Masters 2025: Bernhard Langer walks off the course at Augusta National for the final time

Michael Reaves via Getty Images

AUGUSTA, Ga. — Bernhard Langer walked off the 18th green at Augusta National Golf Club with a smile on his face on Friday afternoon, completely overwhelmed with emotion.

Langer, having just missed the cut at his 41st and final start at the Masters, took his visor off and waved to the crowd that was situated along the final green. After giving a hug to Augusta National chairman Fred Ridley, the 67-year-old Langer tracked down his family. Then, with his wife Vikki’s hand in his, the pair made the long walk up from the green to the clubhouse for the last time.

“There were lots of standing ovations throughout the golf course in various spots,” Langer said afterwards. "Today, coming up 18 was mixed emotions because I was still inside the cut line, even when I made bogey."

Langer was at 2-over heading to his ball nestled beside the 18th green and needed to get up-and-down to make the cut, but his 11-foot putt burned the edge and would not fall.

"There were lots of emotions flooding through my mind the last two days as I was walking down the fairways ..." he said. “I saw my wife, I saw my four kids, and I saw two of my grandkids come out and supported me, and friends from Germany and family from Germany. Just even friends from all over the world, literally, walking a few holes with me. It meant a great deal.”

Langer grew up in Anhausen, Germany, where he said “golf was nothing” at the time. He started caddying and then took a job as a local assistant golf pro. “I thought that was going to be my life,” he reflected on Friday afternoon.

But quickly, Langer’s playing career took off. He won 42 times on the DP World Tour and became a dominant force on the European Ryder Cup teams, of which he played on 10. He was the very first person to ever be ranked No. 1 in the Official World Golf Rankings when they were first introduced, too.

Langer won three times on the PGA Tour in his career, two of which came at Augusta National, where in 1982 he became the first German to play in the Masters. He won his first green jacket in 1985 when he was just 27 years old. That win, which only came after he rallied to beat Curtis Strange in the final round, made him just the third international winner in the tournament’s history.