PGA Championship winner Aaron Rai’s unusual golf habit hides emotional tribute to father Amrik Singh

Indian-origin British golfer Aaron Rai created new history on Sunday by beating the world's top players to clinch the PGA Championship. He is the first Englishman to win the tournament in the stroke play era.

The 31-year-old Wolverhampton-born Aaron Rai is also the first player in PGA Championship history to lower his score in each round.

Aaron Rai's unexpected victory has obviously led to a barrage of online searches about his ancestry, his Indian connection, childhood, his parents, and a major oddity -- he plays golf with gloves on both hands and uses iron covers.

Why Aaron Rai uses two gloves and iron covers?

In golf, almost every player wears only one glove, on the non-dominant hand and removes it around the greens. But not for Aaron Rai. And it's not a style statement.

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The practice dates back to his childhood.

“It started when I was 8 years old,” Aaron Rai revealed to Golf Monthly. “I just happened to be given these two gloves, the guy who actually makes them sent a pair over, and I got into the habit of wearing them.

“Then, a few weeks down the line, my dad forgot to put the two gloves in the bag so I had to play with one. It was terrible. I couldn’t play, I couldn’t feel the grip, so I’ve always stuck with the two gloves ever since.”

Aaron Rai, one of the steadiest ball-strikers, feels that wearing gloves on both hands gives him a better grip on the club.

The only time Aaron Rai uses only one glove is while putting or hitting bunker shots.

But what about the iron covers?

That's a tribute to his father -- Amrik Singh, who was born in England to Indian immigrants.

“It started from the age of 4 years old, when my dad used to pay for my equipment,” Rai said about wearing iron covers. “He paid for my membership, paid for my entry fees. It wasn’t money that we really had, to be honest, but he’d always buy me the best clubs.

“When we used to go out and practice, he used to clean every single groove afterward with a pin and baby oil, and, to protect the golf clubs, he thought it would be good to put iron covers on them and I’ve pretty much had iron covers on all my sets ever since, just to kind of appreciate the value of what I have.”