Roundup
The 19th Hole: a Road Hole scare, a cart-path pick and a 130-ft putt
Piers Morgan flirts with the Old Course Hotel, Max Homa plays off the path, Harry Hall escapes the Utah scrub, Alayna Finau takes the mic and Jose Luis Ballester tries a putt from another postcode.
In Scotland last week, the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship sent tour pros and celebrities round St Andrews, Carnoustie and Kingsbarns in the autumn wind, while in Utah the Bank of Utah Championship took the PGA TOUR into the red rock and black lava of Black Desert Resort. Here are five of our favourite clips, all from the tours’ own channels.
Piers Morgan versus the Road Hole
The 17th on the Old Course asks you to hit your tee shot over a row of dark sheds bearing the words “Old Course Hotel”, and to trust that the fairway is somewhere on the other side. On Thursday’s opening round it was Piers Morgan’s turn. The DP World Tour’s clip shows the drive drifting towards the hotel side, the camera chasing it over the roofline, and the waiting on the tee that follows. According to the tour’s caption, he nearly put it in the hotel, much to the annoyance of Kevin Pietersen. We’ll let you decide which way Pietersen was hoping it would go.
Anyone heading to St Andrews should pick a letter on the shed, commit, and not look at their playing partners.
Max Homa takes the path less travelled
On a cart path the ball sits on concrete, the sole of the club is about to make a noise like a dropped tray, and the only sensible thought is “please just get it airborne”. At Black Desert in the first round, Max Homa stood on the path with the ball at his feet and played it. The PGA TOUR’s clip shows him nipping it cleanly off the surface, and the commentators going from nervous to impressed in the space of one swing.
The Rules usually allow free relief from a cart path, though the nearest point of relief is not always a nicer place to be. We recommend the free drop.
Harry Hall goes bush
The fairways at Black Desert are framed by scrub and lava rock that do not give much back. Harry Hall found that out when his ball settled in the bushes, leaving him knee-deep in the undergrowth with the ball somewhere near his ankles. Not the lie anyone books a desert golf trip for. In the PGA TOUR’s clip, his recovery finishes close to the flag. Every golfer tries this shot after finding the trees, and about one in twenty of us pulls it off.
Alayna Finau, on commentary
The PGA TOUR handed the voiceover for three holes of Tony Finau’s practice round at Black Desert to his wife, Alayna, and the result is part swing notes, part running commentary, starting with a par four on the back nine. Anyone who has ever had a spouse, parent or best mate offer helpful observations from the side of the range will recognise the tone at once.
We would watch a full 18 of this, and we suspect Tony would rather we didn’t.
Jose Luis Ballester’s putt from another postcode
Back in Scotland, Saturday’s third round produced a putt the DP World Tour describes as the longest it has seen on camera all season. Jose Luis Ballester stood on the 5th green facing a putt of around 130 feet, according to the tour’s clip. That is long enough to need a different weather forecast at each end. The aerial shot shows a dot rolling across an enormous green towards a distant flag while the playing group wait. We won’t spoil how it finishes, but the commentator’s closing reaction is a fair summary.
On a putt that long at your club, a two-putt counts as a victory.
Sources
- DP World Tour on YouTube: Piers Morgan’s dramatic Road Hole tee shot
- PGA TOUR on YouTube: Max Homa picks it clean off the cart path
- PGA TOUR on YouTube: Harry Hall’s escape shot
- PGA TOUR on YouTube: Play three holes with the Finaus
- DP World Tour on YouTube: 130-foot, longest putt this season?
- The R&A: Rule 16, relief from abnormal course conditions
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