PHOTO COURTESY BRUCE PENTON
Dillon Batsel of Medicine Hat stunned the local golf community with a 14-under-par 58 during the club's weekly Men's Night on July 31. He will also be playing at the Alberta Open to be held at Desert Blume Aug. 13-15.
Medicine Hat’s Dillon Batsel made golf history at Desert Blume Golf Club on July 31, and hopes to carry his hot streak over to the Alberta Open championship at the Blume next week.
Batsel, a 31-year-old Medicine Hat College instructor in economics and finance and an assistant pro since 2018 at Desert Blume, stunned the local golf community with a 14-under-par 58 during the club’s weekly Men’s Night. The score won’t stand as an official course record, because it was accomplished from the regular green tees, a yardage of 6,487 yards, and it didn’t happen in a competitive event. But it will forever be the score to beat in Desert Blume lore.
Golf’s lowest score ever recorded was a 57 earlier this year by Cristobal Del Solar on the developmental Korn Ferry Tour, but he did it on a par-70. Jim Furyk shot a 58 at the 2016 Travelers Championship on the PGA Tour, but it, too, was on a par-70 layout. There have been 13 scores of 59 recorded on the PGA Tour, but none at 14 under par.
Batsel, who won the 2021 Alberta PGA championship and was named this province’s Player of the Year in 2021, will be one of the favourites at the 54-hole Alberta Open, which runs at his home course Tuesday through Thursday (Aug. 13-15) and features Alberta’s best professional and amateur golfers.
Known for hammering drives of prodigious length, the 5-foot-7, 150-pound Batsel said he and some of his golf pals around the Blume have occasionally talked about what it would take to post a sub-60 score. “(The Blume has) the extra par-5 and No. 13 (a par-4) could be driveable, so we always thought it was possible,” said Batsel.
Batsel and the four others in his group – Matthew Stafford, Troy Gedny, Jordan Forsythe and Cullen Bradshaw – started their round on No. 10 with the benefit of a fairly strong tailwind. Batsel’s drive landed on the green on the 364-yard hole and, “I think it was kind of a sign of how the round was going to go,” he said. Two putts later, Batsel had his first birdie of the day.
An eagle three on the par-5 11th followed, with Batsel sinking a 12-foot putt after an eight-iron into the green on the 491-yard hole. He parred No. 12 before almost driving the par-4 13th hole, chipping from in front of the green to within five feet, and making birdie. He missed a six-foot birdie putt on the par-3 14th and made his only bogey of the round on No. 15 after a 300-plus-yard drive bounded into the hazard left of the fairway about 70 yards in front of the green.
“I was going to hit a hybrid off the (15th) tee to make sure I didn’t go into the hazard,” said Batsel. “But one of the guys in our group hammered a drive down there just in front of the green so they talked me into hitting driver.” He was assessed a penalty stroke and failed to get up and down as he tried to salvage par.
He made birdie putts of four feet and 12 feet on 16 and 17 to get to five under par and said he was “thinking birdie” on the par-five 497-yard 18th to get to 29 for the back side because, he said, there’s something magical about posting a nine-hole score in the 20s. He smashed a drive through a crosswind onto the fairway, hit a five-iron from 185 yards and burned the edge of the cup on a 35-foot eagle putt. The resulting birdie gave him 29, six under par, for the back nine.
The front nine started birdie-par-birdie, with his second shot to the par-five third hole “my best swing all night” – a 250-yard three-wood to the middle of the green. His eagle putt lipped out.
Batsel got to nine under par for the round with a nine iron and 15-foot putt on the par-3 fourth hole, and then crushed a drive on the 545-yard par-5 fifth before hitting a wedge – a wedge! – into the green and holed a “big breaker” of a putt for eagle.
“That was the first time I said anything about what was happening,” said Batsel. “I didn’t want to jinx anything, but after I made that eagle putt (to get to 11 under par), I said, ‘OK boys, we’ve got something going here.'”
On the 408-yard, par-4 sixth, his drive left him 70 yards short of the green and he hit a “great wedge” to six feet and made another “big breaker.”
“The seventh tee was when I was most nervous,” he said. “I had to start it to the left because of the wind but I didn’t want to tug it (out of bounds). The wind took his drive into the longish grass around a bunker on the right, but he chipped it out to 85 yards away, hit a wedge to seven feet and sank the birdie putt to get to minus 13.
Pars on the final two holes would give him a 59.
“I usually go for it (off the tee) on eight, but there was a front-left pin and I didn’t want to risk plugging it in the front bunker, so I laid up with an eight-iron. His 120-yard wedge shot put him 15 feet away and he lipped out his birdie putt.
On No. 9, his final hole, “I was just trying to par it (for 59),” he said. He hit a five-iron off the tee to within 150 yards and then drilled a nine-iron to a mere 2 1/2 feet away. “I was nervous but it was straight in,” he said.
“The boys bear-hugged me right away.”
Is a 57 possible?
“I’d never say never. If you hit it well and make all the putts, I guess it’s possible.”
Local players playing
in Alberta Open
Medicine Hat and the southeast corner will be well represented Aug. 13-15 at Desert Blume as the cream of the golfing crop in Alberta tee it up at the Alberta Open.
The field includes Calgary’s Wes Heffernan, a six-time Alberta Open champion, defending champion Max Sekulic of the Glencoe Golf and Country Club, and scores of other top pros and amateurs from around the province.
The local contingent is led by Batsel, coming off historic round of 58 last week at Desert Blume, and includes Blume amateurs Adam Antkowiak, Wyatt Bishop, Owen Bruins, Jordan Forsythe, Mark Hutchings, Jason Mohr, Mike Valk and Ryan Werre, along with Desert Blume pro Trevor Ellerman.
From the Medicine Hat Golf and Country Club are amateurs Sam Bratvold, Nolan Burzminski and Ryan Hodgins, while Connaught Golf Club will be represented by amateurs Corey Eakins and Ryan Vallely.
Also in the field are amateurs Lyndon Kuryvial of Taber, Ryan O’Donnell of Lethbridge and two from Picture Butte, Jeff Masse and Jesse Sawyer.
A very well written article ! Gr8 work Bruce.