The 85th Masters tournament got off to a rocky start for many big-name players. Get your rundown on how things finished up and what we’re expecting from the second round.
Follow the second round with our live scoring.
Author: Kirsten Ross
Spanish pro and world number three, Jon Rahm and wife Kelly Cahill welcomed their son on Saturday 3rd of April, just days before the first round of the Masters.
Rahm, 26, was prepared to drop everything and leave Augusta immediately should his wife have gone in to labour during the tournament.
He even went so far as to tell fans that they “shouldn’t bet on” him to win this year, assuming that he wouldn’t make it to the final round.
Luckily for those who hoped to see him compete, their son Kepa Cahill Rahm was born just in time for his father to spend a few days with him before leaving for Augusta.
A tough decision
“[Leaving] was the hardest part. Monday thinking about it, I’m like, man, I’m going to have to leave, and that was not easy whatsoever,” Rahm told reporters when asked about leaving his wife behind for the Masters. “For the first few days it was even hard to leave her room if she was doing something with him and I had to go somewhere else.”
He added that knowing his wife and son were both in good health and good spirits made the decision to go a little easier for him.
Paternal instincts kicking in
“I had never changed a diaper in my life, apparently never really held a baby in my life, and as soon as it was my turn, somehow I knew what to do, and those protective instincts, as well, just came in,” he beamed as he told reporters about his first few days of fatherhood.
When asked if he feels his lack of practice leading up to the tournament will negatively impact his performance, he said that he isn’t concerned about it.
“I went through a major life experience. If anything I’m just happier. I’m thankful to be here. If anything, definitely a different mental state, but I would say it’s a better mental state.”
Jon Rahm is set to tee off in the first round of the 2021 Masters at 15.42 BST.
Follow along with our live scoreboard.
The final pre-tournament check from Golf Post is here ahead of the first round of the 2021 US Masters.
Join us every morning after tournament days (Fri-Mon) for your quick recap of what happened the night before.
Get live scoring updates here
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The Masters: Record Firsts
It’s less than 24 hours until we watch the first group tee off at Augusta for this year’s masters.
With just one day left to wait we’re closing our masters countdown series with the all time Masters firsts. Get ready for some quick-fire trivia.
First Winner.
Horton Smith won the very first Masters tournament (then Augusta Invitational) in 1934. At twenty five he was much younger than today’s average winner’s age of 32. Not wasting any time, Smith doubled his record, so to speak, and became the first person to win the tournament twice in 1936.
First Ace.
The first Masters hole in one was played by then amateur Ross Sommerville in 1934 on the sixteenth hole. The hole has since become known, among other things, for having yielded by far the highest number of aces in masters history with 21 of 30.
First Green Jacket.
Sam Snead was the first winner to be presented with a green jacket upon winning the Masters in 1949. In the same year, green jackets were awarded retroactively to the previous 12 winners. Previously the jackets had been worn as more of a practicality so that guests could identify members of the club.
First Non-American.
Gary Player became the first non-American to win the tournament in 1961. The South African’s win came after 23 years in which no foreigner had won a green jacket.
First European to win.
Almost another 20 had to go by before a European would win the event. Spaniard Seve Ballesteros’ 1980 win sparked a wave of European wins in that decade.
German golfing legend Bernhard Langer’s 1985 win was quickly followed by Scotsman Sandy Lyle in 1988 before Englishman Nick Faldo won twice in a row in ‘89 and ‘90.
First Person To Defend Title.
Faldo however, was not the first person to defend his title. That honour goes to Jack Nicklaus, who in 1966 won in a playoff and became the first person to win a the Masters twice in a row.
This article is part of our Countdown to The Masters series. Join us every day between now and April 7 for fun facts and interesting stories about golf and The Masters tournament.
The tee times and groupings for round 1 at this year’s Masters are out. Here are the groups to watch on Thursday.
Group 11: 15.06 BST
Two-time champion Bubba Watson is playing alongside Brooks Koepka, the comeback kid, and rising star Viktor Hovland who won last year’s silver cup.
Group 13: 15.30 BST
Defending champion Dustin Johnson is playing alongside 20-time Masters player and 2 time runner up Lee Westwood. The two tournament big dogs will be playing with 22-year-old American amateur Tyler Strafaci, no pressure there!
Group 14: 15.42 BST
Xander Schauffele, Jon Rahm. Rory McIlroy. Need we say more?
What better way could Jon Rahm make his new-born son proud than winning his first Masters tournament?
Group 28: 18.36 BST
Cut to a little later in the evening over on our side of the pond. Rogue swinger Bryson DeChambeau is playing with Aussie Adam Scott and Max Homa who won in a close playoff at the genesis invitational in Feburary this year. Will he get that far at the Masters?
Group 30: 19.00 BST
After a seemingly never-ending slump Jordan Spieth, winner of last week’s Valero Texas Open could make one of the best comeback streaks we’ve seen if he wins this year’s Masters. He’ll be playing alongside Cameron Smith and Collin Morikawa in the final group of the day.
Other players to watch:
First time Masters contender Robert MacIntyre of Scotland is teeing off in group 19 at 16.42 BST.
Frenchman Victor Perez, rising star on the European tour is teeing off at 17.12 BST in group 21.
Bookies’ favourite and world number 2 Justin Thomas is teeing off later in the day at 18.48 BST in group 29.
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The $2 Ticket to Augusta
With all the fun in Augusta this week, let’s look at another piece of old-school Masters trivia.
It’s just two days until the tournament officially begins- and that many dollars would gain you entry to the tournament back in the day.
Yes, entry to the Masters tournament used to cost just 2 USD per round — $2.20 after tax.
That’s equivalent to just under $40 in today’s money.
Fans today, even those who live just a few hours away, couldn’t cover their travel costs with that.
Anyone lucky enough to get their hands on a ticket in 2021 will have paid $115 per round, with those for the practice rounds on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday having gone for $75.
Bobby Jones had initially refused to officially call the event the Masters for fear it would sound too pretentious. Despite that, the tournament which was then the Augusta Invitational was still known colloquially as the Masters from the beginning. The name change came in 1949.
More from the countdown series: the rarest shot in Masters history
The ticket might have gotten a little pricey over the years- but one thing people love about the tournament is the tasty and almost unbelievably cheap sandwiches they serve to guests during the Masters.
The famous $1.50 Pimento Cheese Sandwich has become something of a legend over the years, with the recipe being shared on food blogs and social media.
It might be nice to imagine what it would be like to go to the Masters back in 1934 with a $2 ticket but there is plenty of excitement still to come in the next few days.
Keep up with all the action and live scoring with Golf Post.
This article is part of our Countdown to The Masters series. Join us every day between now and April 7 for fun facts and interesting stories about golf and The Masters tournament.
As Masters week 2021 gets off to a start today in Augusta, we’ve got just three short days until the first round of this year’s tournament.
But as we’re not quite there yet, we’re back with another piece of Masters trivia that will come in handy at your next golf-themed-zoom-pub-quiz.
3 is the highest number of aces scored in a single year at the Masters.
There have been only two triple-ace years (yes, we just made that term up) in Masters history.
There has been much criticism of the narrowing of the course at Augusta in the last 20 years, as it is said to make more inventive shots near impossible. However, both of these triple-ace years were in this century.
In 2004’s final round, Chris DiMarco scored an ace on the 6th followed by Padraig Hamilton and Kirk Triplett who aced the 16th one after another in consecutive groups.
The 16th hole at Augusta has a reputation for being something of an ace-magnet. The vast majority of aces at the Masters have been at hole 16. As of 2021, there have been a total of 30 aces in tournament history, 21 of which were on the 16th hole.
The most recent Masters aces were recorded in 2019 by Bryson deChambeau and Justin Thomas, both on the 16th.
Since 1954, players receive a crystal bowl if ace they score at the Masters that year.
The second and only other year 3 hole-in-ones were recorded is 2016. Shane Lowry, Davis Love III and Louis Oosthuizen all scored an ace on the 16th hole of the final round in that year.
Both triple-ace years, did not unfortunately make a winner out of any of the players involved.
This article is part of our Countdown to The Masters series. Join us every day between now and April 7 for fun facts and interesting stories about golf and The Masters tournament.
The masters has seen some incredible performances over the years, some of which we’ve already covered in this series; from Tiger’s legendary chip at the 16th hole in Augusta, to the 9 under par rounds of Nick Price and Greg Norman.
But with four days to go, we’re looking at a shot so rare that it’s only happened four times in Masters history: the albatross.
While it may not be quite as rare as the elusive condor, which has never been played any professional event, there are (almost) a full handful of players who can claim to have scored an Augusta albatross at the Masters.
Gene Sarazen was the first to achieve this rare shot, also known as the double eagle, during the final round of the Masters on the 18th of April 1935. Shooting 3 below par on the 15th hole lead to Sarazen tying with third round leader Craig Wood at the end of the fourth round, forcing the event to go to a playoff.
His shot from the 15th tee got him 235 yards from the tee, from which point he chipped it up onto the green where the ball slowly rolled into the hole.
Despite making this shot in the second year of its 87-year history, Sarazen is still the only golfer to have ever played an albatross and gone on to win in the same tournament.
More from the countdown series: the history of the green jacket.
The next two albatrosses came every 30 years or so, from Bruce Devlin in 1967 on the 8th and Jeff Maggert in 1994 on the 13th.
Maggert, like Sarazen, scored his albatross in the decisive fourth round of the tournament but it wasn’t enough to win against José María Olazábal, who won that year with a final score of 9 under par.
Winning was out of the question for Maggert, who was 19 above par when he took his swing at the 13th tee that day. His albatross helped save him from a truly disastrous four days and he finished the final round with a combined final score of 305.
Louis Oosthouzin scored the most recent Masters albatross in 2012 on the second hole. Oosthouzin very nearly won that year before losing to Bubba Waston on the par-4 second playoff hole.
All were a 2 on a par 5, and all apart from Bruce Devlin’s were in the final round.
This article is part of our Countdown to The Masters series. Join us every day between now and April 7 for fun facts and interesting stories about golf and The Masters tournament.
Clifford Roberts, investment dealer and co-founder of Augusta National who first thought of the name for what is now one of the most well known tournaments in golf.
“The Masters”, Roberts suggested, would be shorthand for “the masters of golf”. The name would denote the event’s importance as a contest of the world’s top players.
But there is only one man who, if we follow Roberts’ logic, can be described as the Master.
Jack Nicklaus is the only person to win as many 6 Masters titles in his lifetime.
Nicklaus picked up his first Masters win in 1963 at the age of 23 after turning pro just two years earlier in 1961.
In an incredible finish, he beat out Tony Lema with a 0.9m put on the final hole, finishing just one stroke ahead.
The first of Nicklaus’ six green jackets was awarded by Arnold Palmer. Palmer had won the previous year’s tournament and was at that point already a role model for Nicklaus.
More from the countdown series: Is Golf Getting Younger?
In 1963, Nicklaus won a total of $20,000 dollars for winning the Masters. That’s equivalent to roughly $170,000 dollars in today’s money.
If you think that sounds like a lot, think again: Dustin Johnson earned himself more than $2 million for winning in 2020.
In 1966, he took home his third green jacket and became the first of only three players to successfully defend his title at the Masters.
Nick Faldo (‘89,’90) and Tiger Woods (‘01,‘02) are the only people since then to have matched this feat.
Could Dustin Johnson be next at this year’s event?
Born in Ohio in 1940, Nicklaus has won a whopping 18 major titles in his lifetime, making him the most accomplished golfer of all time.
His major-winning career spanned from 1962 at the PGA Championship at Oakmont Country Club in Oakmont, Pennsylvania until his final Masters win in 1986.
This article is part of our Countdown to The Masters series. Join us every day between now and April 7 for fun facts and interesting stories about golf and The Masters tournament.
Do you think you could shoot four under par on a single hole? Chances are you probably couldn’t.
Only five so-called “condors” have ever been recorded.
To score a condor, you really have to be creative in cutting corners or confident enough to hit over trees. The most recent of these rare shots was recorded just a few months ago in Oakland California.
When local resident Kevin Pon went out for a round at Lake Chabot Golf Course on the 10th of December 2020, he probably didn’t think he would make history.
At 54 years old, Pon achieved the near-impossible when he finished the 667-yard par-6 18th in just 2 shots.
“It’s been a dream,” he said in an interview with Golf Channel in response to how he feels about the historical feat “just being within those 5 five people and being the only one that’s done it on a par-6, it’s just mind blowing”.
More from the countdown series: the men who broke one of golf’s coolest records.
It was the first recorded condor on a par-6 hole
Every other four-under shot happened when a player aced a par 5.
The 54-year-old’s strategic 550-yard drive crossed trees and bounced off cart pathways to leave him with the perfect opportunity to hit the ball up to the green using his pitching wedge.
He recalls onlookers cheering and shouting as the ball slowly rolled across the green and into the hole but he didn’t see the historic moment himself due to the low angle from which he shot.
Don’t expect to see any at the Masters anytime soon. Changes to the course in the last 20 years or so have made such creative shots near impossible.
The first condor was recorded all the way back in 1962 by Larry Bruce in Hope Country Club, Arkansas on the 480-yard, par-5 fifth hole.
Before Pon, the second most recent condor was recorded at Royal Wentworth Falls Country Club, NSW, Australia. Jack Bartlett, who was just 16-years-old at the time, scored an ace on the 467 metre par-5 17th hole.
This article is part of our Countdown to The Masters series. Join us every day between now and April 7 for fun facts and interesting stories about golf and The Masters tournament.