In the history of the Masters Tournament at Augusta National, there have been 34 holes-in-one, the most recent coming in the 2022 edition of the event.
The fourth has just one ace ever.
The sixth has had six holes-in-one.
The most famous par 3 is the 12th, known as Golden Bell, and there have been just three aces there.
The 16th hole has recorded the most aces of any hole at Augusta National with 24.
Below is a list of all the aces.
In tournament history, five aces were made by amateurs, one was made by a golfer using a mashie niblick and one was made by a golfer using a spade mashie. (Bonus points if you know what those two clubs look like).
There have been roughly 14,400 tee shots sent flying during tournament rounds at the par-3 16th hole.
SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — It’s become a true bucket-list adventure in the world of sports for golfers and fans alike, as the 16th hole at TPC Scottsdale is one of the most anticipated events during the week of the WM Phoenix Open.
The event was first played at the Stadium Course in 1987. Over the 36 years, there have been roughly 14,400 tee shots fired during tournament golf at the 140-or-so-yard hole, but there has been only 11 holes-in-one.
Yep, just 11.
The first happened in 1988. The latest was the final round of 2022.
The breakdown by round is:
first round: one
second round: one
third round: seven
final round: two
There have been two aces in the same week three different times: 1990, 1997 and 2022. There has never been two aces at 16 in the same round. A lefty has never made an ace there.
Here’s a closer look at all the holes-in-one on No. 16 at the Phoenix Open.
Playing Orange Tree Golf Resort in Scottsdale, Arizona, the 77-year-old had two holes-in-one in a four-hole stretch during a recent round.
“It started off as probably my worst round in several weeks. I just could not keep the ball in the right spots,” Romme told Phoenix TV station Fox 10 about the inauspicious start to his day. But then came the par-3, 124-yard fourth hole.
After teeing off, he didn’t see it go in. In fact, as he approached the green, he had his wedge in his hands because he didn’t see his ball on the green. That’s when one of his playing partners told him “look in the hole,” Romme said. “And here it was.”
Three holes later was the par-3 seventh.
“I hit it again and the ball, it was another nice hit,” he said. “It felt good, it went up high, had a little bit of a draw, hit the green and rolled down the hill and right in hole.”
This time he kept his eyes, and ears, on the ball.
“Clunk. We could actually hear it,” he said. “I was a little numb. I couldn’t believe it.”
Orange Tree later gave him a red pin flag as a souvenir.
One of 40 in an area golf group dubbed “The Bogey Boys”, Romme did admit that he bought a lottery ticket on his way home, just in case there still some luck left in his day, but he struck out with that purchase.
Having them come in a span of four holes is totally wild.
That’s just what happened to Blade Kurilich. Yep, Blade, that’s his real name. His club of choice for his pair of aces was a 9-iron.
“That club will be getting framed once I get a new set,” he joked after his round.
Kurilich was playing Sterling Grove Golf & Country Club in the Phoenix suburb of Surprise, Arizona, earlier this week with his regular crew. His first hole-in-one came on the third hole, where he did his best Michael Block PGA Championship impression.
“I hit just a stock 9-iron and actually dunked it straight in the hole on the fly,” he said. “I didn’t know it at the time but heard the pin rattle from the tee box. When I got up there I saw where the ball actually took a chunk out of the cup before I saw the ball in the hole.”
Four holes later, Kurilich was on the seventh tee box, again holding his 9-iron. The hole measured 172 yards but it was downwind.
“I couldn’t see that one in either over the ridge. So for both hole-in-ones I had to check the cup to be certain,” he said.
The National Hole-in-One Registry reports that the odds of an average golfer making an ace are 12,000-to-1. Kurilich says he’s a +2.4 so the odds for a golfer like him is 5,000-to-1. But this two ace thing is the real longshot, as the odds of a player making two holes-in-one in the same round are 67 million to 1.
A former baseball player who only started playing about five years ago, Kurilich had never had a hole-in-one before he got these two.
The scorecard for Blade Kurilich, who had two holes-in-one in a four-hole stretch at Sterling Grove Golf Club in Surprise, Arizona. (Photo: Blade Kurilich)
“After my second hole-in-one I had promised my buddy driving up to the green that if that one was in too, I’d dive in the lake,” he said. “Well I had to keep up on that promise and dove right in. My game went completely in the tank after that second one.”
Kurilich worked in finance in Denver but moved to Scottsdale recently with his fiancee to chase his dream of professional golf.
Not one. Not two. Not three. How about four holes-in-one in one day?
Golf influencers Troy Mullins and Tania Tare did just that, with each making two aces at Indian Wells Golf Resort.
All the fun was captured on video by Breaking Par, an Arizona-based, syndicated golf TV show carried by Bally Sports affiliates across the country.
The series is called “Ace Race with Tania Tare”, a renowned trick-shot artist. Mullins is a long-drive competitor.
On this particular day on the par-3 16th hole, each golfer took aim from 140 yards out for about four hours. The contest ended once paying customers reached the hole.
Mullins was declared the winner after she hit the most balls inside a four-foot circle around the hole. In addition to bragging rights, she won a custom Phat Ride.
“Whether you’re a golfer or not, everyone knows how special a hole-in-one is, so being there to witness four aces is something I’ll never forget,” said Ryan Johnson, executive producer of Breaking Par.
The Ace Race show debuted on July 1 and will be televised on Bally Sports affiliates until Aug. 31, 2023.
Tare has a combined 588,000 followers on Instagram and TikTok; Mullins has more than 250,000 on the two social-media platforms.
Four aces on one day on the same hole was cool, but it certainly won’t happen again this year.
Here’s perhaps the safest bet for this week’s PGA Championship: Four players won’t make holes-in-one on the same day at No. 6 of Oak Hill’s East Course. Sounds like a silly bet, of course, but it happened during the second round of the 1989 U.S. Open on the East.
There’s no way that exact feat will reoccur in this year’s PGA Championship on the same layout, because that hole no longer exists.
In a two-hour span that morning in 1989, Doug Weaver, Mark Wiebe, Jerry Pate and Nick Price each made an ace on the 167-yard par 3. The hole wasn’t exactly in a bowl, but it was pretty close, having been cut into the base of a swale. None of the four holes-in-one flew into the cup, each instead landing left, right or beyond the flag then curling into the cup. Each player used a 7-iron.
An amazing occurrence, for sure. It had never happened before in major championship or PGA Tour golf. Before the round, tournament officials had noted that it was a likely spot for ace, and they ended up with four.
That hole isn’t on the course any longer, thanks to a recent renovation by architect Andrew Green to Donald Ross’s layout in Rochester, New York. That sixth hole from 1989 was created during a 1970s renovation to the course by George Fazio and Tom Fazio. Green ripped it out, instead installing a new par 3 as No. 5. Green’s new No. 6 is a punishing par 4 that plays over and along a creek, earning the name Double Trouble. The hole is listed on the scorecard at 503 yards.
Not that a repeat of what has been dubbed the “Four Aces” – not to be confused with the LIV team of the same name – was likely anyways. The PGA of America reports that the odds of any Tour player making an ace on a given par 3 are 3,000 to 1. The National Hole-in-One Association calculated at the time that the odds of four Tour pros acing the same hole in one day to be 8.7 million to one, although such a friendly hole location that allows balls to break into the cup from multiple directions surely improved those odds a bit.
Still waiting for your first ace? Play a round at Mesa Verde CC in California.
We’ve all had a similar thought standing over a tee shot on a par 3: “Maybe this is the one that goes in.”
It’s rare for an amateur golfer to make a hole-in-one, so much so that the odds are somewhere in the ballpark of 12,500 to 1. Last weekend at Mesa Verde Country Club in Costa Mesa, California, those odds were put to shame.
Not one, not two, but three holes-in-one were made in three consecutive days from Friday, Nov. 4 to Sunday, Nov. 6 at the club, and one man was there to witness all three. Dan Kelly aced the par-3 12th with a pitching wedge from 125 yards out on Sunday, and was also a player in both groups the previous two days, when Mike Abel aced the 165-yard par-3 3rd hole on Friday and Ken King aced the 12th on Saturday.
So if you’re like me and still waiting for your first ace, maybe try and get a round at Mesa Verde with Mr. Kelly.
Check out the photos of the recently upgraded bonus hole beneath staggering cliffs, which now features a new waterfall and bar.
The most popular golf hole at Big Cedar Lodge isn’t even among the Missouri resort’s three traditional 18-hole courses or even its two par-3 courses. That distinction goes the 19th hole, a 112-yard bonus hole designed by Bass Pro Shops and Big Cedar founder Johnny Morris at the resort’s newest layout, Payne’s Valley.
Built into a pond beneath a stunning cliff wall featuring waterfalls, the bonus hole until recently had been aced 12 times since its introduction in September of 2020, when the Tiger Woods-designed Payne’s Valley opened with a name in tribute to Ozarks native Payne Stewart. But on August 18, that total was raised by two more holes-in-one in a matter of minutes.
Billye Hollister of Arlington, Virginia, made the first hole-in-one of the pair, and his group went suitably bonkers after his shot from the back tees found the cup toward the front-middle of the island green. The left-hander’s ball touched down just past the stick before one-hopping backward into the hole.
Just minutes later in a different group, Susan Stevens of Augusta, Georgia, jarred her tee shot from the front tee box, the ball bouncing twice before rolling into the cup as gently as a putt.
It’s an amazing setting for a 19th hole, and the resort has made significant upgrades since the par 3 opened two years ago. A bar was recently built near the tee, and a new waterfall feature was added to the cliff wall atop which sits the clubhouse and cabins. Check out the photos below.
Susan Stevens and Billye Hollister after their holes-in-one at the bonus 19h hole at Payne’s Valley at Big Cedar Lodge in Missouri (Courtesy of Big Cedar Lodge)
Big Cedar is home to three of the top four courses in Missouri, as judged by Golfweek’s Best rating of public-access courses for each state. Ozarks National, designed by Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw, ranks No. 1 on that list, followed by the Tom-Fazio designed Buffalo Ridge at No. 2 and Payne’s Valley at No. 4. The resort also boasts the Top of the Rock and Mountain Top par-3 courses among dozens of other attractions that include everything from fishing to go-cart racing for kids.
The WNBA knows exactly how to make their league interesting
Welcome to Layup Lines, our daily NBA newsletter where we’ll prep you for a tip-off of tonight’s action, from what to watch to bets to make. Subscribe here to get it delivered to your inbox every afternoon
What’s good, family. It’s Sykes, back again, with another edition of Layup Lines. Let’s chat about the WNBA’s new All-WNBA voting system.
The league unveiled a new system to recognize its best players with on Friday. Previously, voters had to pick the best player by position each year. You know how it goes — two guards, two forwards and a center. But under the new system starting this year, there are no more positions.
Instead, the panel of 56 media members voting will pick the 10 best players in the W overall regardless of their position. This is a monumental shift.
They made this change because of the league’s emphasis on positionless basketball, per Bethany Donaphin, the WNBA’s head of league operations.
“Our game continues to evolve. As greater emphasis is placed on spacing and pace of play, the players have expanded their multifaceted skill sets. This process change allows us to celebrate the best of the best going forward.”
This is huge, y’all. All-WNBA voting is important. Yes, it recognizes the best players in the league, but that’s the impact on a micro-scale. On a macro one? These selections tell the story of the league in that season. It’s documentation of where the league is at any given point in time.
Right now, basketball is positionless. There’s skill everywhere. There’s shooting everywhere. Teams are rolling out their best 5 player lineups and telling them to go win. That’s how basketball is played today across the sport. It’s only natural that voting reflects this. The WNBA got it exactly right — again.
Their counterparts on the NBA side could learn a thing or two here. If there’s one thing the W is going to do, it’s innovate. They’re going to make changes where they see changes are needed.
These are all things that they only just discuss on the NBA side of things. The biggest risk they’ve taken was the NBA Play-In tournament and that was mostly out of necessity because of the league’s bubble situation.
Obviously, these are two different leagues in two different spaces. The NBA is 75 years old — the W is only 26. And it’s much smaller with a much shorter season, so making changes is a bit easier.
But still, when it comes to innovation and creativity? The W has its counterpart beat by a country mile. Hopefully, one day it starts to catch up.
The Tip-Off
Some NBA goodness from around the USA TODAY Sports network.
Joe Camporeale-USA TODAY Sports
The homie Bryan Kalbrosky had an amazing interview with Jamal Crawford today and, in it, there are a bunch of gems. But the thing that really caught me off guard from it was Crawford saying he could’ve played “even longer” if he knew what he knows today earlier in his career.
“There are so many things I didn’t know that I’m giving to him and my team. That’s part of our routine. We feel ready for whatever movement might come. When you’re on the court, you’re just reacting. When you’re young, you think you can never get hurt. You’re like: “Get hurt? I just grew a new muscle. I don’t get hurt.” I don’t want them to overthink it and scare them. But I want it in the back of their mind and just introduce them to how to take care of their body. It’s so important. I would’ve played even longer if I knew the stuff I know now.”
Sky (-6.5, -260) vs. Mystics (+6.5), O/U 159.5, 8 PM ET
(AP Photo/Terrance Williams)
It’s rare that you see the Washington Mystics being this big of an underdog, but they’re literally playing the best team in the WNBA so it makes sense. But the Mystics are pretty hot, too. They’ve won two straight games and are 4-1 in their last 5 with a win over the Aces. I’m taking Washington +6.5 tonight.
That’s all, folks! Talk to you next week. Remember: Monday, Wednesday and Fri
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Playing together, Patti Thompson and Patty Southwick each made an ace.
Hole-in-one stories are always fun. This is another good one.
The Troon North Women’s Golf Association played its final event of the season Thursday in Scottsdale, Arizona.
One of the foursomes included Patti Thompson and Patty Southwick. When the group got to No. 7 of Troon North’s Monument course, Thompson pulled out her new 6-hybrid and sent her ball flying on the 115-yard hole. Seconds later, the ball was in the cup for an ace.
Six holes later, Southwick – sporting her Masters visor – hit her 4-hybrid from 128 yards and also found the hole.
Two aces, same round, similar first names. Quite a day for the duo.
