A hole in one might be the most sought-after accomplishment in golf. The unexpectedness. The out-of-nowhere jolt golfers feel when the ball finds the cup. The raucous celebrations that follow. There have even been aces made on par 4s, including on the PGA Tour (Andrew Magee, anyone?). But has there ever been a hole in one on a par 5?

Believe it or not, yes.

According to liveabout.com, it has occurred five times, with three of them coming on sever doglegs or horseshoe-shaped holes where the listed yardage could be mitigated by going at the green as the crow flies. A pair of par-5 aces, however, were made on mostly straight holes. Think of these guys as real-life versions of Happy Gilmore (yes, we know Happy is wielding his putter here but it was the only image of him available to us).
One of them was assisted by the altitude in Denver, as Mike Crean, a 4-handicapper, ripped a driver on the 517-yard ninth hole at Green Valley Ranch G.C. and found his ball in the hole when he reached the green. His feat came on July 4, 2002. Talk about fireworks!

Did you know: No one has shot fours rounds in the 60s in one Masters

If an ace on a par 5 sounds a little fishy, well, Dick Hogan, who made one in 1973 on the eighth hole at Piedmont Crescent Golf Course in Burlington, N.C., isn’t about to argue with you as even he isn’t sure his ace is legitimate.

A scratch player who played at North Carolina State, Hogan hit a drive on the 456-yard hole and knew the ball would be somewhat close to the green. “That thing was like an interstate highway,” Hogan told the Times News in 2013. “We were in a dry spell and the fairway was red clay. The ball just never stopped rolling.”
Still, after finding his ball in the hole, Hogan had suspicions. There were maintenance workers near the hole and none said a word—odd if they had witnessed the ball go in the hole. So whether it went in on its own or got an assist Hogan will never know. Oh, and this one also happened on July 4. What is it about July 4 and par-5 aces?

Adam Sandler plays golf in a scene from the film ‘Happy Gilmore’, 1996. (Photo by Universal/Getty Images)

The first known condor (don’t ask us how it got this name, but it’s been used several times so we’ll go with it) was by Larry Bruce in 1962, who cut the corner on the sharp dogleg 480-yard fifth hole at Hope C.C. in Arkansas. Guess he still believes in a place called Hope.

One of the par-5 aces came Down Under in 2007, when Jack Bartlett banged one in on the 511-yard 17th at Royal Wentworth Falls C.C. in New South Wales, again cutting the corner on a sharp dogleg.

So, making an ace on a par 5 is a pretty big deal. But making one with a 3-iron? Yep.

In a 2004 article in Golf World by Bill Fields titled “The Rarest Bird,” Fields noted that a golfer named Shaun Lynch took dead aim at the green on the horseshoe-shaped 496-yard 17th at Teign Valley G.C. in Christow, England. Lynch took his shot up and over a 20-foot high hedge and his ball hit a sever downslope on the other side, sending it toward the green and in the cup. See? Nothing to it.

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Based off its name alone, Amen Corner has to automatically be considered the most heavenly place at Augusta National. In reality, the most heavenly place isn’t even on the golf course.

Magnolia Lane? No. The Champions Locker room? No again. Ok, it must be that spot underneath the massive oak tree in between the clubhouse and the first tee, right? Wrong. 0-for-3.

No, the most heavenly spot is one of the hardest to find, and it’s open only to amateurs. Yes, we’re talking about the “Crow’s Nest,” which has been home to amateurs competing in the Masters since the very first small gathering of friends in 1934.

Don’t believe us? Just take a look at some of the quotes from those that have stayed there, pulled straight from this incredible 2012 piece on the Crow’s Nest from our own Dave Kindred.

“You dream of being there, and when you’re there, you go, ‘Wow, is this really real?’,” says Manny Zerman, who stayed there in 1991.

Brandt Snedeker had a similar feeling. “You’re walking on air, like it’s not really reality. Everything, the Masters, the place–it’s inspiring. I’ve made no secret how much I love it. If I could win a Masters, I wouldn’t care if I ever won another thing. I’d make that deal right now.”

“No player, no amateur, no junior wouldn’t want this,” says Billy Andrade, who accidentally wandered into the Champions Locker Room when he first stayed at the Crow’s Nest in 1987, only to be met by an angry Gene Sarazen. “Your goal in life is to get to that peak where you can stay in the Crow’s Nest. It’s like Bobby Jones has this attic in a big house, and you’re a little boy going up there. When you come down, you’re grown up.”

Former U.S. Amateur winner Bill Campbell once told the Masters Journal that “It was kind of like heaven for a golfer.”

To find it, amateurs first need to locate the secret door inside of the clubhouse marked “TELEPHONE.” Once there, a second door leads to a staircase, which takes you into the nest. The 30-foot by 40-foot room sits atop the Augusta National clubhouse, and more resembles a college dorm than a luxury hotel. There are four bedrooms, divided off by wooden partitions, and a common area, complete with a small TV, a small couch, a game table and one bathroom. Amateurs do have to pay to stay, though the price is unknown. In 1968, it was just $1 a night, according to 1972 U.S. Amateur winner Marvin “Vinny” Giles III.

There’s little doubt the price has changed over the years, but the old-school nature of the Crow’s Nest will always remain the same. As Ben Crenshaw perfectly put it in a video profile of the Crow’s Nest last year, “pretty nice, this is a pretty nice spot.”

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By Joel Beall
The Coronavirus pandemic has hit a giant pause button on fans being able to watch golf on TV, and in some cases, even kept people off courses. But while we hunker down and hope for a speedy return to normalcy, we can also use this time as an opportunity to learn more about the game we love. Here’s our latest instalment of “Did you know?”

In 2019 the Augusta National Golf Club launched the Augusta National Women’s Amateur. But it’s not the only time a tournament other than the Masters was played on the hallowed Georgia property.

In 1937 and 1938, Augusta National served as host for the PGA Seniors’ Championship. The tournament, which debuted in 1937, was brought to Augusta National by co-founder Bobby Jones, who thought the event would be a platform to honour the pioneers who came before him. Jones asked the club’s board of governors to alter its bylaws to allow another tournament to be played at Augusta National.

“They all feel as I do, that they are glad to make an exception to an established policy in order to make a gesture of appreciation to those members of your association who have contributed much to golf in this country,” Jones said.

It was supposed to be more of a celebration rather than a competitive tournament. There was a practice round and three 54-hole tournaments, divided by ages groups: 50-54, 55-59 and 60-plus. Jock Hutchison won the inaugural Senior PGA over 36 other players with a seven-over 223, while Fred McLeod won the rain-shortened 1938 event in an 18-hole playoff over Otto Hackbarth, after Hackbarth three-putted the 17th and 18th in regulation. (Related note: “Hackbarthed” should be the new term for “three-jack.”).

The tournament moved to warmer confines in 1939, but the spirit of the Senior PGA was brought back with the introduction of the Honorary Starters in 1963, with Hutchison and McLeod serving as the ceremonial strikers.

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Golfers around the world have Scotland to thank for inventing this great game, but the term “birdie” is actually an all-American term. Specifically, Atlantic City Country Club is where the fluttery phrase for shooting one under par came to be—and boy, do they let you know about it. Here’s the opening sentence when you visit the club’s website:

As one of America’s oldest and most prolific golf clubs, Atlantic City Country Club has been home to many firsts, including being the “Birthplace of the Birdie.”

Look, they even have a nice plaque commemorating it (pictured above).

Did you know: Why does a golf course have 18 holes?

Atlantic City Country Club also claims to be the site of the first “eagle,” the first senior tour event, the first Ivy League Championship, and the first slots-and-shots member-guest. Kidding about the last one.

The origins of this conception vary slightly, but the gist is that during a round in 1903 Abner “Ab” Smith launched a long approach shot on ACCC’s par-4 12th hole (now No. 2) that wound up within kick-in range of the cup. The result caused one of the group’s members (Ab’s brother William and Pine Valley architect George Crump rounded out the threesome) to exclaim it was a “bird of a shot!” At the time, “bird” was slang for something pretty swell or really neat or whatever else they said at the turn of the 20th century.

Here’s how Jock Howard explained it in a 1991 issue of Golf Digest:

Towards the end of the Nineteenth century, bird was American slang used frequently to describe a person or thing of excellence, such as, ‘He is a perfect bird of a man.’”

Speaking of perfect birds of a man, this means it’s possible Crump is responsible for both the birdie and the creation of the country’s greatest golf course. That is quite the résumé.

Also of note was that the group was playing for a few bucks (obviously). According to Scottish Golf History, Ab said he should get double the money for an under-par score and somehow his playing partners agreed to these ad-hoc terms and a tradition was born.

As time went on, the story got better—as stories often do. Ab claimed it actually happened in 1899 and that he both made the birdie and said, “That’s a bird of a shot!” No self-esteem problems there! According to “The Book of the Birdie” by William Kelly, The Atlantic City Press added a fourth golfer to the group, A.W. Tillinghast, and legendary golf writer Charles Price wrote that Smith’s shot had “first struck a bird in flight.” So this tale about a bird also became a big fish story. Amazing.

In any event, the term “birdie” was coined, which, according to Price was an “abomination in the eyes of the British.” And more than a century later, like bird poop to the windshield of my car every time I park outside, it has stuck.

RELATED: How tour pros are staying busy while under quarantine

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By Alex Myers

The coronavirus pandemic has hit a giant pause button on fans being able to watch golf on TV, and in some cases, even kept people off courses. But while we hunker down and hope for a speedy return to normalcy, we can also use this time as an opportunity to learn more about the game we love. Here’s our first instalment of “Did you know?”

In the beginning, there was St. Andrews. And this old course that is most appropriately named THE Old Course had 18 holes. Well, near the beginning it had 18 holes, that is. And eventually, other courses were copycats.

Those are the broad strokes of how a typical golf course came to have 18 holes. Sadly, as Snopes confirmed, the number has nothing to do with how many shots are in a bottle of Scotch—though that makes for a much more fun story.

In any event, if you love golf, 18 holes is great because it takes a long time to play that many. Of course, if you love someone who loves golf, it’s not as great. But again, it took a long time for this to become standard. Even longer than it takes to play 18 holes at a public course today.

So how did St. Andrews come to have 18 holes? There must have been some special Scottish reason for this, right? Wrong.

The first courses actually varied in number of holes, and even St. Andrews had 22 at one point. TWENTY-TWO! Too bad it didn’t stay that way, huh? According to the website Scottish Golf History, the number was cut to 18 pretty arbitrarily when four short holes were combined into two (played in two directions) in 1764. And this still wasn’t a template right away for other courses as evidenced by Prestwick Golf Club opening in 1851 with just 12 holes.

In fact, Prestwick’s dastardly dozen (Not an actual nickname, but something I just made up. Like it?) hosted the first 12 British Opens—sorry, Open Championships—beginning in 1860. That makes Willie Park Sr.’s three-round winning total of 174 seem a lot less impressive, huh?

It would have been a baker’s dozen of Opens to start, but there was no tournament in 1871 because Young Tom Morris was allowed to just keep the title belt (yes, an actual belt) that year because he had won the three previous years. Man, they had some crazy rules back in the day.

Anyway, when the Open returned in 1872 at Prestwick, it remained a 36-hole event and stayed that way when it moved to St. Andrews (two rounds of 18) in 1873 and Musselburgh (four rounds of 9!) in 1874. And you thought the current Open rota was tough to keep track of.

In 1881, Prestwick finally joined a number of other courses in getting on board with having 18 holes, because, again, everyone was trying to copy the Old Course, which also happens to be where the Royal and Ancient Golf Club is based. And when you’re regarded as “The Home of Golf,” people tend to follow your lead. It’s just too bad they didn’t stick with 22. . .

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