Featured Post

Review: Leatherstocking Golf Course (Part 1)

Most people who visit Cooperstown, New York, are going to see the National Baseball Hall of Fame. It is the obvious reason to visit the town...

Showing posts with label hole in one. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hole in one. Show all posts

Wednesday, January 27, 2021

Golf's Rarest Score Achieved

Most golfers have made a birdie. Quite a few have made an eagle, and quite a few have made hole in ones. The albatross (or double eagle) is rare, but when a few hundred million rounds are played every year a few are bound to happen. But then you've got the condor, or a score of four under par on a single hole. For 99.9% of golf courses, the only way to do that is to make a hole in one on a par 5, something which clearly doesn't happen every day. Or every year. In fact, it's only happened four times in recorded history.

There is, however, more than one way to make a condor. They aren't common, but some golf courses do have par 6s (like Fore Sisters, though I don't think anyone's getting to that one in two). Lake Chabot in California is one such course, as it finishes with a 675-yard par 6 that, crucially, plays dramatically downhill in a similar fashion to the final hole at Kapalua. You can get some long drives there, but the 540 yard drive that Kevin Pon hit is something else. Some cart path assistance was assured. From there, it was a simple wedge into the hole for the only recorded condor on a par 6. Man, it's tough enough making a two on a par 3, and this guy goes and makes one on a par 6. I'm very jealous.

Wednesday, April 13, 2016

All About Louis Oosthuizen's Insane Ace

The last round of the 2016 Masters was not the most pleasant thing to watch. Danny Willett was a deserving winner, but Jordan Spieth's quadruple bogey on the 12th hole is going to be remembered for a long time. But if you like hole-in-one's, then Sunday at Augusta this year was the place to be. There were 3 of them at 16, including Louis Oosthuizen's even-more-improbable-than-normal ace, which bounced off of J.B Holmes' ball and into the hole. Now, I've made two aces, and I can assure you that while some skill is obviously involved, actually getting that hole-in-one is mostly luck.

If you want to analyze this particular shot using math, here's a fun little article on the physics of this hole-in-one, and just how improbable it was. Spoiler: it's pretty unlikely.