| TALES FROM THE BOX
more do I have to do? Hit the ball in the general direction of the hole, I hear you say. Fair point. But Kingston’s only ace that resulted in a prize – a handsome Audi TT – ricocheted off trees well to the left of the green at Houghton in Johannesburg. I also remember Vijay Singh, playing in the US PGA Championship at Valhalla, hitting rocks 20 yards left of the target before shooting across the green and in.
A Pair of
Aces
Julian Tutt takes a break from his European Tour commentating duties to question why he has never had a hole-in-one after watching Andrew Dodt record two in a single round. Dear Great Provider, can I have a hole-inone for my birthday please? I have been playing this frustrating game on and off for 50 years and have never had one. Tiger has had 18 or so. Mind you he is The Best. South African James Kingston has had nine and, amazingly, four albatrosses, one famously coming at Fanling. Even Dominique Boulet has had five. OK, so he has his name on his bag, but my mother-in-law, a 22 handicapper, has two, and now Andrew Dodt has nine, after starting the second round of the recent Scandinavian Masters in Stockholm with seven; the Aussie, staggeringly, had two in the space of 15 holes which, according to the statisticians, is a 67 million-to-one chance. Apparently I have better odds of having quintuplets, which is something that slightly concerns me. Detailed research by my heavily computerised colleague Warren Humphreys
revealed that this has happened twice previously on the PGA Tour, and once in the UK, in 1971, the year before the European Tour was formed. English pro John Hudson, playing in the Martini International at Royal Norwich, holed in one at a par three, and then did it with a driver at the very next hole, a short par four. Imagine! In my naivety/ignorance I thought this must be an exceedingly rare occurrence. However, having scoured the internet, (so much easier than going to the British Library) I discovered that this happened three times last month alone – all by amateurs. Sixty-five year-old Jan Walker did it on Australia’s Gold Coast, using the same 5-wood and the same ball, a pre-owned Wilson: how nonchalant. According to one website, 45 per cent of holesin-one in America are achieved using a Titleist ball. I always use a new Titleist Pro V1x. What
Daniel Wong (Tutt); AFP (Dodt and Els)
Andrew Dodt (right) beat odds of 67 million-to-one when he made two holesin-one during the second round of the Scandinavian Masters in Stockholm last month; Ernie Els (opposite) played this beautiful bunker shot at the 13th hole on his way to winning the 2002 Open Championship at Muirfield 26
HK Golfer・JUL 2013
HKGOLFER.COM
Whilst chewing the fat with Paul Casey one evening in Stockholm, I discovered one or two little pro secrets that might be worth trying. You will know that the way a ball spins off the face of a club is crucial and that the pros are always tweaking the loft and lie and shaft and ball to get the right combination. Paul for instance cannot use the modern system of “twist and click” with his driver because the club looks shut to him. He has to shave the tip of the shaft and use glue in the old fashioned way, with the club fitter holding the head at exactly the right angle for 10 minutes until the glue dries. He carries two almost identical drivers, the difference being that in wet weather he uses one with a face that he has very lightly “roughed up” with wire wool, being careful to make sure the club remains legal. This allows the face to grip the ball better, giving an important extra two hundred rpm. A lack of such attention to detail may be why your ball goes sideways in the wet: I can think of no other reason. I have been broadcasting for 30 years, but I was reminded of a basic lesson the following week at the Lyoness Open outside Vienna. Every day we do a brief lunchtime round-up for the internet and tournament TV. This day it had taken me three attempts to get it right. Imagine my horror when Sky Sports commentator Richard Boxall burst into the press centre saying that he’d just walked through the tented village listening to me saying on the big screen there, “Oh no, I’ve got that the wrong way round, sorry guys, very dopey, we’ll have to do it again. I need a cold shower to wake up, etc.” A young and inexperienced assistant producer had rushed and not checked she had the right version. Egg over Tutt’s face, but thankfully I had neither abused Austria or its inhabitants, nor resorted to the vernacular at my lunacy. The rule is NEVER, ever, swear into a microphone. You just never know. I was suffering with a sore back in Vienna, so decided to enlist the help of a reflexologist. She did help, and persuaded me that what I really needed was her “extremely good value leech treatment.” I still bear the scars from 10 hours HKGOLFER.COM
On Sunday, Ernie played one of the greatest bunker shots you could hope to see from underneath the steep face of a greenside bunker at the 13th, and went on to beat Thomas Levet in the only suddendeath play-off in the championship’s history. of bleeding, but I can say they are the only beneficial blood-suckers I have come across. My colleague Paul “Slippery” Eales (I have no idea why he is called that) thought I was mad. I was too, once I discovered how much the treatment cost. It will be good to be back at Muirfield this month for the first time since 2002, when I was walking the fairways for BBC TV. For two days Tiger played as he had in winning the 2000 Open at St Andrews: irons off tees, keeping out of the treacherous bunkers and often having long irons into greens when many others had wedges. He was unlucky to be caught in the worst of Saturday’s brutal storm, when on one hole the aptly named Duffy Waldorf hit it into a bush 70 yards in front of the tee. Such was the gruesomeness of the conditions that Tiger barely managed 200 yards with his driver. Ernie Els was luckier, as the wind abated while he still had enough holes to repair the damage somewhat. Such are the vicissitudes of links and Open Championship golf. Tiger shot 81, Ernie 72, and Colin Montgomerie 84, after he’d moved into contention with a second round 64. On a lovely final day, a typically resolute Tiger bounced back with a 65 to finish tied 28th, while Monty shot 75 to finish 82nd. Tiger has won 14 majors and counting, Monty has won, err, none. But maybe that’s just a coincidence … On Sunday, Ernie played one of the greatest bunker shots you could hope to see from underneath the steep face of a greenside bunker at the 13th, and went on to beat Thomas Levet in the only sudden-death play-off in the championship’s history. (The pair had earlier seen off Steve Elkington and Stuart Appleby in The Open’s now-standard four-hole play-off). In 1992, Ernie was a fresh-faced youth just making his mark, finishing an excellent tied fifth. Working then for BBC Radio I was behind the 18th on Sunday when Nick Faldo hit a peerless 3-iron that never left the flag, and then proceeded to thank the press from “the heart of his bottom” in his victory speech. It is just possible that Sir Nick, who has confirmed his entry into the field for his first competitive outing since the 2010 Open, might be reminded of this when he tees it up this time around. HK Golfer・JUL 2013
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