Talk about a stroke of luck…
This past weekend was the LPGA’s 2023 Chevron Championship in The Woodlands, Texas, and though Lillia Vu walked away as the champion, it was Angel Yin’s miraculous shot that will be remembered.
Professional golfer Angel Yin was hitting her tee shot on the Par 3 12th hole and a bad swing led to her ball heading straight for the water hazard.
The errant shot landed just short of the shore and it appeared that her ball had no way of escaping its watery grave.
However, the ball somehow bounces “off the water” and up near the green, perplexing the commentators for the tournament.
The first announcer can be heard shortly after Yin’s swing saying:
“This has to go.”
The ball did, in fact, need to go to reach the shore, and as it came up short in the water, the announcers were baffled by the fortunate bounce that the golf ball got:
“Oh what a bounce!
Did it stay out (of the water)?
It did! It’s out.
Oh my gosh.”
As the ball rested on the safety of the grass by the green (and somehow not in the water), the commentators struggled to find words to describe the unbelievable break.
Finally, someone said what we were all thinking, and recklessly speculated:
“It must’ve hit a turtle or something.”
Another commentator added:
“It honestly has to have hit a turtle. What else could it have hit?”
The camera then captures the reaction of Angel Yin, who laughs off the lucky bounce and picks up her tee from the tee box.
The improbable video was posted on the LPGA’s Twitter account with the caption:
“Angel Yin needs to buy a lottery ticket after this lucky bounce.”
Anytime golfers hit their ball into a wooded area, often times they’ll audibly ask for the trees to “spit it out,” as if trees had the ability to control their bad shot and guide it back to safety.
Now when I’m playing and I hit the ball towards the water, I’ll make sure to yell out “hit a turtle” since it seems like that is an actual possibility after seeing this video.
I would venture to say that if it did hit a turtle, it could be one of the luckiest bounces in the history of golf.
And I would also say that the turtle who “took one for the team” probably has a pretty good scuff mark on its shell. It should make for quite the story in the pond.
P.S.- I’d like to briefly touch on the idiom “subpar,” which means to be below average. “Subpar” also means that someone in golf is “below par,” which in golf terms would be above average.
So, Yin’s subpar shot (bad) got an extremely lucky bounce and allowed for her to continue her subpar round (good).
There’s a reason why the English language is the hardest language to pick up…
