjoy quite the transformation, with his impressive display at the US Open coming just three years on from a time in his career when he found himself playing one-day circuits in the north of England and bouncing between Europe’s second and third-tier tours.

His first-ever career triumph came in Toulouse on the Challenge Tour back in 2009, with that promising start backed up by another win as a European Tour rookie at the Vivendi Cup in October 2010.

But, the Yorkshireman would go on to suffer an extended drought, with the next decade and a half spent bouncing between Europe’s top three tours.

Then, almost out of nowhere, a hat-trick of triumphs on the Challenge Tour earned him a place back on the DP World Tour late in the summer of 2024.

Parry then won the Mauritius Open in December of that year to bag his second top-level title some 14 years after the first.

In 2025, rounds of 67 at The Open at Royal Portrush earned him a tie for 16th place alongside such English golfing dignitaries as Justin Rose and Tommy Fleetwood.

This year, Parry made 13 successive cuts at the start of his rookie season in America before going on to really shine at Shinnecock Hills.