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Byron Nelson - The man who set the record Tiger is chasing

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This week Tiger goes in search of an eighth consecutive victory but the bar was set at 11 by Byron Nelson in 1945. Bill Elliott fills us in on the life and career of the original record setter

Twelve years ago I travelled to Texas. My brief for this trip was simple - to interview as many leading golfers as I could shake a notebook and pen at during the week I was at a tournament there. I did too, Corey Pavin, Nick Price, Ben Crenshaw and Greg Norman extending welcome handshakes to an initially fairly desperate reporter.

That's the reason I was there. The reason they chose to be there was because of a gentle-looking granddad figure who trundled around the tournament that week in a customised buggy, dispensing smiles and advice to anyone who stopped him. This was Byron Nelson and this, of course, was his tournament The Byron Nelson Championship and the stars came partly because of the money on offer but mostly because they all wished to honour one of the men who did so much to burnish the image of the golf pro.

Two days into my trip this old guy stopped his buggy next to me. "How ya doing son? Having a good time?" he asked, and then after a glance at my media badge that revealed I was based in England, he added, "My, you've come a long way to see my little tournament, I feel greatly honoured. Climb up here beside me and we'll talk a while."

And we did. For nearly an hour Mr Nelson drawled gently away about golf, life and everything, including the day a thousand years earlier he had won his first significant title, a Texan caddies championship. Easy enough, you might think, except that the guy he had to beat in the end was Ben Hogan.

After that, of course, everything got easier for Byron. Or so it seemed. He won his first major, the 1939 US Open, courtesy of a holed second shot, a 220 yards one iron out of rough at the second play-off hole against Craig Wood; he added two USPGA Championship titles and two US Masters before he finished full-time competition prematurely in his mid-thirties; he brought class, style and a fresh swing, one that involved hips and legs more than ever before and that accommodated the new-fangled steel shafts better than the wristy technique everyone else used at the time.

He was a thinker and an innovator and, uniquely, among the true greats of the old game he is best remembered not for his five majors but for his quite extraordinary record of 11 consecutive victories in 1945. In all he won 18 times that year and although some of his more predictable rivals were otherwise engaged in another tussle on mainland Europe nothing can diminish the strength of his achievement that year.

The only reason he was missing from active service himself was a blood disorder that meant the US military rejected him. This upset him greatly and it may well have been some sort of catalyst for his extraordinarily focused achievements in 1945. To put it another way...even if he had been playing against the bloke next door then 11 wins on the trot would have been improbable.

Just how much the effort took out of him was shown a year later when he stepped away from full-time tournament play to concentrate on his teaching and his beloved ranch in Texas. Two years ago after a lifetime spent embroidering golf graciously he died peacefully at the age of 94. A special time passed away with him but the memory lives on and surely so too will his record. Even Tiger Woods would be pushing the envelope too much to expect to surpass it although he will, as ever, be trying to make it eight in a row this weekend so that for the first time in 63 years Mr Nelson's achievement is under threat.

Last time I saw Byron Nelson was at the Masters where he was making his way to the first tee to perform his duties as an Honorary Starter. He was an old and shrunken man but his eyes were still young. As he passed a group of us in the clubhouse these eyes twinkled and he said: "Any of you boys wanna carry an old guy to the tee?" He was still chuckling as he creaked his way through the door.