This was the first time in 19 years that the championship had been held in the Chicago metropolitan area; the Merit Club course opened eight years earlier in 1992. The purse was $2.75 million, an increase of over 57% from the previous year, with a winner's share of $500,000. Webb also picked up an additional $250,000 bonus from the Nabisco Grand Slam Challenge for winning two majors in the same year.[2]