What's the one shot or putt ... a question of integrity

[GrumpyGolf]

Not counting a hole-in-one (because there are never enough people around to see them, even when we are in our regular foursome), what is the one shot or putt that you made either when you were playing alone or maybe as a single with a others you had never met before the first tee that day, that you wish your regular playing group had seen?  It can be any shot or putt whether it went in the hole or not.

Mine:  Playing at Sligo Creek just outside DC, a little 9 hole course that was a great lunch time excursion.  The ninth hole is a dogleg right that plays at about 400 yards if you play it straight down the middle, but if you are good enough (or in my case lucky enough) you can go over or through some trees guarding the dogleg and have a pitch to the green.  If you are REALLY lucky you may even catch the front of the green green.  I had been playing really good that day (by my standards) had two birdies, two pars, and 4 bogies leading up to the ninth hole.  The others in my group were good and had been playing par golf all day.  They had been laying money on each hole and had asked me if I wanted in at the start but I had declined.  On the ninth, I had to last to hit since I had bogeyed the 7 and 8.  Now, I had spent plenty of times in the trees to the right due to my tendency miss right, and when you are in there it is usually not a fun place to be.  So the guys upped their bet and made a condition of the bet that they had to try to cut the corner of the hole. They all hit and one of the three made it over and through to the fairway,  one of them hit a tree flush with a thunk causing it to bounce back out into the fairway about a hundred and twenty yard from the tee box, the other one we lost sight of and did not see it land (he would find it deep in the trees).  Since we had been talking all day and they had given me grief about not betting they told me to cut the corner and see if I could do it.  After hitting a bogey on the previous two holes, I had already planned to just try and hit it straight up the fairway, try to get my par, and get out with a +2 for the day and be very happy.  I told them no but I would be happy to try and get par and get my best score to date.  They said that they would give me the pot that was a carry over of the last 3 holes (it was $18), so I said OK.  My drive felt pure (I try to remember that shot every time now so that I know what pure is) it sailed and my normal my fade (not one of my banana slices) started to show, but we lost it in the trees, no sound of hitting anything but it looked like I had lost it, as it didn't look high enough to clear the trees.

Long story short at this point.  I cleared the trees, landed on the front edge of the green (the only time I have ever hit a par four green in 1), wound up three putting to a back of the green hole and getting my par only to be beat out by the guy who hit the fairway as he struck his 2nd shot to within three feet and sank his putt for a birdie.  I didn't win, but the feeling of that shot and the results of being on the green with my tee shot on a par four is something I remember well, but I constantly got kidded about because if none of my buddies saw it, did it really happen?

BTW - funny thing about that round is, I played over a hundred lunchtime rounds or twilight rounds at this course over the years back then.  Right now I can still see the course in my mind today, not because of my playing so many rounds, but rather because I can still recall every shot from that round.  I think it is because that one shot caused that entire round to be imprinted in my memory.

[GolfSpy TCB]

I'm not sure what this says about me... but I can't think of a scenario that I have been in, or would be in (aside from a 1) that I care who was with me to see.   Made me stop and think about it though... interesting question!

[THEZIPR23]

I have a more than a few, but the funniest happened last week while I was playing in AZ. We are a foursome, 3 of the gentleman would be classified as older and with age our senses diminish. Par 5 and I hit a good drive and staring down the throat of the green from 201, ball is in the fairway on a tight lie, a pretty severe downslope with wind coming off left at about 12mph. 2 big bunkers front the green, think 2 giant eyeballs, pin is right in between them on the front 1/3 of the green. Pull 4 iron with the hopes that I can carve one in against the wind. Take it back and boom perfect contact, I am watching this ball curl directly at the pin, it is doing everything I imagined. Just after contact I hear click whizz as the cart next to me drives away. Ball still curling directly at pin, it lands right on front edge between bunkers takes one bounce and stops about 12 feet. I am standing in the middle of the fairway with dead silence admiring one of the best 4 irons I have ever hit. Get up to the green and tell my playing partners that "I know playing with the older generation is different however I just hit one of the greatest long irons I have ever hit and not only did you guys not say anything nobody freaking saw it!!" The one guy other than myself that could see over 100 yards was in the desert somewhere playing with himself (taking a leak) the other 2 who were not 10 feet away when I hit but didn't even bother to watch because they couldn't see. One of them says "well I heard it." 

The whole incident was very comical and became the conversation of the trip.

[GrumpyGolf]

24 minutes ago, THEZIPR23 said:

I have a more than a few, but the funniest happened last week while I was playing in AZ. We are a foursome, 3 of the gentleman would be classified as older and with age our senses diminish. Par 5 and I hit a good drive and staring down the throat of the green from 201, ball is in the fairway on a tight lie, a pretty severe downslope with wind coming off left at about 12mph. 2 big bunkers front the green, think 2 giant eyeballs, pin is right in between them on the front 1/3 of the green. Pull 4 iron with the hopes that I can carve one in against the wind. Take it back and boom perfect contact, I am watching this ball curl directly at the pin, it is doing everything I imagined. Just after contact I hear click whizz as the cart next to me drives away. Ball still curling directly at pin, it lands right on front edge between bunkers takes one bounce and stops about 12 feet. I am standing in the middle of the fairway with dead silence admiring one of the best 4 irons I have ever hit. Get up to the green and tell my playing partners that "I know playing with the older generation is different however I just hit one of the greatest long irons I have ever hit and not only did you guys not say anything nobody freaking saw it!!" The one guy other than myself that could see over 100 yards was in the desert somewhere playing with himself (taking a leak) the other 2 who were not 10 feet away when I hit but didn't even bother to watch because they couldn't see. One of them says "well I heard it." 

The whole incident was very comical and became the conversation of the trip.

That story reminds me of the one time I played with gentleman of a certain age on the same course I mentioned above. He played the forward tees. He carried (not pushed on a cart) a bag that looked like it had been passed down to him by Bobby Jones, he had 7 clubs including his putter, a pitching wedge (no sand wedge), and a persimmon 5 wood (no driver). He hit the ball straight up the middle with each and every shot.  His "driver" as he called it would maybe clear 145 yards with the wind. He had a brisk walk and played ready golf where he would hit within less than 30 seconds of getting to his ball.  We had been talking as we walked and on the 4th hole I asked him why he didn't play a true driver and only used the 5 wood to tee off?  He dead pan seriously said, "I don't want to hit it further than I can see." 

Edited May 12, 2022 by CWR

[Tom the Golf Nut]

I got paired up with three strangers 15 or so years ago. On the first hole it was a dog leg right. They all hit nice shots up to the middle of the fairway at the turn. I get up and hit a horrible shot. A worm burner that fortunately hit a sprinkler head and got a good bounce and barely made it to the turn but somehow did. The entire right side was a fence to protect you from the driving range so you had to make it to the turn. The three of them turn to each other and said "This is going to be a long day" Well feeling like total crap and about 180 / 185 yards out I hit a 5 iron. This was laser straight right at the green and disappeared. It looked like I went over the green. then the comments started again. "I guess we will have to hunt for that one, yep that's OB".  They started looking as did I feeling like all was lost and one of the guys looks in the cup. There it was bottom of the cup. They applauded the accomplishment and then I never heard a peep from them the rest of the round. Starting off with an Eagle on a par 4 set the tone for the rest of my round. My game was pretty good after that. Unfortunately I wasn't with anyone I knew.  

 

[Siamese Moose]

I have never had a hole in one,  but I have three albatrosses (there are a great many trolls on the internet who call me a liar, especially when I tell them that I would trade all three for a hole in one). Two of my albatrosses, I was playing alone, although one was witnessed by one of the grounds staff. The other (the first) was witnessed by a trio of older guys who I never saw again.

[Headhammer]

150 yards out of a fairway bunker over a pond to an elevated green to 6'.

[MNUte]

Hmm, great question because it gets into whether or not we care about others seeing some of our highlights. The only reason I'd want some of my playing partners to see them would be just for the fun conversation that would come afterwards. But overall, I'm personally not the type where it matters whether the highlight occurred with witnesses or not since I know what I did. 

That being said, if I had to choose some of the moments:

My eagle this past winter. Nearly freezing day on my local muni course and it was a fairly straight forward ~ 280 yard par 4. My drive went about 240 total but bounced left of the fairway into a little trough area. So a 40 yard second shot to a green that was at about my head height. Since I wasn't caring about sinking it and instead just focusing on getting it on the green with a good shot before my hands started shaking too bad, I had a smooth easy swing that got the ball to one hop and then just plop into the hole. Didn't realize I'd made an eagle until I was walking to the next hole and tallying up my score.

My 300 yard drive. When I'm hitting my driver well, I've gotten it out to about 285 total on a clear day. I was playing a day with maybe 15 to 20 mph winds and knew it would be just a fun day for sending it. So on the par 5, I teed the ball a bit higher than normal and just cranked it as hard as I could. Fortunately, it didn't duck hook and went up in the air, caught the wind, and went about 305 total on a flat course.

[Middler]

It’s been years since I played alone, the social aspect is part of the appeal of golf to me, so not something I worry about. But I would hate to have a first hole-in-one with no witnesses, another good reason to not play alone…

[heavygolffeels]

Great question. Had to think about this one a little bit as nothing really jumped out to me. But there's a golf course I use to frequent that has since been turned into a bunch of homes. Very funky setup, par 70, played very short at 5700 yards, but was alot of fun. Anyway #6 was listed at 318 yards but was a dead dogleg right. Really awkward tee box lined with trees that forced most players to hit it dead straight 150 yards or so. If you had some confidence that you could elevate an iron quickly enough, you could go over the first set of trees, over the water, and cut the corner. I usually played an open face 7 iron on the 180 line shown below. Would carry 160, safely roll out and end up with a little 100 yard play in. 

But we would always joke about going for the green with driver. You couldnt take dead aim with it because of the trees, but if you could hit a huge banana slice that elevated quickly it was possible. Nobody had the guts though because if you didnt slice it enough it would easily carry into the fairway across the way and probably run off the course entirely. I cant imagine trying to explain that shot to the group in the other fairway. Why you nearly killed them with driver. Or worse to spend time looking for your ball in the wash and having to hit back across the fairway and hold up play. Just stupid. And thats all assuming you got it over the immediate trees in front of you. I played with a few random people that tried it and they always hit the trees and ended up in the water and you would just look at them like 'you really thought that was going to work?'

Before the course closed down I picked up an old Cleveland HiBore 2 wood. This thing is 440cc, 16.5* of loft. And on the range I was just crushing high bombs. I decided to bring it my last round here, playing as a single. I knew it could get over the trees quick enough, so it was just about to putting the right amount of slice on it. I was playing 1 under to that point and more than questioned my decision. But I decided to go for it. Teed up as far left as I could, and let it rip. And sure enough it traced the perfect line to the green. High bomb, that stalled out and kept going right of right. I couldnt see it land through the trees. Unfortunately when I got up there the ball  ran a foot or two into the fringe off the back right. So technically not a GIR, but I was thrilled with it. Ended up putting to within a foot for a tap in birdie. No one to see it. My friends hardly believed me. And the course is gone to try to replicate it. 

 

[DStar]

I have a reciprocal game with my step-father-in-law on our respective birthdays - he plays my course, I play his. 

It was Bob's birthday so playing as a pair on my course. #14, SI 1, 446y, slight left dogleg, big green pin right at the back, slight headwind.

Not the best drive, left myself 175 to the back. Had been hitting my 5i pretty well so took it out, lined it up and hit the sweetest (think Mizuno feel) shot that started slightly right and faded onto the pin. Landed on the top tier, stone dead and 2 feet from the hole.

None of my usual crew saw it but a school-dad friend had just walked onto the 10th tee, which is right next to the 14th green, said he watched it all the way and thought it was going to slam dunk..rolled in the putt for a birdie on our hardest hole  

 

Edited May 20, 2022 by DStar