Six-time Masters champion Jack Nicklaus highlighted the Par-3 Contest at Augusta National on Wednesday by making a hole in one with an 8-iron on the 123-yard fourth hole.
And the thing is, he predicted it.
The 75-year-old Golden Bear, playing alongside fellow Masters champions Gary Player and Ben Crenshaw, hit his tee ball on No. 4 past the pin and spun it back down the hill and into the hole.
“I’ve never (before) made a hole in one at Augusta, not in the Par 3 Contest, not even on the practice range,” said Nicklaus, who famously captured his last Masters and 18th major title in 1986 at the age of 46.
“The fourth hole played 123 yards to the pin. You have to hit the ball by the hole if you want to have any chance. I took a little 8-iron and choked down on it. We had a little wind in our face, and the hole plays uphill, so I just made sure I hit it good and solid. I put the ball just by the hole, and it came back downhill and into the hole.
” … That’s my first hole in one in over 10 years. It’s nice to do it at a place so special to me, and to have one of my grandkids, Stevie, on the bag only underlined the moment.”
Hours earlier in an interview on ESPN, when Scott Van Pelt asked what he might do in the Par-3 Contest, Nicklaus said: “Maybe a hole in one, how’s that?”
Camilo Villegas of Colombia became the third player to make two aces in the nine-hole Par 3 Contest and seemed to be on his way to winning.
However, Villegas wound up in a playoff with Kevin Streelman and hit his tee shot on the third extra hole into the water before conceding to Streelman, who had hit his shot to within a few feet of the hole.
Both players wound up at 5-under-par 22 for nine holes.
Before going to Augusta, Streelman reached out to the Make-a-Wish Foundation to see if any youngsters in the group had a dream of attending the Masters. Streelman wound up with 13-year-old Ethan Couch of Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, who has an inoperable brain tumor, as his caddie in the Par 3 Contest.
Trevor Immelman of South Africa, the 2008 Masters champion, and amateur Matias Dominguez of Chile also made holes in one, helping tie the record of five in one Par 3 Contest set in 2002.
No player has won the Par 3 Contest and the Masters in the same year.
