Plenty made light of Steve Bowditch’s score at the weekend’s WGC Cadillac Championship, not least of all the man himself.
The self-effacing Queenslander walked off the 18th green at Trump National Doral so early that there were only four people in the grandstand after he played alone in firing an 84 on the way to a record-setting total of 37 for the week.
Bowditch, twice a US PGA Tour winner, played his final round in just two hours and 12 minutes. So rapidly was his score mounting that PGA Tour officials are believed to have told the walking scoreboard volunteer not to post any numbers.
The 32-year-old smiled to the four fans who clapped the end of his round and then said, simply, when asked about his scores: “Hey, it's just golf.”
“I think there were four dozen golf balls at the start of the week in my locker … now I'm down to my last one.”
Bowditch’s 325 was the highest total score in a World Golf Championships event, but thankfully for him it was a no-cut tournament and he still managed to pocket almost $65,ooo for his troubles in making the elite field.
“You don't want to play that way, but it is what it is,” he said.
“No one wants to play that bad, but it's just golf. I'm out here in one of the biggest events of the year, playing bad – but I earned my right to be here.
“I shot 37 over par and still made a pay cheque – all’s not that bad,” he said with a grin.
Bowditch actually opened his week with a birdie, but that was the high point as he went on to become the first player on the US PGA Tour to shoot four rounds in the 80s since Mike Dunaway in 1983.
He had a triple-bogey to cap his opening-round 81, then a combination of a triple-bogey, quadruple-bogey and sextuple-bogey 10 on a par-four in his second-round 80.
For his 36 weekend holes, he made more triple-bogeys (three) than birdies (two).
“It's the Blue Monster for a reason,” Bowditch said.
“I wasn't driving it the greatest here, and it's all over if you can't drive it.”