Most memorable shots you have hit.

[Bill Gayne]

Memorable Good: #16 on the Old Course. The drive was really good but the second shot was very memorable as I stuck it close and made the putt to close out a match that I really wanted to win.


Memorable Bad Shot: #1 on the Old Course. First competition round on the Old Course and it was a hard slice. I turned to the Secretary and asked "do I have to re-tee?" It was a simple "yes" and I piped it down the middle for a cool double bogey.

[Bill Gayne]

In the company of Adam Clayman at Quintero I once hit a teed ball backward without it striking any object.   Done it another time since then.


How you ask? Talent.


Mike

Yes, defying the laws of physics is very memorable. I can remember a shot (I didn't hit it) but the ball ended up behind the person teeing off with a driver.

[Kevin Pallier]

Never had a hole in one. I've witnessed about 6. Closest I've been = hit the pin a couple of times.

Most memorable = hit driver onto the 16th green on a windy day at CPC.

Most poor = didn't Jack Nicklaus once say "I never remember a bad shot" 

[Bill Seitz]

No holes in one, but I've had some memorable hole-outs.  13th at Cog Hill #4 from about 185.  10th at Santa Anita, which has a big nob in front of the green, so none of us saw it go in.  Almost had an albatross on 7 at Kingsley after driving past the trees, then barely clearing the bunker with a 3-wood that took one bounce, slammed into the thick Cheesbrough flag stick and dropped to about 18 inches.  Made a pretty loud bang just as someone was getting ready to pull the trigger on 8.


But the shot I'll never forget was at Troy Burne in Wisconsin in 2006.  I was driving back from Eastern Montana to Chicago, and stopped for a round on the way.  I was a single, and they had nothing but foursomes, but let me go as long as I was off the course before a shotgun they had starting later that day. 


I walked to the 18th tee as the groups were driving onto their holes, so I just made it.  I asked the group on 18 if I could finish up, and they didn't mind.  As they introduced themselves to one another, I heard one of the guys tell the rest of the group that his name was Bob Mason.  Turned out it was a Minnesota Wild charity tournament, and Mason was a goalie coach.  He was also the goalie for the Washington Capitals in a four overtime game seven against the Islanders in 1987.  I was 14 years old watching the whole thing in LA, and to this day it's probably the greatest display of goaltending (adjusted for era) I've ever seen.  All the sudden I was shaking like a leaf on the tee, but fortunately it's a medium length par 4, and I hit a 3-wood into the fairway. 


The funny thing was I got the sense the group had no idea who Mason was before the tournament started, and were probably slightly bummed to get paired with the goaltending coach.  After I hit my shot, I turned around and asked "are you Bob Mason the former goaltender?"  When he said yes, I told him I'd watched that game in 1987 and that he'd put on one of the greatest performances I'd ever seen.  Unfortunately for him, the Capitals lost on a Pat LaFontaine slap-shot.  Kelly Hrudey was just a little bit better that night.  The golf shot was fairly routine, but one I'll never forget. 

[MKrohn]

It's always a great experience to travel and play some of the great courses and holes, knowing that you might not get the chance again. Whilst I wish they would stop watering Pebble, it's still the scene of my most memorable.


I think I was close to even par after 7 and had hit a nice 3 wood up 8, wind was off the right and for a moment thought I should just lay up to the left and hope to get up and down. Sense then prevailed, "you wanker, its not like you are playing here next week, hit the shot". Perhaps 10-20 years earlier I would have been more confident but I grabbed my 3 iron, aimed it over the right edge and saw it draw back to finish 10 ft under the cup. BOOM.


3 stabs later I wandered off towards the next tee, made an easy double and signed for 80, well done chop.


@archie_struthers, loved the story about being hung and playing good golf, remarkable about how often it happens when you remove expectation. Can you tell us the top 5 bands you saw on the Shore in those days, must have been crackin'

[Kalen Braley]

As a high capper, I've only had a few good chances at eagle in my golfing life and finally got one a number of years back.

Slight uphill par 5 on a local William Neff course here in Utah. After a good tee ball, and a well struck 3 wood I was hole high right of the green on the side of a hill about 10 feet above the surface of the green.  Hit a chip that landed in the rough just before the green, kicked forward and rolled another 20-25 feet for a 3!!

I shoulda quit the game then, because I had my personal best 77 a few months earlier and it was all downhill after that! 

[Tommy Williamsen]

The shot I am most proud of happened when I was 16. My Dad was stationed at Ft. Meade, Md. Dad would drop me off at the course at 5:30 where I worked on the ground crew til 1:00. I would eat lunch and play til Dad either played nine with me or picked me up. I was playing a quick nine before Dad was scheduled to pick me up. There were two courses then, although both are closed now. I played the front Nine of the Applewood Course and came to the par five ninth. It was 475 yards and par five. I hit a good drive and figured I had a two iron left to the green. The green was narrow, long, and had a little stream to the left of the green. I hit a magnificent high shot that landed on the front of the green and quickly ducked onto the hole for an albatross 2. My first thought was, "Oh no! I am playing alone and no one will believe me." Fortunately, the super, Sgt. Jones, was on the hill just off the green and saw it go in. I still have the ball proudly displayed. It was a ball that was only made for a few years called a Stylist.

[Mike Hendren]

Two stand out as I’ve told before.


1. Over 30 years ago partner and I are lighting it up in a flighting qualifier. He’s adamant that we cool off and make pars to avoid the championship flight and asks me to take an 8-iron and aim long and right on a 135 yards par three. The result - the only ace of my career.


2. Labor Day 1976 - 190 yards 4-iron to 3 feet on second hole of sudden death to win my 2nd men’s club championship. Had holed a 30 feet downhiller on 18 to force the playoff.  It’s bittersweet to recall I had game 45 years ago.


Thanks for letting me share.


Mike

[Garland Bayley]

... I hit a magnificent high shot that landed on the front of the green and quickly ducked onto the hole for an albatross 2. ...

The one that rises above the rest was without a doubt my greatest golf highlight thus far - an albatross on 16 at Ballyneal.
...

OK Alex and Tommy, start your own albatross thread and let the rest of us mere mortals celebrate our meager accomplishments.

[Mark Mammel]

My most memorable shot occurred at a fine old 9 hole course in Birchwood, Wisconsin called Tagalong. Now expanded to 18 holes, the original holes were mostly preserved, thank heavens. Here's the description from the website:

"Tagalong Golf Resort is located about 20 miles northeast of Rice Lake, in Barron County, Wisconsin. In the early 1920s, wealthy businessman Frank Stout, said to have been Chicago’s fifth-wealthiest man at the time, built a 9-hole course on the shore of lovely Red Cedar Lake, to go with his Adirondack-style family lodge (now Stout's Island Lodge). He built it for the private use of his family and guests. Private construction of the now-public course began in 1916 and was completed in 1922.

It’s said that Stout had the bentgrass for the greens cut in Scotland and shipped across the ocean, along with a world-famous architect and a member of the Scottish nobility. Fourteen miles of pipe were used to irrigate the greens, tees and fairways. The course also features elevated greens surrounded by deep, grass bunkers. As a gala to commemorate the opening of the course in 1925, the reigning U.S. Open and British Open champions, Willie Macfarlane and "Long Jim" Barnes, christened the course with a match."

My family had a cabin on Red Cedar Lake, where the course is situated. I was playing on a Sunday morning with my dad. The fifth hole, then about 375 yards up to an elevated green, had two approaches: a low fairway on the left, requiring a blind shot to the flagstick, and a high fairway along a ridge running diagonally to the now visible green on the right. I hit a drive to the right fairway - my usual shot in those days- but hit it a good distance with a clear view of the green. My dad was nearby. As I was getting ready to hit a 6 iron into the green, I saw the super preparing to reset the hole to a different spot. For some reason, I waved my arms and got his attention. He moved off the green. My dad thought I was nuts I'm sure. Well, I hit the shot and it felt good. Sure enough, the super now waved his arms as the ball found the cup. My only eagle on a par 4.

[Steve Salmen]

In the summer of 2004, I flushed a 9 iron to the middle of the rock hard 8th green at Jackson Park in Chicago. It bounced, checked, and released in to the cup for my first hole in one.


I've made 5 holes in one in about 35 years of golf, but that was the purist.


Yesterday, GCA's Andrew Calcutt hit it to less than a foot on our first par 3 of the round and less than 6 inches on the second.