{"id":433431,"date":"2025-03-01T11:32:09","date_gmt":"2025-03-01T16:32:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/?p=433431"},"modified":"2025-04-23T16:39:17","modified_gmt":"2025-04-23T16:39:17","slug":"dale-whitnells-stuns-the-golf-world-south-african-open","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/golf\/dale-whitnells-stuns-the-golf-world-south-african-open\/","title":{"rendered":"Dale Whitnell’s Incredible Round Stuns the Golf World at South African Open"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dale Whitnell hit two holes-in-one in the same round in a remarkable showing at the South African Open<\/a> on Friday. The 36-year old’s biggest worry at the start of the day was just to make the cut at the DP World Tour Event. But he put in a stunning performance, acing the par-3 second and 12th holes at Blair Atholl Golf & Equestrian Estate<\/a> in a 9-under 63 in the second round.<\/p>\n

Dale Whitnell Leaves the Field at South African Open in Awe<\/h2>\n

The Englishman had never previously achieved a hole-in-one in a professional competition. But this achievement meant he became just the second Englishman to have made two holes-in-one in the same round in a professional competition. The feat was first achieved by John Hudson<\/a> in 1971 at the European Tour\u2019s Martini International<\/a> held at Royal Norwich Golf Club. More recently, American Frank Bensel Jr. made two holes-in-one at the 2023 U.S. Senior Open<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The 36-year-old also made more history by becoming only the fourth player in the DP World Tour<\/a> history to hit multiple holes-in-one in the same round, following John Hudson (1971), Emanuele Canonica (2002), and Andrew Dodt (2013).<\/p>\n

Whitnell\u2019s achievement is made even more remarkable as the U.S.-based National Hole-in-One Registry estimates that the odds of making two hole-in-one in the same round are 67 million to 1! “I’ve never had one in a tournament play. To have two in one day is pretty special<\/em>,” he said after he shot an even-par 72 in the opening round.<\/p>\n

How Whitnell Aced His Incredible Double<\/h2>\n

Ranked number No. 545 in the world, Whitnell shot even-par in the tournament\u2019s first round and faced the risk of missing the cut. However, his two aces on Friday moved him into the top 10 on the leaderboard, leaving him at 9-under for the tournament. He was only five shots behind the clubhouse leader, 41-year old South African, Shaun Norris.<\/p>\n

The Englishman man from Essex aced the 197-yard second hole and repeated the feat on the 149-yard 12th, instantly following his first hole-in-one with an eagle. Whitnell was chasing a historic 13-under-par 59 until he made a costly double bogey, which included an air shot. He then eagled the par-5 third but had to wait nice holes to hit his second ace, eventually finishing with a 63\u2013nine strokes better than his Thursday round.<\/p>\n

“Coming back this morning I knew I was struggling to make the cut, so I knew I needed to go out and play well and I got off to a hot start,<\/em>” Whitnell told the DP World Tour. “I birdied the first and then hit a flush 7-iron on the second and didn’t realize it went in until down the bottom they<\/em> sort of cheered,” <\/em>he added. “That <\/em>was lovely<\/em>.”<\/p>\n

Main Photo Credit: \u00a9 Jordan Prather-Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dale Whitnell hit two holes-in-one in the same round in a remarkable showing at the South African Open on Friday. The 36-year old’s biggest worry at the start of the day was just to make the cut at the DP World Tour Event. But he put in a stunning performance, acing the par-3 second and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4860,"featured_media":433439,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[15,246],"tags":[265,151,266,267],"class_list":["post-433431","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-golf","category-golf-news","tag-dale-whitnell","tag-dp-world-tour","tag-south-african-open","tag-u-s-senior-open"],"modified_by":"yobodev","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/433431","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4860"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=433431"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/433431\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/golf\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=433431"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=433431"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=433431"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}