Lesson number one: if you make an hole in one, save the ball and don’t touch it again during that round because you may lose it.
Usually when someone makes a hole in one, they put the ball back in their pocket and don’t look at it again until they put it in a nice glass display case. That wasn’t the case with Gregory P. Shaughnessy recently.
On August 27 at the Rockville Links Club in Rockville Centre, New York on Long Island, Shaughnessy went to play with his friend Ryan Byrne. On the fifth hole, Shaughnessy stepped into the tee box with his 7-iron 135 yards from the hole. Shaughnessy teed up the ball, swung, and watched the ball find its way into the hole.
“The first ace made me chuckle a bit as I was having such a bad round that day,” Shaughnessy told GolfDigest.com.. “On the fifth hole, you can see the stick so we could tell right away what had happened. It was a pretty cool feeling and I was glad I could share it with one of my best friends.”
Five holes later on the 10th, Shaughnessy stepped into the elevated tee box with a 9-iron only 105 yards away from the hole. Unlike the fifth hole, nobody could see the hole from the tee box. Shaughnessy teed up his ball, swung, and assumed he’d find his ball somewhere on the fairway or green.
Shaughnessy searched for his ball, but couldn’t find it. As a result, the 40-year-old decided to look in the hole.
“It’s in the cup,” Shaughnessy told his group before they went crazy.
That’s a pretty impressive feat, but unfortunately all Shaughnessy has to show off his accomplishment are memories, pictures, and his scoring cards. Shaughnessy doesn’t have the actual balls anymore.
After making the hole in one on the fifth hole, Shaughnessy’s tee shot on the sixth found the woods, and ball No. 1 was lost. After making the hole in one on the 10th hole, Shaughnessy teed up the ball on hole 11 and lost it on his tee shot.
“The rest of the round was so painful,” Shaughnessy said while also admitting he didn’t keep score the rest of the round.
“All the while we are talking about the odds of two aces in the same round and I joke that I would like to see the odds and statistics of hitting two aces in the same round and losing both balls.”
Well the statistics of losing both balls may not be available, but Golf Digest has done some research into the odds of an amateur golfer making two holes in one in a single round. The answer? 162 milliton to 1.
