The Big Break is an American golf reality competition series. Premiering on October 6, 2003, on Golf Channel, the series features aspiring professional golfers competing in various skills challenges for a chance to win a prize package, usually featuring a sponsor exemption for one or more tournaments and/or developmental tours.
The series originally ran on Golf Channel for 23 seasons from 2003 through 2015, after which the series was cancelled amid cuts by Golf Channel's then-owner NBCUniversal.
In October 2025, Golf Channel announced that The Big Break would be revived for a 24th season, in collaboration with the golf-oriented media company Good Good; the season was originally scheduled to premiere on August 25, 2026, but was withdrawn amid controversies involving Good Good and a resulting loss of sponsorship. Despite this, Golf Channel stated that it still planned to produce a new season of The Big Break in 2027.
Format Contestants on each season of The Big Break include professionals on semi-professional tours as well as amateurs who aspire to play golf professionally. The contestants compete in a series of golfing challenges, such as hitting balls into scoring zones or targets, shooting closest to the pin, and H-O-R-S-E-like competitions among others.
Each episode consists of three main challenges: the "Mulligan Challenge" is a competition that allows its winner to receive a mulligan that can be used in the second challenge—the "Skills Challenge". The winner of the skills challenge receives immunity during the elimination challenge, whose worst performer is eliminated from the competition. In the season finale, the final two contestants compete in a final match to determine the champion, who typically receives one or more sponsor exemptions for events on the PGA Tour, LPGA, and/or a developmental circuit (such as the LPGA's Futures Tour).
The show's signature challenge in the glass-breaking challenge, which usually takes place as the skills challenge in the season premiere; the golfers must make shots on a practice range to shatter glass targets with the names of the contestants on them. In the first season, the challenge was structured as a race, with the first contestant to shatter their target declared the winner. Beginning in the third season, the challenge was changed to a turn-based format, where contestants choose an opponent's target for each shot: if they hit and shatter the target, the respective contestant is eliminated, and the last golfer standing is declared the winner. In the fifth season, if the contestant hit a target successfully, they could keep playing until they missed a target.
Editions of The Big Break
The Big Break I
The Big Break I premiered on October 6, 2003. The contest was filmed over ten days at the TreeTops Resort in Gaylord, Michigan. The winner would receive exemptions into four selected events on the Canadian Tour in 2004.
The ten hopefuls for the first season were:
Contestant Hometown Randy Block San Antonio, Texas Garrett Garland Northridge, Los Angeles Charles Calhoun Marietta, Ohio Justin Peters (Winner) Plantation, Florida Steve Duemig Clearwater, Florida Anthony Sorentino (Runner-up) Rochester Hills, Michigan Mark Farnham Port Jefferson, New York Craig Pawling Sunrise, Florida Jeff Brown Hampton, Georgia Jon Roddy Orlando, Florida
The show was hosted by Phil Mickelson's swing coach, Rick Smith, and Katherine Roberts. In the end, Justin Peters defeated Anthony Sorentino 3 & 1 in the matchplay final. Peters, though, failed to make the cut in any of the four Canadian Professional Golf Tour events he played in.
The Big Break II: Las Vegas
The Big Break II first aired in September 2004. The contest was filmed in Las Vegas. The winner would receive four exemptions into Nationwide Tour events during the 2005 season.
The ten contestants were:
(In Order of Elimination)
Contestant Hometown Jay Mcnair Florida Shelby Chrest Canada Scotty Yancey Illinois Sean Daly Visalia, California Mike Foster Georgia David Gunas Connecticut John Turke Clearwater, Florida Bart Lower Ionia, Michigan Donny Donatello Florida Kip Henley (Winner) Chattanooga, Tennessee
The Big Break II was the Golf Channel's highest rated show in its history of all programming. The show featured not only good golf but also some tension between roommates Sean Daly and Donny Donatello.
The winner Kip Henley failed to make any cuts on the Nationwide Tour, and shortly after his attempt to play his way on Tour, he went back to caddying on the PGA Tour for Brian Gay. Henley, who turned 50 in 2011, qualified for the FedEx St. Jude Classic through winning a Tennessee PGA Section event that included an automatic entry into the event, and has eligibility for the Champions Tour.
The Big Break III: Ladies Only
The Big Break III: Ladies Only premiered on February 8, 2005, featuring a field consisting exclusively of women's golfers. It took place at the Kingsmill Resort and Spa just outside Williamsburg, Virginia, with the winner receiving exemptions for three LPGA events (including the Michelob Ultra Open at Kingsmill and the American Century Championship) in 2005, along with a new Chrysler Crossfire and a $5,000 Golf Galaxy shopping spree.
The ten hopefuls for the third season were:
Contestant Hometown Tasha Browner Tarzana, Los Angeles Danielle Amiee (winner) Newport Beach, California Pamela Crikelair Westchester County, New York Valeria Ochoa Miramar, Florida Debbie Dahmer Escondido, California Jan Dowling Dallas, Texas Cindy Miller Silver Creek, New York; Sarah Sasse Lincoln, Nebraska Liz Uthoff St. Louis, Missouri Felicia Brown Redondo Beach, California
Vince Cellini and Stephanie Sparks, who once briefly played on the LPGA Tour herself, became the show's new hosts. In the final, Crikelair and Amiee faced off, with Crikelair going 2 up after just three holes. Amiee came all the way back, and, at 1 up on the par 3 17th, sank a birdie to go 2 up, and clinch The Big Break III title 2 & 1.
Also for the first time, professional golfers from the tour handing out the exemptions made cameos. In the first episode of the season in which a contestant was eliminated (whom, by the way, would end up being Browner), LPGA winners Kelli Kuehne and Lorie Kane dropped by to participate in the season's first "Mulligan Challenge."
Amiee's first tournament, the Michelob Ultra Open, did not go well as far as trying to make the cut was concerned. She had plenty of fans following her. In her first round, Amiee shot 79 on the par-71 course. The second round was pushed back a day due to rain, where Amiee shot 77, missing the cut in her first LPGA event. Her second event, the Corning Classic, never materialized, as she withdrew before the first round, citing a back injury, throwing her second exemption away. However, it is believed that Amiee withdrew because of media pressure over an alleged topless photo of her that was circulating around the Internet. There has been a great deal of discussion over the validity of the photo.
Meanwhile, Miller, who actually played on the LPGA Tour from 1979 to 1981, when she married former PGA Tour player Allen Miller (the couple are still married, and have three children), competed in the LPGA Championship, having earned a spot by winning the 2004 LPGA Teaching & Club Professionals national championship. She shot an 84 in the first round, and an 88 in the second round, missing the cut.
It was then Dowling's turn to play in an LPGA event. She took part in the BMO Canadian Women's Open, where she shot a 77 in round one, and a 74 in round two to take a respectable 7-over for the tournament, though she still missed the cut. Dowling won the Canadian Women's Amateur Championship in 2000, helping her earn the Female Canadian Amateur Golfer of the Year Award; she was also individual champion of the Mid-American Conference in 1999 and 2000 while a student at Kent State University, and in her senior year at Kent State in 2002, she was given the Janet Bachna Award for Kent State Female Senior Athlete of the Year. While at Kent State, Dowling became friends with the winner of the 2003 The Open Championship, Ben Curtis. Dowling says her golfing hero is the great Canadian professional, Moe Norman, who died on September 4, 2004, over a month before the show began taping.
The Big Break All-Star Challenge When The Big Break was first announced, a lot of celebrities applied for the show in addition to aspiring pros. The Golf Channel soon created a celebrity edition of the show, this one to benefit charities. On March 22, 2005, The Big Break All-Star Challenge debuted, featuring four members of the Boston Red Sox. Since then, there have been many more editions of the show, featuring NASCAR drivers, as well as members of the Green Bay Packers, the Chicago White Sox, the Tampa Bay Lightning, the cast of Scrubs, and the band Hootie & The Blowfish. There have been many various hosts of the All-Star edition, and not once have Cellini and Sparks co-hosted an episode together. Other Golf Channel personalities who have hosted the All-Star edition include Brian Hammons and Steve Sands, and some co-hosts have included former NASCAR star Benny Parsons (whose two sons have involvement in the sport; Kevin was a Gardner-Webb Runnin' Bulldogs golfer, and Keith is a high school golf coach in North Carolina) and two-time Champions Tour major winner Peter Jacobsen.
Jay Kossoff, the senior producer of The Big Break, told The Charlotte Observer at the taping of the first NASCAR edition, "We had a lot of celebrities apply for spots in the original shows, so we figured it was a neat idea to do something like this — let's take the next step."
The Big Break IV: USA vs. Europe
The Big Break IV was filmed in Scotland in June 2005 at the Carnoustie Golf Links and the Old Course at St Andrews, and premiered on September 13 of the same year; the season featured teams representing the United States and Europe, competing for exemptions into two European Tour events (the Algarve Open de Portugal and the Celtic Manor Wales Open), an endorsement deal with Bridgestone Golf, a two-year lease on a Ford Explorer, and a $5,000 gift card from Dick's Sporting Goods.
Team USA
Contestant Hometown Randall Hunt Arlington, Texas Tommy Gainey Bishopville, South Carolina T.J. Valentine Plymouth, Massachusetts David Carnell Miami, Florida Paul Holtby Simi Valley, California Bart Lower Ionia, Michigan
Team Europe
Contestant Hometown Warren Bladon Leamington Spa, England Guy Woodman Old Windsor, England Edoardo Gardino Crans-Montana, Switzerland Marty Wilde Jr. Tewin, England Richard Gillot Paris, France Thomas Blankvoort Wassenaar, Netherlands
Lower was the first contestant eliminated, surprising, considering the fact that he finished third on The Big Break II. Gillot, who won a Challenge Tour event in 2000, was the next to go, followed by Carnell, then Gardino. The USA-Europe elimination trade-off continued with Gainey getting the boot. It finally stopped with Hunt being eliminated in a two-part episode (the Immunity Challenge took a full hour, while Elimination took another). With just two members left, Team USA was given two episodes off so that the European team could be whittled down to its last two. In the first episode of this, ex-Amateur Championship winner Bladon was out, with Wilde to follow the next week. The final two were determined in a double-elimination episode, in which Woodman defeated Blankvoort and Holtby manhandled Valentine in separate 9-hole matchplay challenges. Holtby went on to defeat Woodman in the matchplay final, 1 Up. Unlike the previous editions, all the eliminated contestants stayed, followed the match and even took group photos with the winner.
In the Algarve Open, Holtby shot 1-over for two rounds, missing the cut by one shot.