Club pro describes ‘out of body’ experience as he hit consecutive aces at the Senior Open

Amazingly, after an ace on the 164-meter fourth hole, Bensel managed another on the 203-meter fifth hole at the Newport Country Club.

According to the National Hole-in-One Registry, the odds of hitting two aces in the same round are 67 million to one. Odds for consecutive holes are not given.

“I’ve played a lot of golf in my life, and it’s pretty rare to see a hole-in-one in a tournament,” Bensel said after following up his consecutive aces with four bogeys in a row and making three more on the back nine in a round of 74 holes.

“The first one was great, it put me under par for the day. And then the second one, I just couldn’t believe it. Just thinking that something like that could happen was unbelievable.”

“I somehow hit the ball in the right place and then it just started rolling. I was just kidding and thought, ‘Okay, now let’s try another one,’ and it went in. Everyone just couldn’t believe it. We all went crazy.”

“I have a lot of family and friends here and they all went crazy, and the guys I played with were the same, they couldn’t believe it. It was unbelievable.”

“Of course, that will stay with me forever. After those two hole-in-ones, I just didn’t know what to do anymore… it was like an out-of-body experience. I was more excited than I wanted to be.”

The only other case of a player scoring two consecutive holes-in-ones during a tournament probably occurred under even more remarkable circumstances: the 1971 Martini International at Royal Norwich.

John Hudson followed up a hole-in-one on the 195-yard 11th hole with another ace on the par-4 12th hole, which was 314 yards long.

Hudson finished ninth and won £160 of the tournament’s total prize money of £7,000.