Today, Brian Harman is one of the most famous golf players in the world. He is a smiling and charismatic 35-year-old guy who has twice won the PGA Tour and earned about $25,500,000 for his career since 2009. By the way, Brain could be called an almost unique man because he is one of the few ambidextrous players on the PGA Tour, and golf playing is the only thing he does left-handed.
For most fans, it’s pretty interesting to find out their idol way. In which family was he born? Where did he live? Who were his parents? Is he married? Who is that girl? Which hobbies Brian has? As we didn’t find any full biography of this well-known golf player, we decided to write it ourselves. We found answers to every question above and several fun facts and unexpected details. Did you know that Brian’s father isn’t a big golf fan? To learn more, read this article.
Brian’s parents and his childhood
Brian Harman was born on January 19, 1987, in Savannah, Georgia, USA. Since his childhood, his mother, Nancy Harman, often says that Brian is more like her and they have quite a bit in common, as he is “brilliant, thorough, stubborn, tough and very detail-oriented.” With the same features, Nancy works as a chemist, and now she is a massive fan of golf.
Brian’s father, Eric Harman, is a dentist. He’s a DMD, or Doctor of Medical Dentistry, and owns his practice. While Brian has already been a successful professional golf player, Eric started his brand and founded a dental clinic. As it was said, Eric doesn’t like golf, and Brian once mentioned that his father is predictably not the best golf player. Despite this fact, Brian’s parents often attend tournaments where their son plays. Once, father said that he would never go to the event if Brian wasn’t playing.
Summarizing all the information above, it seems that Brian grew up in a supportive family. All family members have a common hobby: they are world-class scuba divers. Overall, his parents are immersed in their crafts and, at the same time, share their son’s passion and help him on his way as much as possible.
First steps in golf
At the age of 18 Brian started his post-secondary education at the University of Georgia. His specialty was Finance and he could be a nice financier but a sudden hobby changed his entire life. Having found golf for himself, Brian never could refuse it. He started by joining the second Team All-American on the University of Georgia golf team and from competition to competition was showing astonishing results. The first victory he got at the U.S. Junior Amateur Champion in 2003. At that moment Brian was under 19 years old. In 2005, Brian won the Players Amateur and, later the same year, the NCAA Preview.
In 2007 the event that has shown that golf is real Brian’s calling occurred. It was the elite amateur tournament Porter Cup. This championship has been played since 1959 and hosted the biggest names; undoubtedly, Brian has won it. There remained two years until Brian shifted into a big way and started his professional career.
In 2009 Brian graduated from the University but he has never worked in finance. That year was the last one in his amateur playing: he won the 2009 Walker Cup.
A new level in career
Brain Harman began his professional career at the 2010 eGolf Professional Tour. This tournament is intended for golf newcomers so it’s perfect for players trying to ascend to higher-level tours. At that tournament, Brian won in the top-10: it was a pretty nice result for a newbie, wasn’t it?
2012 was a year of worldwide fame for Brian as that year he played… alone. Exactly, the situation was so unique and extraordinary that tournament officials were consulting with PGA for a quite long time. It was the Players Championship and Brian was the alternate but, unexpectedly, D.A.Points withdrew several minutes before his tee time. While Brian’s partners Carl Pettersson and Robert Garrigus had already teed off, Harman had left without rivals. However, after consultation, officials let the player tee off alone for the first round. In the Championship he finished T51.
Brian won the PGA Tour twice and his first victory was the 2014 John Deere Classic. 2017 became his second victory year and Brian won the Wells Fargo Championship, so he was #1 on PGA Tour again.
Today Brian Harman is still one of the most famous golf players. He is fifth due to FedEx Cup Ranking and 24th in the World Golf Ranking. For the 2022-2023 seasons, he has earned $1,725,005. During this time, Brian played 4 events, and 2 times he took places in TOP-10, and all 4 times he was in TOP-25.
His best 3 results for the past two seasons represent his skills the best.
- In 2023 he took part in the World Wide Technology Championship at Mayakoba and finished solo-second. This result was his second career runner-up on TOUR and the first since the 2017 U.S. Open.
- In 2022 Brian played at the FedEx St. Jude Championship and finished T3.
- The same year he got into the top-10 at the Open Championship and finished T6.
What do we know about Brian’s family
As Brian is a successful golf player he is also a happy husband and father. His wife and children cheer him behind the scenes, support and share their energy.
Brian’s wife, Kelly Van Slyke, is from Syracuse, New York. She graduated from SUNY Genesco in 2007, earning her Bachelor’s Degree in Biology. Some time, Kelly worked as a pilates instructor at a Pilates Loft in Georgia. Currently, the girl works as a radiation therapist at the UC San Diego Radiation Oncology Center.
Brian and Harman dated for several years. They engaged in May 2014. Brian made quite a special proposal: it was during turkey hunting and he put Kelly’s engagement ring into the inside pocket of her new pants. The couple was supposed to get married in November 2014 but Harman changed the date. Their marriage date was the same weekend as the Georgia-Auburn football game and sportsmen explained that some guests could prefer the football game to their marriage.
Kelly and Brian became a wife and husband eight months later after the proposal in December 2014 near their home in St. Simons Island, Georgia. They chose the date of 12/13/14 by chance but now it seems like a symbolic date picked on purpose. These days the two live in Sea Island, Georgia. Kelly may be the biggest Brian fan ever. When she had a Twitter account, in her bio was written that she is ‘the president of the Brian Harman Fan Club’.
Two years after marriage, the couple announced their first child. The girl Copper Marie Harman was born on 8th June 2016 and she is 6 years old now. Three years later Brian and Kelly welcomed their second child: the boy Walter was born in 2019 year.
In the end
It took seven years for Brian to become a professional from an amateur. Speaking with Michael Bamberger of Golf.com, Harman said that soon after turning pro, he lost his confidence. “It wasn’t like I lost my swing, but my confidence. And it’s taken me a long time to get it back. And I feel like I have.” For now, Brain Harman is known as one of the most successful golf players. We hope Brian will improve his skills further because he has the three most important conditions for this: talent, willingness, and support. His family fan club is as strong as their love: his parents come to his competitions, his wife Kelly is a ‘fan club president’, and his children attend his pieces of training and tournaments from early childhood.