The Ace and the Albatross

ON JUNE 23, Eloy Ramos had the most unconventional career round ever.

A scratch golfer at Parker’s The Club at Pradera and The Pinery Country Club, Ramos was 2-under par heading into Pradera’s par-5 seventh—a 570-yard right-dogleg divided lengthwise into two fairways by a cart path. With the left fairway presenting the longer, more conservative route, Ramos elected to risk the 275-yard carry to reach the narrower right-side landing area.

Voigt, Stoner, Ramos and Headley at The Club at Pradera.

“And I yanked it,” he says. Three bounces off the cart path propelled his ball into the left fairway, 452 yards from the tee and 118 from the hole. “A hill stood between my ball and the pin,” Ramos remembers, “and I only knew the yardage by adding the distances to each from the top of the hill.” He picked an aiming spot and pured his 55-degree wedge.

The other members of his foursome—Jeff Voigt, Brian Stoner and Andy Headley—couldn’t see the green either, so “when we got up there, we found their shots, but not mine,” Ramos says. “I was ready to claim a lost ball, take a penalty and drop.”

Then, Stoner says, he noticed a glow to the hole. “It was Eloy’s Optic Yellow ProV1.”

“I suddenly went from 2-under and thinking about how to save par, to 5-under and wondering if an albatross meant I had to buy drinks after the round,” Ramos remembers.

He didn’t have to, but…

After shooting a personal-best 5-under 31 on the front, Ramos gave back four strokes when he double-bogeyed the 18-handicap 10th and bogeyed the 11th and 14th. His tee shot on the par-3 15th bounced right over the hole, resulting in a tap-in birdie. “My friends were like, ‘No way you’re going to get a double-eagle and a hole in one,’” Ramos laughs. But on the 187-yard 17th, he did precisely that, fading a 7-iron into a back left pin that sidespun into the cup.

Eloy Ramos' scorecard from The Club at Pradera.

“What the hell, dude!” Stoner remembers exclaiming.

Ramos birdied the par-5 18th to close the back nine at even par, his 5-under 67 a career- best round. “I hit two decent shots and got some lucky bounces,” says the former soldier now working as a defense contractor at Buckley Air Force Base. His luck carried through to the clubhouse bar. “There were only about 10 people inside,” he laughs. “The drinks cost me $173. I got off easy.”

Easy isn’t a word used to describe Ramos’ feat. According to organizations that track such accomplishments, the odds of the same player having both in the same round are somewhere in the neighborhood of a trillion to one.


This article appeared in the 2019  August/September Issue of Colorado AvidGolfer.

Colorado AvidGolfer Magazine is the state’s leading resource for golf and the lifestyle that surrounds it, publishing eight issues annually and proudly delivering daily content via coloradoavidgolfer.com.

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