Calamitous and bizarre at the French Open
By Paul Gueorgieff
Calamitous and bizarre at the French Open
It was a par three of just 125 metres.
But the first shot went into the water.
So it was down to the drop zone which was just 70 metres from the hole.
But just like the first shot, the second spun back off the green and again into the water.
It was reload from the drop zone and this time the ball didn’t even make the green. A third shot into the water.
For you or I this would be disaster. Imagine what it would be like for a golfer like Rasmus Hojgaard from Denmark on the DP World Tour. Calamitous is probably a word that goes half way to describing it.
Hojgaard finally put his fourth shot on the green, which with the penalty shots was his seventh. To his credit, Hojgaard holed a lengthy putt for a score of eight.
All this occurred in the third round of the French Open last month which Hojgaard started with a six shot lead. That lead was gone in the space of one hole that wasn’t even as long as the shortest hole at my golf course from the men’s members’ tee.
Hojgaard and his twin brother Nicolai are both beautiful swingers of the golf club. But the quintuple eight of Rasmus underlines how fine the lines can be between a good and a bad shot. Rasmus’ first shot, for example, landed well onto the green but spun back into the water.
But what impressed me was that Rasmus maintained his composure and went onto to finish second in the tournament, just one shot behind the winner.
If you didn’t see Hojgaard’s calamity click on the following link. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIgJqIhCTKM .
If that incident wasn’t bad enough there had been a most bizarre event on the previous day of the same tournament.
It came from Thomas Pieters of Belgium. Pieters, another beautiful swinger of the golf club, had about a 40-foot putt but hit the ball perhaps only five or six feet.
It was sort of a mishit but it wasn't sort of a mishit.
Pieters tried to stop his putting stroke because, he said, a kid in the audience coughed.
Unfortunately, Pieters couldn’t stop quick enough, gracing the ball with his decelerating club. The ball looked like it had been chunked, moving only about six feet from its original spot.
Pieters called in an official to explain what had gone on, who initially said that unfortunately that stroke would count.
Pieters sought a second opinion and the second official was more willing to take into account Pieters’ thought that he was no longer trying to hit the ball. The second referee decided under rule 13.1d that Pieters could return the ball to its original spot and putt again without penalty.
Here’s the language of that rule.
There are two specific rules for a ball or ball-marker that moves on the putting green.
(1) No penalty for accidentally causing the ball to move. There is no penalty if the player, opponent or another player in strokeplay, accidentally moves the player’s ball or ball-marker on the putting green.
The player must:
- Replace the ball on its original spot (which if not known must be estimated)
- Place a ball marker to mark that original spot.
Television commentators were astounded at the ruling and Pieters went ahead and two-putted for a par. He went on to shoot a one-under 70, 10 strokes back of 36-hole leader Rasmus Hojgaard, but the incident on the third hole wasn’t entirely closed.
After reviewing the incident soon after Pieters had played the hole, Mark Litton, the DP World Tour chief referee on site, decided that under the definition of a stroke, Thomas’ attempt not to strike the ball failed and the fact that he made contact with the ball meant the stroke should have counted. Litton was not present for the original ruling, according to the DP World Tour. The ball should have been played from the position where it came to rest.
However, because Pieters had played on, and because he had been incorrectly advised by an official to play without penalty, Pieters was not retroactive penalised for what happened. A DP World Tour official said the tour used guidance from The
R&A that says:
“Where a referee in strokeplay incorrectly advises a player that his or her stroke does not count and to play again without penalty, the ruling stands and the player’s score with the replayed stroke is the player’s score for the hole.”
Pieters went on to finish third in the French Open. Click on the following link to view the incident.
It never ceases to amaze me what can sometimes happen on a golf course, even by the best players in the world.