Playing this week on a sponsor exemption, Tae Hoon Kim won a car at the Genesis Invitational after making a hole-in-one on Thursday.
PACIFIC PALISADES, Calif. — The Genesis Invitational is sponsored by luxury automotive brand Genesis and there are cars strategically parked around the property.
There’s one out front of the Riviera Country Club. There’s another on the tee box at the famous 10th hole.
On Thursday during the first round, Tae Hoon Kim aced the 16th hole, which means he’ll be taking home one of those vehicles. A Genesis G-80 to be exact.
Playing 168 yards, Kim used his seven iron to earn himself a new set of wheels. It’s the first ace of the tournament this year. It got Kim to 4 under through seven holes. He started on the back nine and birdied the 10th and eagled the 11th to start his day.
Kevin Lamb, a Connecticut resident who vacations in Naples, Florida, made two holes-in-one in the same round.
The reported odds are 167 million to 1 for a golfer to make two holes-in-one in the same round.
But for the second time in less than four months, it’s happened in Naples, Florida.
On Jan. 20, Kevin Lamb, 67, made a pair of aces in a seven-hole span at Quail Creek Country Club. Back in October, Randy Jones, 70, made two in the same round at Wyndemere Country Club.
Lamb was playing in a scramble on the Quail Course at Quail Creek, and on No. 17, his second hole, he stepped up with his 5-hybrid from 175 yards.
“It landed halfway between the front of the green and the hole, and rolled right in,” Lamb said. “I couldn’t see it, the way the light was. A couple of the other guys in the group had better eyesight. They said ‘Oh, that went in. That went in.’ I said ‘Sure. Sure.’ We got up there and there were no balls around, and it was in the cup. It was pretty exciting.”
Lamb rode that wave to chip in on the next hole, and make a 30-foot putt on the one after that. “I was unconscious,” he said.
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The group made it to No. 5, his eighth hole of the round. He pulled out an 8-iron on the 139-yard hole.
“I hit it good. It looked good,” he said. “I didn’t want to be cocky and say ‘Oh, this is going in.’ But it bounced once and disappeared. The pin was on the back of the green, and I thought it must have gone long. One of the fellas in the group said ‘That went in on the fly.’ I said ‘No, it couldn’t have gone in on the fly.'”
Lamb said due to the coronavirus pandemic, all of the cups had liners in them for safety reasons, making them shallower.
“How could it even stay in there?” he said. “So I get out of the cart and I bring my chipper and putter, and I walk to the back of the green. And I don’t see it.”
James Nelson, one of his playing partners, was next to the hole.
“It’s right in here,” he told Lamb.
“We were all going crazy,” Lamb said. “I tried to not get too excited.”
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Lamb has been coming to Naples for 10 years from Connecticut, and retired this past year after being a managing partner in an aerospace manufacturing business. Lamb’s holes-in-one total is now four. He made one about five years ago, also on the fifth hole at Quail Creek, and made his other one at Hartford Golf Club in Connecticut.
Lamb said his game fell apart the rest of the way.
“I couldn’t even knock in 4-footers,” said Lamb, who shot a 77.
But any disappointment was softened when he finished, and the group of 40 men were there in the clubhouse.
“We happened to be the last group that finished,” Lamb said. “We walked into the bar and grill, and it was about 1 o’clock. All 40 guys and a number of other lunch people, everybody started standing up and clapping. It was pretty cool.”
According to a story on TMZ Sports, Wayne Gretzky recorded a hole-in-one at Sherwood Country Club in Thousand Oaks, California, to end his year.
Gretzky reportedly used a 9-iron on the par-3 sixth hole, which was playing 140 yards. TMZ also reported that Masters champ Dustin Johnson, who is engaged to Gretzky’s daughter Paulina, called from vacation in Hawaii to congratulate his future father-in-law.
In October, Gretzky put his mansion in Thousand Oaks back on the market for nearly $10 million more than he bought it for just three years ago. He built the home with his actress/model wife Janet Jones in 2002 and then sold the property to former Major League Baseball star Lenny Dykstra for $18.5 million in 2007. Dykstra later fell into debt and the home was auctioned off, it changed hands twice before Gretzky again purchased the property — this time for $13.5 million. It is still for sale.
If you ever needed more evidence of how ridiculously good pro golfers are, look no further than the sorcery Jon Rahm pulled off Tuesday.
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If you ever needed more evidence of how ridiculously good professional golfers are at golf, look no further than the sorcery that Jon Rahm pulled off at Augusta on Tuesday.
It has been a tradition over the years to attempt to skip your shot off the water on No. 16 during practice rounds. And while any regular golfer would simply send their shot plunging into a pond (you know, because gravity), pro golfers turn that pond into a playable avenue of some sort.
But man, Rahm’s attempt at No. 16 on Tuesday may legitimately be the most remarkable golf shot I’ve ever seen. He skipped his shot off the water for a hole-in-one.
“Yeah, pretty nice birthday present,” said Rahm, who turned 26 on Tuesday. “Can’t complain. Hit my normal tee shot to two feet and then skipped it and made it, which is the craziest thing, the second hole-in-one of the week.”
Indeed, it was his second ace this week. Rahm made a hole-on-one on the fourth hole on Monday.
“Well, yesterday it was on 4, I hit a 5 iron, and we didn’t know it went in. A couple people on the green, and we didn’t know until we basically got to the green. But the one on 16 today was visible, so very different. You don’t see people skipping it and actually hitting it on the green very often, and to make it to that back pin, clearly we were all pretty shocked.”
Rahm said he isn’t counting the skip ace towards his career total.
“The one on 16 doesn’t really count as an ace. With the one on 4 yesterday, that’s four. Two in competition,” he said.
A new study by TheLeftRough has discovered that, since 1999, Californians have made more holes-in-one than golfers from any other state.
The hole-in-one, golf’s Holy Grail. One club, one stroke, one ball in the cup. Even the best in the world struggle to pull it off.
Tiger Woods himself has made only 20 holes-in-one over a professional career that spans 23 years, with 82 PGA Tour wins and counting. Interestingly, 19 of Woods’ 20 aces came before his 26th birthday.
By that particular metric, Norman Manley has Tiger Woods beat.
Wait, who? Manley was an electric designer from Culver City, California, who made his first hole-in-one in 1963 at 40 years of age. A once-per-lifetime achievement, right? Except Manley, who never got within shouting distance of professional golf, racked up a total of 59 aces over the course of his life. 59. It’s a world record that still stands.
Another Californian, Elsie McLean, holds the record for oldest golfer to ever make a hole-in-one. In 2007, she aced the 100-yard fourth at Bidwell Park Golf Course in Chico at 102 years old.
Meanwhile, we find Jake Paine at the other end of the spectrum. In 2001, at three years old, he made an ace from 66 yards on the Lake Forest Golf and Practice Course. Where is this course located? You guessed it: California.
While it appears Californians have a knack for making holes-in-one, a new study corroborates that claim. This research, collected by TheLeftRough, analyzed nearly 30,000 aces scored since 1999 to discover which Americans are most likely to make one and what states they are from.
The top five states where the most talented (or most fortunate) golfers reside, and the number of holes-in-one each state has recorded, are as follows:
But the plot thickens when you factor in the number of golf courses located in each state. Based on research from Travel Magazine, here are America’s top five states based on course count:
Florida – 1,250
California – 921
Texas – 907
New York – 832
Michigan – 650
The same five suspects present themselves, but in a curiously different order. Californians have made 316 more aces than Floridians despite having about 329 fewer golf courses in their home state.
The study also revealed that the eighth hole was the most common ace location, with 2,701 holes-in-one taking place there. Holes No. 3 (2,422) and No. 7 (2,180) came in second and third, respectively.
Moreover, players using a 7 iron found the most success with 2,938. An 8 iron and a 6 iron round out the top three, with 2,819 and 2,350 aces respectively.
“It’s interesting to see Californians hitting so many holes-in-one — especially when it’s nearly 500 more than any other state — you have to wonder what training they’re doing out there on the west coast,” said Charlie Parsons, founder of TheLeftRough.
“We’re planning to make this research a recurring thing, so that we can track how holes-in-one in the U.S. are changing — who knows, maybe Florida will surpass California this time next year.”
He’s just 5, but the resident of Bonita Springs, Florida, is already an accomplished trick shot artist who just made his second hole-in-one.
Cameron Middleton’s treat is playing tricks.
He’s just 5 — yes 5 — but the resident of Bonita Springs, Florida, is already an accomplished golf trick shot artist.
Oh, and he just made his second hole-in-one. That he called.
It’s been a treat so far for parents Marc and Gina Middleton, even though they have no idea where this came from. They aren’t golfers. Gina’s father, Augie Buffa, is, though, and made her watch golf on TV growing up. She thought it was boring.
Cameron hits a bag of balls from the driving range at Stoneybrook. Cameron Middleton, who is 5, recently made his second career hole-in-one out at Stoneybrook Golf Club in Estero about halfway between Fort Myers and Naples. His first was at Alico Family Golf. Middleton also does trick shots and is already an accomplished golfer.
Now the Middletons have no choice. And the ride has been anything but boring.
“He is hooked,” Gina said, fittingly, Wednesday at Stoneybrook Golf Club, Cameron’s home course, in Estero.
“We’ve seen him grow a lot in the last two years,” said Bobby Conway, his instructor at Stoneybrook. “He’s got a nose for the hole — I mean, he’s got two hole-in-ones already.”
This all started when the Middletons got Cameron some plastic golf clubs when he was 3, and he started hitting balls.
“My husband and I stood there in amazement,” she said.
Middleton has been featured on the Golf Channel and a West Palm Beach television station — an anchor had come across his trick shots on Instagram and reached out to do an interview. Those pieces were because of his trick shots he came up with — starting with many simpler ones just messing around on indoor putting greens at Dick’s Sporting Goods, Golf Galaxy, or PGA Tour Superstore.
Middleton has transferred that to the actual golf course this year.
He made his first ace at Alico Family Golf’s short course from 40 yards on Jan. 6. Then on Oct. 15, Cameron and his mom were out practicing at Stoneybrook, and they got to No. 14. A year earlier, Cameron had holed out for birdie from about 50 yards. He had something better in mind.
“We’re in the cart pulling up to 14, and he goes ‘Mommy, you might want to film this, I’m going to get a hole-in-one,'” Gina said. “I just kind of shrugged him off — not that I didn’t think he could do it.”
Cameron pulled out his 7-iron and sized up the shot on the 67-yard hole.
“I got out of the cart and I got my phone. as soon as he hit that ball, you can hear him in the video, he goes ‘Yep.’ I was like, Oh. My. God. This kid,” she said. “I couldn’t believe what I was watching. It’s amazing.”
Gina was running behind Cameron, who is a kindergartener at Pinewoods Elementary, after watching the ball go in the hole.
“I was trying so hard not to run him over,” she said. “I’m running with my phone so I can’t see him. I’m going to crash into him, and we’re going to fall.”
The video of the hole-in-one has been shared on social media by Sports Illustrated, and was featured as “Play of the Day” on “Good Morning America” on Tuesday. The video has over 1,500 views on Instagram.
An ABC producer had reached out to Gina on Instagram and asked for permission to use the video. She couldn’t say that it would definitely be on, just because if there had been some kind of breaking news overnight, so Gina didn’t tell Cameron about it.
Tuesday morning, Gina had taken a walk and was taking a shower but had “Good Morning America” on the TV.
“I heard ‘Coming up next, the Play of the Day,’ and I’m jumping out of the shower. I’m like ‘Hurry, Cameron, hurry,'” she said.
Cameron has kept the two balls he hit when he got his hole-in-ones. Cameron Middleton, who is 5, recently made his second career hole-in-one out at Stoneybrook Golf Club in Estero. His first was at Alico Family Golf. Middleton also does trick shots and is already an accomplished golfer.
“He was staring at the TV. He was like ‘Mommy, that’s my hole-in-one!'”
As for his trick shots, they started out just as bank shots off barriers around indoor putting greens — people in the store would become enamored and stop to watch him bank in shot after shot — and have become more intricate, especially when the family was spending time basically in quarantine earlier this year due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Cameron Middleton, who is 5, recently made his second career hole-in-one out at Stoneybrook Golf Club in Estero, Florida. Middleton also does trick shots and is already an accomplished golfer.
“These are original ideas,” Cameron said.
Gina started @CameronLovesGolf on Instagram, and it has over 2,500 followers, and he also has a YouTube channel. There are dozens and dozens of trick shots on there over the past several months — one is a series of him hitting a plastic golf ball into an open Instant Pot, an open microwave, an open oven, and an open refrigerator, all while his dad is going about his business and opening and closing the top or doors of them — but the balls sneak in.
“It all works in his mind,” Gina said. “‘Mommy, take the flag out and put it here, and put the bottle here, and I’m going to chip the ball, and knock it in.’ I’m like ‘Whatever you say, just tell me what to do and that’s what I go do.
“… He’s pretty good at telling me what he wants to do, or if I put it for him, he’s like ‘No that’s not angled right.’ He’s able to stand up on the hills and stand up and see ‘If I hit it, that’s not going to work.'”
You can see his favorite trick shot — that ended up on Golf Channel when he was 4 — hitting a ball through the opening of a hanging roll of duct tape that was spinning. There are ones of him hitting trick shots up and down stairs, knocking a playing card from between two plastic cups from across the room, and off doors and walls into cups or other containers. Most are followed by his yet-to-be-trademarked happy dance.
“The best part about Cameron is he loves golf,” Conway said. “Every time I see him, he wants to play more holes after every tournament. He wants to go play until it’s dark.”
Cameron’s room is a mecca to the sport, with autographed items, pictures, medals he’s won in tournaments, and even golf shoes with his image on them (those stay in a case). And there’s a turf putting area. The Middletons’ lanai is an improvised practice area that is completely covered in turf and also has a hitting net.
Like Cameron’s mind when figuring out the angles and setting up a trick shot, he just never stops. He’s got big plans for his sixth birthday in late December, too.
“I want to come here in the morning, and hit balls on No. 17 until the sun sets,” he said.
Marc now plays, practices and caddies with his son, and Gina is his unofficial manager/social media documenter.
The family went to the Chubb Classic, and PGA Tour’s Honda Classic and The Players Championship this year before the pandemic hit, meeting as many players and getting as many autographs as they could.
Last year, they went to the QBE Shootout. When tournament founder and host Greg Norman had his clinic that also featured LPGA Tour star and Shootout participant Lexi Thompson, Cameron became an unofficial part of the show. Thompson and Middleton had a putting contest — with his putter. His ball stopped inches short of going in, but the major championship winner drained her putt.
Competition is part of what draws Cameron to the game. That resolve comes from his father. And Conway, his instructor, plays into that.
“When I’m giving him a lesson, all we really do is do competitions against each other, just to get out his competitive spirit,” Conway said. “He’s learning that way. It’s not instruction, but it’s more fun, fun, keep it fun.”
Any competition between the two is supposed to end up with the loser doing push-ups, although it seems neither competitor has actually seen the loser do any — Cameron goes behind the display desk in the pro shop and giggles as he does (or doesn’t) do them. Conway, for some reason, hasn’t lived up to his end of the bargain when he’s lost.
“I haven’t seen you do one,” Cameron needled him.
While he’s become somewhat of a star in front of the camera with his talent, Cameron is slow to open up. Again, he’s 5.
When the Middletons, who moved from the state’s east coast in September 2018, brought Cameron out to Stoneybrook to have head professional Jeff Nixon and Conway take a look at him, he didn’t say much.
Conway ended up being Cameron’s instructor, and after a while, he wasn’t sure how it was going. There wasn’t a question in his mind of Cameron’s talent, but Cameron just wasn’t talkative, and he had mentioned to Gina that he wasn’t sure Cameron liked him. She assured Conway that Cameron would eventually warm up to him, and that happened not too soon after.
Cameron drives the ball on the driving range as he hits a round of balls. Cameron Middleton, who is 5, recently made his second career hole-in-one out at Stoneybrook Golf Club in Estero. His first was at Alico Family Golf. Middleton also does trick shots and is already an accomplished golfer.
Wednesday, they spent most of their time messing with one another. Conway quizzed him on his favorite baseball players, if he had heard of certain tour players (Rickie Fowler is his favorite — he mainly wears Puma golf attire, which Fowler endorses — with Bryson DeChambeau an emerging second). Meanwhile, Cameron sat still for brief periods and climbed nearly every inch of the inside of a golf cart — while repeatedly interjecting it was time to have the putting contest.
And Cameron finally got Conway to do the putting contest.
“He has such a passion for the game, and you can’t teach that,” Gina said.
That’s no trick.
Greg Hardwig is a sports reporter for the Naples Daily News and The News-Press, part of the USA Today Network. Follow him on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter: @NDN_Ghardwig, email him at ghardwig@naplesnews.com.
Nothing about a John Daly hole-in-one is going to be boring, from the attire down to the colorful language used to describe it.
Nothing about a John Daly hole-in-one is going to be boring, from the attire down to the colorful language used to describe it. From that standpoint, his most recent ace – caught on camera during a recent charity pro-am – doesn’t disappoint in the least.
Daly holed out Sunday on the par-3 11th hole at the Bone Frog Open, a charity pro-am at Federal Golf Club in Glen Allen, Virginia, benefitting the families of fallen Navy SEALS.
Unsurprisingly, Daly was without a hat or shoes and in colorful shorts with his shirt un-tucked. Federal Club golf professional Josh Price caught the swing on camera followed by the celebration that took place afterward among the group.
After the high-fives, Daly can be heard declaring that the shot “makes 11 of those mother–,” catching himself as he realized he was being filmed.
Stephanie Scott is the first girl ever at her high school to record an ace and she did so on the first swing she ever took in competition.
Stephanie Scott was surprisingly calm walking to the opening hole for the first match of her high school career. Her first golf competition ever, actually. The Otsego (Michigan) High freshman was playing in a dual match against rival Plainwell, and all 15 girls on her team were in action on Monday in a shotgun start.
Scott’s round began on the par-3 eighth hole. She pulled a 7-iron from her bag for the 90-yard shot and aimed toward a pin that was cut behind a bunker. It didn’t feel like that good of a strike to Scott, and the marshy area in front of tee box kept her from seeing where it ended up. But the yelling around the green told the remarkable tale.
Scott, 14, had one-hopped it in the hole for an ace.
“I was just frozen,” she told Golfweek by phone after school on Friday.
Her mom, Robin, and her grandfather were by the ninth hole when it happened, trying to find their way around Lake Doster Golf Club. Her father, Matt, didn’t see it go in either.
“I gave her a high-five and a hug,” said head coach Matt Rayman, “and I think I scared her to death because she didn’t know what was going on.”
Stephanie had never carded a par or a birdie in practice. She was going to walk up to the hole, pick up her ball and move on to the next tee before Rayman told her stop and take some pictures.
She shot 53 that day, breaking 60 for the first time. Rayman was so caught up in the excitement of the day that he still has no idea which team won the overall match. Stephanie is the first girl in Otsego history to record an ace, and yes, she did keep the ball.
Rayman has coached high school golf at Otsego for more than two decades and started the girls’ program 11 years ago.
“I’ve seen 22 years of freshmen dribble it into the weeds, skull it over the green, whiff completely or whatever it may be,” Rayman told mlive.com, “so for that shot to be executed to perfection, it was awesome.”
Stephanie knew that aces were rare in golf, but she’s been shocked by the amount of media attention her accomplishment has received. She’s been interviewed by four local television stations and two newspapers, finding the exercise more nerve-racking than the golf shots.
“I’m enjoying the game a lot more now,” said Stephanie, who first picked up a club around age 7 but didn’t really start playing the game until this summer when she decided to play a fall sport. She also plays club soccer now and hopes to compete on the high school team in the spring.
Rayman is director of golf at Lake Doster Golf Club, a semi-private course that hosts both Otsego and Plainwell, and said that family memberships are up 200 percent since COVID-19 hit.
“We have so many kids playing, families playing,” he said. “I cannot keep up with the range.”
No telling how many more will be inspired to pick up a club after one freshman’s extraordinary shot.
The hole is playing 165 yards. Reed’s ball one-hopped into the hole, while Zalatoris took a different approach. His ball bounced four times before gently rolling up to the cup and then falling in from the left side.
They are the 46th and 47th holes-in-one recorded in U.S. Open history, and the first aces of the 2020-21 PGA Tour season. At the 1989 U.S. Open, Doug Weaver, Mark Wiebe, Jerry Pate and Nick Price set a championship record when they all aced the 159-yard par 3, 6th hole at Oak Hill.
For Reed it’s his first ace since 2015 and helped him to a first-round 66. Zalatoris currently leads the Korn Ferry Tour points list.
For the second time in a week, two golf teammates made a hole-in-one in the same round.
For the second time in a week, two golf teammates made a hole-in-one in the same round.
Campbell University’s Edwin Blomander and Henrik Lilja are the latest pair to pull off the trick on Sunday. Five days ago, two high school teammates in Arizona pulled it off. The high school kids did it on the same hole in consecutive groups.
Blomander is a junior and Lilja is a sophomore. They are both from Sweden.
In a tweet announcing the feat, Campbell asked about the odds of two aces in the same round.
