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The Ghost Hole

D

Dick Turpin

Justified & Ancient
Joined
Mar 28, 2018
Messages
1,027
A few days ago I met up with a mate for a few after work beers. The conversation drifted onto golf, and he reminded me of a curious Incident that happened several years ago, and which I had completely forgotten about.

I told him that I’d upload the story on here, and see if any of the good folk on this forum can give me their views as to what happened, as we couldn’t then or now get our heads around it

Some years back two friends and I (the guy I met up with was one of them, I'll call Jim) met up one Saturday afternoon for a round of golf.

Holes 1 to 4 went as per normal, but on the 5th hole something odd happened

Upon teeing off, my ball landed in the heavy rough to the right of the fairway, Jim drove straight up the middle ( approx. 200 yards ) and the other guy’s ball went into the heavy rough to the left.

Jim decided to help me look for my ball, and we’d been searching for a few minutes, when I decided that I’d had enough, and told Jim that I was going to take a drop shot, so he walked back onto the fairway to where his ball was

I was just about to take the drop shot, when Jim started shouting and beckoning me to come over to where he was standing, he also started to do the same to the other guy, who was still looking for his ball in the rough on the left

I walked over, and as I got closer I could see him pointing to the floor with a confused but amused look on his face, there in the centre of the fairway were three golf balls, all in a straight line around 1 meter apart - we checked each ball and they were definitely ours ( we were all playing with corporate balls)

All three balls flew off in different directions, one to the left, one to the right and one up the centre, but only a few minutes later all three balls were in a neat little line in the middle.

The only thing that we could think of is that 2 of the balls ricocheted off of something in the rough, causing them to land in the centre of the fairway, however not one of us saw this happen, and in any case the chances of both balls doing that and land a few meters apart from Jim’s ball (which was in the centre anyway) must be in the millions to one.

We now only half-jokingly call this hole the ghost hole. :oops:
 
No offense to you or Jim intended, but ... I just have to ask, given the storyline as I understand it ...

Is there any chance Jim got impatient with you other guys' futile searching and simply tossed another two balls in the fairway alongside his, so as to move things along?

Seriously ... This wouldn't be the first time I'd heard of a golfer screwing with his buddies' heads just to keep things moving.
 
Krepostnoi said:
Now there's a truly Fortean phenomenon: an interesting golf anecdote. ;)

I don't suppose you happened to notice whether the line aligned with anything in the vicinity?
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Ha Ha, what was it Churchill said about a game of golf.?

Hi Krep not from memory, the other odd thing is that I’m not very big hitter off the tee, and have always struggled to drive the ball at long distances.

Jim drove his shot at least 200 yards, - I couldn’t have driven that far with a force 10 gale behind me lol, so how on earth my ball ended up in a neat little line next to his, is anybody's guess
 
EnolaGaia said:
No offense to you or Jim intended, but ... I just have to ask, given the storyline as I understand it ...

Is there any chance Jim got impatient with you other guys' futile searching and simply tossed another two balls in the fairway alongside his, so as to move things along?

Seriously ... This wouldn't be the first time I'd heard of a golfer screwing with his buddies' heads just to keep things moving.
Click to expand...

You old cynic Enola ;)

Okay well that’s got me thinking,

Of course that’s entirely possible however I have known him for over 20 years, and there is no deviousness to his character, or at least he’s never shown it before - In fact he’s probably one of the most honest people I have ever met.

I will ask him though, just in case :)
 
Dick Turpin said:
You old cynic Enola ;) ...
Click to expand...

Bwa-ha-ha ... :twisted:

But seriously ... I'm just noting there's a quite conceivable mundane explanation that needs to be ruled out before one can reasonably start addressing the incident in other ways.

If anything, your subsequent post stating you couldn't drive a ball that far (like Jim could) only makes me even more suspicious.
 
To be fair ... There's another mundane explanation that occurred to me. If the balls ended up circa 200 yards from the tee, how confident could you be that you and the third guy knew where your balls landed (or whether / how they may have bounced or ricocheted)?

Balls' paths can - and often do - curve in mid-air. Maybe those two balls ended up in the fairway but you and the third guy simply couldn't see the final portions of your balls' flights. In other words - maybe you and the third guy were overly presumptuous in assuming the balls ended up where they first seemed to be headed.
 
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Dick Turpin said:
A few days ago I met up with a mate for a few after work beers. The conversation drifted onto golf, and he reminded me of a curious Incident that happened several years ago, and which I had completely forgotten about.

I told him that I’d upload the story on here, and see if any of the good folk on this forum can give me their views as to what happened, as we couldn’t then or now get our heads around it

Some years back two friends and I (the guy I met up with was one of them, I'll call Jim) met up one Saturday afternoon for a round of golf.

Holes 1 to 4 went as per normal, but on the 5th hole something odd happened

Upon teeing off, my ball landed in the heavy rough to the right of the fairway, Jim drove straight up the middle ( approx. 200 yards ) and the other guy’s ball went into the heavy rough to the left.

Jim decided to help me look for my ball, and we’d been searching for a few minutes, when I decided that I’d had enough, and told Jim that I was going to take a drop shot, so he walked back onto the fairway to where his ball was

I was just about to take the drop shot, when Jim started shouting and beckoning me to come over to where he was standing, he also started to do the same to the other guy, who was still looking for his ball in the rough on the left

I walked over, and as I got closer I could see him pointing to the floor with a confused but amused look on his face, there in the centre of the fairway were three golf balls, all in a straight line around 1 meter apart - we checked each ball and they were definitely ours ( we were all playing with corporate balls)

All three balls flew off in different directions, one to the left, one to the right and one up the centre, but only a few minutes later all three balls were in a neat little line in the middle.

The only thing that we could think of is that 2 of the balls ricocheted off of something in the rough, causing them to land in the centre of the fairway, however not one of us saw this happen, and in any case the chances of both balls doing that and land a few meters apart from Jim’s ball (which was in the centre anyway) must be in the millions to one.

We now only half-jokingly call this hole the ghost hole. :oops:
Click to expand...
I must admit that upon reading the title of your thread, I thought it was going to be about people tripping/falling over when there is absolutely nothing in the surrounding area to have caused it..........hence The Ghost Hole!
 
a) Previous golfers using the same (corporate-marked) balls lost them in the same rough and couldn’t find them.

Depending on the time span between loss and recovery:

b) Gulls?


c) Foxes?


The accumulation of three balls in one small area suggests purposeful, intelligent interference.

maximus otter
 
EnolaGaia said:
To be fair ... There's another mundane explanation that occurred to me. If the balls ended up circa 200 yards from the tee, how confident could you be that you and the third guy knew where your balls landed (or whether / how they may have bounced or ricocheted)?

Balls' paths can - and often do - curve in mid-air. Maybe those two balls ended up in the fairway but you and the third guy simply couldn't see the final portions of your balls' flights. In other words - maybe you and the third guy were overly presumptuous in assuming the balls ended up where they first seemed to be headed.
Click to expand...

I’m meeting Jim for lunch on Friday so I’ll ask him in more detail as to what he remembers.

I do remember however that when we found the balls in a neat little line, we were a little shocked by it and if my memory serves me correctly we didn’t carry on with the hole.

I’ll speak to Jim and let you know what he says.
 
Trish71 said:
I must admit that upon reading the title of your thread, I thought it was going to be about people tripping/falling over when there is absolutely nothing in the surrounding area to have caused it..........hence The Ghost Hole!
Click to expand...

Sorry to disappoint Trish.:)

Although I did know a guy who drunkenly fell down a manhole :D
 
After you played your shots, and walked towards the location(s) where you thought your balls to be, did the terrain allow you to maintain a line of vision to those locations as you walked? The reason I ask is that my Cousin and I (forty years ago) used to sometimes play tricks on golfers on a certain hole on a certain well-known course. After Tee shots were played, there was often around 30 seconds where the golfers walked through a dip and could not see the area they had landed their shots on. We would run low and move the balls to different locations, and then run back into nearby dense bushes / trees to watch their confusion. On odd occasions we replaced their balls with ones to which we had already attached lengthy pieces of fishing line to. When the players reappeared still 50 or so yards away, we would slowly (or quickly) pull the balls into the bushes and stealthily move to a different hidden location to watch their confusion. Oh how we laughed.
 
maximus otter said:
Depending on the time span between loss and recovery:

b) Gulls?
Click to expand...
This is all about new scoring conventions, then. Golf already has animal related terms for scoring, which make it sound much more interesting than it actually is.
Wikipedia says:
"Eagle means scoring two under par (−2). An eagle usually occurs when a golfer hits the ball far enough to reach the green with fewer strokes than expected. It most commonly happens on par-fives but can occur on short par-fours."
According to Leader Board, an ostrich means "hole-out a Par 7 with two strokes or shoot a Hole-In-One on a Par Six."

So a gull means "ball-in-the-water-hazard-too-bad-sucker." No recovery.
A ghost hole means "skip-to-the-next-hole." No loss (everyone is under par).
And a fox means—?
 
evanspa said:
After you played your shots, and walked towards the location(s) where you thought your balls to be, did the terrain allow you to maintain a line of vision to those locations as you walked? The reason I ask is that my Cousin and I (forty years ago) used to sometimes play tricks on golfers on a certain hole on a certain well-known course. After Tee shots were played, there was often around 30 seconds where the golfers walked through a dip and could not see the area they had landed their shots on. We would run low and move the balls to different locations, and then run back into nearby dense bushes / trees to watch their confusion. On odd occasions we replaced their balls with ones to which we had already attached lengthy pieces of fishing line to. When the players reappeared still 50 or so yards away, we would slowly (or quickly) pull the balls into the bushes and stealthily move to a different hidden location to watch their confusion. Oh how we laughed.
Click to expand...

It’s a good point evenspa, and I’m sure it’s more common that people think what with local kids etc.

But no, the course in question is as flat as a pancake, and that hole in particular has wide open fairways with little treeline, so we had sight of the entire fairway at all times.
 
Trish71 said:
You can't just state that and then not expand upon it!! Please, do tell!
Click to expand...

Ha ha okay Trish

We had our departments Christmas booze up couple of years ago. It dangerously started at 1pm with no finishing time set.
Around 7pm one of our number announced that we was off to meet his wife, as they needed to finish off their Christmas shopping, we watched as he staggered off into the night.

Next morning he duly turned up for work but was limping and had bruises down one side of his face, of course we asked him what happened and he told us he fell down a man hole near monument tube station.

Did we believe him..?.....hmm not sure, but someone suggested that that his wife got the old rolling pin out for turning up for their shopping trip drunk.:D
 
Dick Turpin said:
Ha ha okay Trish

We had our departments Christmas booze up couple of years ago. It dangerously started at 1pm with no finishing time set.
Around 7pm one of our number announced that we was off to meet his wife, as they needed to finish off their Christmas shopping, we watched as he staggered off into the night.

Next morning he duly turned up for work but was limping and had bruises down one side of his face, of course we asked him what happened and he told us he fell down a man hole near monument tube station.

Did we believe him..?.....hmm not sure, but someone suggested that that his wife got the old rolling pin out for turning up for their shopping trip drunk.:D
Click to expand...
Starting a Christmas do at 1pm is dangerous territory!! I bet he never lived it down x
 
Trish71 said:
Starting a Christmas do at 1pm is dangerous territory!! I bet he never lived it down x
Click to expand...


Well it gave us all a chuckle Trish :)

But this is the odd thing with this guy, and maybe this should go onto the strange people thread.

I met his wife on a number of occasions and she was lovely, in fact she was everything a man could want in a partner, intelligent, funny, kind, elegant, pretty, and apparently she done a wicked steak and kidney pud, but two months into the new year he leaves her for his secretary who had none of those attributes, she was quite the opposite in fact.

I caught them once having a bit of “how’s yer father” in the office basement.

Almost scarred me for life :Givingup:
 
Dick Turpin said:
Well it gave us all a chuckle Trish :)

But this is the odd thing with this guy, and maybe this should go onto the strange people thread.

I met his wife on a number of occasions and she was lovely, in fact she was everything a man could want in a partner, intelligent, funny, kind, elegant, pretty, and apparently she done a wicked steak and kidney pud, but two months into the new year he leaves her for his secretary who had none of those attributes, she was quite the opposite in fact.

I caught them once having a bit of “how’s yer father” in the office basement.

Almost scarred me for life :Givingup:
Click to expand...
Maybe he'd turned vegan..?
 
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