What do Sergio Garcia and Donegal's Brian McElhinney have in common? They are the only two golfers to ever win both the European Amateur and British Amateur Championships.
What else do they have in common? They both teed it up at the Masters at Augusta National 20 years ago this week.
Eleven years after that, the Spaniard would put his right arm into the green jacket, followed by the left, having fended off Justin Rose in a play-off – something that’s becoming all too familiar for the Englishman.
McElhinney’s career didn’t come close to matching Garcia’s trajectory, but every Masters week he can sit down to watch it, turn to whoever is in the vicinity and proudly state: 'I played in that’.
He was only the 11th Irishman to do so too, with Tom McKibbin set to move that number to 18 on Thursday; throw in two appearances at the Open and McElhinney has enjoyed a career that the overwhelming majority can only dream of.
"Some things you remember like they were just yesterday, but 20 years went down fairly quickly now," McElhinney tells RTÉ Sport.
"That's the way it goes as you get older, time goes faster. It brings back great memories."
The Burnfoot man’s ticket was punched by his 2005 British Amateur Championship success at Royal Birkdale following a 5&4 win over John Gallagher in the final having come through tense contests with Gary Lockerbie and Oliver Fisher along the way.
As well as that invitation to Augusta, it also brought extras.
Those included the right to stay in the famed Crow’s Nest accommodation [McElhinney stayed one night to experience it] above the champion’s locker room – somewhere the likes of Jack Nicklaus, Ben Crenshaw and Tiger Woods stayed as amateurs before going on to wear green jackets.
Another previous resident was Tom Watson – whose play-off loss to John Mahaffey at the 1978 PGA Championship meant that Rory McIlroy became the sixth man to complete the men’s Grand Slam at last year’s Masters rather than the seventh.
Twenty years ago, eight-time major winner Watson was teeing off at 9.17am alongside McElhinney and Michael Campbell.
"He was quiet, just went about his game, the way most of them do," McElhinney said of his legendary playing partner on that Thursday and Friday two decades ago.
"I did get chatting to him a few times and Ireland was one of his favourite places and he loved getting over to Ballybunion to play golf and he loved links golf himself."
The future Ryder Cup captain played a role in McElhinney’s favourite moment from his time on the course, coming at the Golden Bell 12th, Augusta’s most renowned hole.
"When you come to Amen Corner, when you're watching on TV you probably don't appreciate the way they talk about the wind swirling and it's hard to judge the yardages and things like that there.
"When we were playing the 11th you could see the guys hitting off the 12th and in front of us was Paul McGinley, Charles Howell and I’m not sure who the other was [Fuzzy Zoeller].
"Two of them hit it into the water when we were watching.
"Michael Campbell was up first from our group and he took a wee while to decide what club he was going to use; he took a seven-iron, hit a nice shot towards the middle of the green and left of the flag but it hit the bank and rolled into the water.
"Next up was Tom Watson and it with the experience he had, I thought he can’t be caught, especially with three players in a row going into the water.
"He was undecided with his club, but went for the seven-iron as well, nice shot, just left of the flag. What does it do? Pitches into the bank and rolls back into the water.
"I had the luxury of going after watching all that and I knocked it just past the pin on the right-hand side and safe – so that’s something that stands out in my memory."
Another notable moment from his trip was winning the Georgia Cup which brings the British Amateur champion and the United States Amateur champion together in an 18-hole charity match at the Golf Club of Georgia prior to the Masters.
In 2006, McElhinney beat Edoardo Molinari and, of course, Garcia is a former winner too having defeated Hank Kuehne in 1999.
The Spaniard sneaked inside the cut-line in 2006 but for McElhinney, rounds of 80 and 75 saw him fall well down the leaderboard and tied with fellow Irish man Paul McGinley, who invited him to practice prior to the Masters.
He stuck around to watch Phil Mickelson win by two strokes from Tim Clark, and so came to an end the Masters adventure of the first and, to date anyway, only Donegal man to play in the Masters.
"I made the most of it while I was there," said McElhinney, the current pro at Northwest Golf Club.
"It's great to have had the opportunity to experience something like playing in the Masters.
"When you grow up playing golf, it's not something that you ever kind of see yourself maybe doing that, but to get that opportunity was just brilliant."
Follow Live Updates of the 2026 Masters on rte.ie/sport from opening tee on Thursday 9 April.
