If you’re anything like me, you’ll spend most of New Year’s Day breaking the resolutions you resolutely made because, well, you don’t have much resolve. Sound familiar? Oh well, there’s always next year ...

THE KEEP CALM AND CARRY ON AWARD

With the kind of inscrutable countenance that would make the Sphinx of Giza look animated, Francesco Molinari’s sterling endeavours in 2018 were a joy to behold.

Amid the nail-nibbling tumult of an absorbing final day of the Open, Molinari’s unwavering and ultimately triumphant round of 16 pars and two birdies in the company of Tiger Woods was as sturdy as a military fort.

His five-out-of-five record haul in the Ryder Cup, meanwhile, burnished a quite dazzling campaign as the Italian’s level-headed poise and passion shone through.

The transatlantic tussle is an event which sees golf break out of its straitjacket. Molinari, in a thrilling alliance with Tommy Fleetwood, burst from his too. Cupping his ear to fans, pumping his fist, whipping up the galleries? Molinari did all that. But he remained calm, composed and classy throughout a wonderful year. A true champion.

THE TAKE A DEEP BREATH AWARD IN ASSOCIATION WITH BUSTER CRABBE

Less is more. Well, that’s what the sports editor said anyway when he tried to discontinue the Tuesday column.

While revered names of cherished events like The Open or The Masters slip off the tongue with the gliding nonchalance of a well-sooked Butterscotch, some of the modern day monstrosities are as awkward to gouge from your mouth as a niggling clump of nougat that’s embedded in one of your molars.

Rather like Brazil winning the World Cup three times and getting to keep the Jules Rimet trophy, the exhausting ‘Lorena Ochoa Invitational Presented by Banamex and Jalisco It Happens Within You’ from 2011 holds this long-winded award in perpetuity. But ‘The Dubai Duty Free Irish Open hosted by the Rory Foundation’ from the 2018 European Tour campaign emerged as a strong contender.

Long, but still not long enough.

THE WHAT THE HELL DO I DO WITH THIS AWARD

It remains one of the most gloriously genteel sights in golf; the engraver delicately chiselling the name of the Open champion on to the resplendent Claret Jug as said recipient enjoys his victory march up the 18th.

Whether it’s a tankard, a gauntlet, a silver salver, a sceptre, an orb or a rosebowl, the shimmering, opulent spoils of golfing conquests come in many majestic, elegant shapes and sizes. And then you have a propeller.

When Brady Schnell (pictured) won the Web.com Tour’s Wichita Open this season, he was presented with this particular accoutrement of aviation during a prize giving ceremony which looked more like a quiet presentation to the retiring curator of the Museum of Flight in East Fortune.

THE OOPS WE LEFT THAT DETAIL OUT AWARD HOSTED BY SCOTRAIL

All aboard. By all accounts, Barry Links train station is as quiet as a Trappist Monk with a sair throat. But wait.

This little Angus stop-off shed its title as the UK’s least used railway port of call in 2018 when passenger numbers rocketed from 24 in 2017 to 52 last year.

Widely circulated reports on this great upsurge of humanity, which made for the kind of quaint reading you’d get in a Bradshaw Guide, forgot to mention one key factor, though. The Open Championship, with around 172,000 folk in attendance, was on at nearby Carnoustie.

So just who were the 28 extra souls who bolstered ticket sales on the rattler from Barry? Well, it was either Tiger Woods’ entourage or some R&A liggers heading for a liquid lunch in the Craw’s Nest ... presumably.

THE TIGER WOODS AWARD FOR BEING TIGER WOODS

It wasn’t that long ago that Tiger Woods’ physical, professional, personal and psychological state had plumbed such bleak depths, he was in danger of being smothered in deep sea coral.

Love him or loathe him, you certainly couldn’t avoid him in 2018. Like a sultry siren warbling on a rocky outcrop, Woods teased and tormented by flirting with a variety of possible successes as his comeback gathered momentum.

When he briefly held the lead on the final day of the Open, the collective dropping of jaws left dents in the Carnoustie turf.

His emotional victory in the Tour Championship, which was accompanied by a riot of exuberance as fans spilled onto the fairway, was like a scene from a DeMille epic.

It was such a memorable moment, you could almost forgive Tiger for his part in The Match, an appallingly contrived exercise in ostentation with Phil Mickelson. I said almost forgive ....

Happy New Year, folks.