‘Don’t lie’: Average golfers on what it’s really like to play Augusta… and what they scored

They are the iconic shots that every golf fan remembers, the marvellous Masters moments at Augusta that leave mere mortals awe-struck, the flourishes that earn immortality.

FOX SPORTS, available on Kayo Sports, is the only place to watch the 2025 Masters LIVE | New to Kayo? Get your first month for just $1. Limited time offer.

Consider Tiger Woods unbelievable chip from beside the 16th green in 2005, a shot the commentator declared was “extremely difficult” given the ball had landed “in one of the toughest pitches on the entire place”, that defied credulity.

“Oh my goodness. Ohhh WOW!” the commentator bellows.

“In your life have you seen anything like that?”

READ MORE

20 YEARS ON: Tiger’s secret Aussie chat and what still stings rival: Lid lifts on golf’s greatest moment

TEE TIMES: Aussie stars drawn in blockbuster groups as full Masters tee times revealed

MASTERS GUIDE: Historic Masters change explained — and what it means for Aussie golf fans

‘HE’S DIFFERENT’: Secret change to unlock Smith revival — and why he’s exception to Masters rule

What about Bubba Watson’s banana bender around the corner from deep in the woods on the 10th hole in the 2012 playoff to win the green jacket from Louis Oosthuizen, who himself conjured a miracle when scoring an albatross on the par 5 2nd hole named Pink Dogwood?

As the caller intoned; “This one could be very nice. Oh ‘Come to papa’. YEEESSS”.

There is the chip shot during the 1987 playoff on the 11th, named White Dogwood, from Larry Mize that broke the heart of Greg Norman and many Australians.

Or the tee shot from Jack Nicklaus on 16 in the 1986 Masters. And Woods on the same hole 33 years later that effectively helped him seal a win for the ages in 2019.

Over the next week, as the 2025 field seeks to enter the annals of the famous tournament, those spine-tingling moments will be replayed in all their glory during the live coverage.

About 18 hours after the Masters is complete, another group lives their childhood dreams, with more mortal members of the media granted access to the course via an ballot, an annual invitation among the varied traditions and quirks at Augusta.

It is pot luck, with the writers receiving notice on the weekend of their good fortune. They are required to attend a special briefing, pay heed to every guideline associated with their invitation and then set forth on Monday on the golfing adventure of a lifetime.

Mindful that many Australians who watch The Masters are regular golfers, foxsports.com.au quizzed some of those lucky enough to live out the fantasy round on what it is like to play Augusta under tournament mode … or near enough.

The challenges abound, not least because the pins are left in the same place as they were in the championship round on Sunday.

Securing golf clubs can be a trick. So too shoes. Avoiding the temptations at the famous Tbonz Steakhouse which caters to fans and players alike after the 72nd on Sunday night is up there as well. Then there is the task of finding a driver responsible enough to follow the strict guidelines of the Augusta Golf Club to ensure you arrive on time.

On the eve of the 2025 Masters, we spoke to author Evin Priest and renowned journalist Mark Hayes about their experience in the heart of Georgia.

They add their recollections to those of News Corp Australia journalist Julian Linden, Martin Blake from Golf Australia, Queensland Reds media man Jim Tucker and AAP scribe Darren Walton, who touched on the deceptive camera angles to beers before Hogan’s Bridge, from using the locker of a champion to using the facilities on course.

EVIN PRIEST (2017)

Australian Golf Digest

Childhood course: Tura Beach Golf Club/Camden Valley Golf Resort

Primary course: Bankstown Golf Club

Handicap: 4

Score: 89 (was off 12 at the time)

Australian author and journalist Evin Priest’s heart was racing by the time he stepped on to the opening tee to play Tea Olive, a beautiful par four that is the gateway to golfers Heaven.

Priest, who has just co-authored a terrific book titled Together We Roared with Steve Williams, the long-time caddie of Tiger Woods, had been breathless for the best part of an hour from his entry via Magnolia Lane, which serves as the stairway to golf’s pearly gates.

As the fortunate few members of The Fourth Estate who have been invited to play Augusta National the day after the Masters can attest, the rules related to entry are specific.

An hour is allocated from the time the gate opens to allow the invitee onto the course prior to stepping on to the first tee … and there is much to savour in that hour, Priest said.

“It’s an experience you never forget because Augusta National’s mission is to treat you like a member for the day. I know that sounds far fetched, but they do give you a tasting sample of what members enjoy whenever they visit,” Priest told foxsports.com.au

“You’re allowed in exactly one hour before your tee time and the drive up Magnolia Lane is particularly special because the media don’t enter through Magnolia Lane — that’s for the players.

“You’ve then got less than 60 minutes to go to the pro shop and get Augusta National merch, which is different to Masters merch and can only be bought when playing Augusta, meet your caddie, hit balls on the range and check out the Champions Locker Room, for example.”

Priest made sure to check out the locker allocated to Australia’s only Masters champion Adam Scott, who shares it with three-time winner and all-time great Gary Player, before teeing off.

On learning his name had been called in the media ballot, the Sydneysider had several experiences he wanted to tick off on the course as well.

His work duties aside as he covered Sergio Garcia’s triumph, Priest could scarcely stop thinking about what it would be like to play his first shot at Augusta and took a deep breath, in part to slow the racing heart, but also to savour the experience of a lifetime.

“After the first tee shot, which you’ve been thinking about all weekend, playing the course is the closest thing a golfing adult can experience to the euphoria of going to Disneyland or Sea Word as a kid. You just couldn’t be happier,” Priest said.

“I wanted to play well, but my focus was just trying to hit the best shots I could on the shots I’d dreamt about since I was a teenager — the tee shot on No.2, the second into the par-5 eighth, the tee shot on 10 and 11, as well as obviously the famous par-3 12th and par-5 13th, the second shot on 13 and 15 and the tee shot on 18. And for the most part I hit a lot of good shots on all of them.”

No matter the score, most golfers will walk off a course wanting to come back if they can master the last and Priest has the good fortune of having a roar of affirmation echoing in his head to this day, having saved his best for last … unless his lucky number comes up again.

“At the end of a great day, I wanted to hammer a 50-metre slice off the left bunker,” he said.

“I no joke hit a 270-metre drive so pure and with such a strong slice spin my caddie — and I have this on video — yelled out, ‘My WORD’ in his thick southern accent. From the middle of the fairway I hit a wedge on and just missed the birdie putt.”

Priest’s round was complete but the scrambling was not.

Such is the last-minute nature of the invitation, invariably it leads to complications with other obligations, not that any Augusta invitee cares.

“The scramble to change my flight out of Atlanta, which is 2.5 hours up the highway, was not a problem because you couldn’t wipe the smile off my face,” he said.

“What other sporting event in the world allows the media to enter a lottery to play the arena — and not just any football stadium, but the world’s most exclusive and prestigious course — the day after competition?”

MARK HAYES (2014)

Golf writer

First Course: Tewantin Noosa Golf Club

Primary Course: Curlewis and Port Arlington Golf Clubs

To suggest Mark Hayes felt a whirlwind of emotions at Augusta in April 12 years ago would be an understatement given the personal and professional tumult he experienced in a day.

Among the highlights of his journalism career was the joy of covering Adam Scott’s triumphant success in 2013 as he brought to an end the great Australian drought at the Masters.

The magnitude of the success, which meant thousands of words of coverage for the Herald Sun and stablemate papers back in Australia, made for a frantic finish to the weekend.

It also hoped him recover from the heartbreak a day earlier when his dreams of playing the fabled course were dashed just as he was envisaging driving up Magnolia Lane.

“I was told by a mate that my name had come up and I was like, ‘Don’t lie to me.’ And he said, ‘No. No. No. It has come up,’” Hayes recalled.

“I had been out on the course, but I came back in because I didn’t have my phone. And the thrill left me almost breathless. I started scurrying down the stairs to the foyer where the foyer is and for some reason, and I can’t even tell you how it happened, but this bloke … was standing in front of me and I heard him talking to someone, telling them his name had come up.

“I asked him what his name was and he said, ‘Marcus Hayes’. My heart nearly fell through the ground. And I look up and sure enough it says Marcus Hayes, not Mark Hayes with a ‘K’.

“I turned to him and introduced myself and he said, ‘Oh, my God’. It turns out he was a great fella. But I was so close to getting it and to have it wrenched out of my hands was gut wrenching.”

Hayes, not surprisingly, was a little gun shy the following year when he returned to cover Scott’s defence of the green jacket and had a similar scenario unfold.

But there was no near namesake in line to knock him off in 2014, which led to a sleepless night following Bubba Watson’s second triumph as he imagined what lay ahead of him.

“I just remember everything running like clockwork,” he said.

“You can’t go down Magnolia Drive before your dedicated time … and then you’ve got a pyramid (of golf balls) to do on the driving range, but they’re all Titleist balls and you are hitting out on to this beautiful range.

“That’s what starts your mind racing, because you think of all the players who had been there and done that and think, ‘Oh, my God. They were here yesterday.’ It’s all a bit of a whirlwind in some respects. You get your own locker for the day, which is amazing in itself.”

Hayes, who was playing off a handicap of either 11 or 12, had a simple mission for his Masters day.

If he could manage to birdie a hole on the famous course, well … it would not matter what he scored. For the record, though, he notched a 91. And that birdie?

On the 13th, he thought he was a chance, only for it to all go wrong as he ended up taking a triple bogey, which included a three-putt.

But on the following hole, he hit a massive drive and followed that with a seven iron straight to the middle of the green.

That, in itself, was not a guarantee, for Hayes’ caddie told him that if the ball moved to the left, he would have a monster downhill putt to navigate, but if it fell to the right, it would dip down close to where the pin was. And it went right.

That left him with a three to four inch putt that Hayes “could not have missed”.

He had snared his birdie and from then on it was party time, with a birdie following on the 15 as well, before parring 16 and 17 and finishing off with a bogey after getting into trouble.

“I played the last five holes of Augusta in square and I felt like I had won the Green Jacket,” he said.

Darren Walton (2023)

Australian Associated Press

First course: Coffs Harbour Golf Club, New South Wales

Primary course: Carnarvon Golf Club, Sydney

Handicap: 10

Score: 97

The instructions were spelled out to Darren Walton by the officials of the Augusta Golf Club last year as he prepared for the biggest round of his life. Every order must be followed.

“They give you a nice invitation and say that you have to be there one hour before. It was not 59 minutes before. It was not 61 minutes before. You must be there exactly an hour before,” he said.

“Brent Read (Sydney journalist) drove me up Magnolia Lane in the hire car and I was warned that he had to exit the property immediately after dropping me off.”

After arriving, Walton was taken to the Champions’ Locker room and was issued with the locker used by Canadian Mike Weir when he won the Masters 20 years earlier.

The long-serving AAP journalist felt nervous initially but “honestly thought I was playing at my home course once I settled down, because it is not overly long and the fairways are quite forgiving, although the greens are treacherous.”

Walton managed to par the fourth, six and eighth holes on the front nine to reach the turn in a reasonable position, having shot 43 despite three-putting the ninth, but his excitement got the better of him at the break.

“I felt like Charlie in the Chocolate Factory, that I had won the golden ticket. And after I had three pars on the front nine, I felt like ‘Augusta’ Gloop. But then Amen Corner got me,” Walton said.

“I had a couple of beers at the halfway mark and then rushed to the tee box on the tenth … and was completely seduced by the beauty that is the beast. It was the most beautiful sight in my life. It is just a majestic hole, but it is an absolute monster.”

Walton’s wheels fell off. He triple-bogeyed the 10th, named Camellia, and then double-bogeyed the 11th, which is called White Dogwood. And he was stunned when arriving at the 12th hole, the famous par three named Golden Bell.

“The most amazing thing is that … when you are watching on TV, it looks like a drop shot, like they are hitting downhill. But that is actually an illusion,” he said.

“The tee box is below the green and you are actually hitting to an elevated green. That, to me, is something I could not believe.”

Australian journalist Graeme Agars, who celebrated his 40th Masters in 2023, had advised Walton to take two clubs more than he might think he needed on the 141m hole.

But he did not listen and ended up in the water. A double-bogey there further rattled his confidence and while the Sydneysider regrouped to par the 14th, the 500m 15th named Firethorn proved prickly for Walton. He ultimately recorded a nine as his hopes of breaking 90 fell away.

Martin Blake (2012)

Golf Australia. Formerly The Age.

First course: Stawell Golf Club, Victoria

Primary course: Yarra Yarra Golf Club, Melbourne

Handicap: 11 (13 when he played Augusta)

Score: 98

On his third trip to Georgia to cover The Masters, Martin Blake had just returned from several hours on the course tracking the Australian contingent on Saturday when all hell broke loose.

Officials were running from all directions to let him know that his name had been called in the ballot and that he would need to get cracking in order to guarantee the invitation stood.

Part of him wondered if he was being set up for an elaborate prank but, sure enough, Blake’s name was on the ballot board alongside fellow Aussie scribe Jim Tucker.

There were a couple of obstacles to overcome.

It was the first time he had travelled to Augusta without his golf clubs, so the Melbourne-based journalist jumped into a cab and visited local courses, where he was ultimately saved by a club pro who was so amazed by the opportunity that he leant his own clubs.

Standing on the first tee the day after Bubba Watson hit one of the most remarkable shots in Masters history to edge Louis Oosthuizen on the second playoff hole, Blake had another problem. So thick was the southern drawl of his caddie, he could not understand a word.

“Then again, he could not understand me either, but we managed to get by using a form of sign language,” Blake said.

Playing from the Members tees, Blake started well when thumping a drive straight down the middle of the 406m par 4 called Tea Olive, which helped him secure an opening par.

“It was very nerve-racking standing on the first tee … but my memories of the day are just looking at Jim and we were just laughing with each other,” Blake said.

“We were pinching ourselves. ‘Is this ever real? Is this actually happening?’.”

Then writing for The Age, he said he fluked a par on the par 3 16th hole, named Redbud, despite slicing a ball far to the right and into the trees.

“I’d never seen anyone end up there and I had to hit it back towards the water, straight down hill towards the water, but somehow managed to stop it on the green and make par,” he said.

The one hole Blake wanted to play perfectly was the famous 12th hole, a 141m par 3 known as Golden Bell. But the occasion got the better of him.

“We stopped on Hogan’s Bridge and got our photos taken on the bridge as we came off the 11th, and then I proceeded to knock one straight into the drink,” he said.

“I flared it straight out to the right and anyone who has watched it will know that the creek runs at an angle and it bounced straight into the water.

“I dropped it and ended up in a nasty little spot and I flubbed it straight back into the water, so I ended up taking six on the most famous par three in the world. That was not ideal.”

Similarly to his colleagues, Blake said the undulation of the course is something that is not easily identifiable for those who are watching on television and that the condition of the course really “has to be seen to be believed”.

“There is not even a weed there. And you really do feel like you are on some sort of hallowed ground,” Blake said.

“I remember that on the fourth, I took a huge divot and thought, ‘This is sacrilege. I’ve dug up Augusta’. But I think the course is playable … from the members’ tees.

“It is just like the old Lee Westwood line, like ‘Disneyland for Adults’. It was just brilliant, one of the highlights of my life and I can tell you I have dined out on it since.”

Jim Tucker (2012)

Queensland Reds communications, formerly Courier-Mail

First course: Warringah Golf Club, Sydney

Primary course: Indooroopilly Golf Club, Brisbane

Handicap: 13. Now off 9

Score: 92

Jim Tucker’s nerves were jangling when he stepped onto the first tee alongside Blake for his dream round at Augusta in 2012.

Once again, the strict edict associated with the invitation to play Augusta required some quick thinking.

Tucker, who filed his last story on that year’s Masters at 1.30am on Monday morning, had arrived in Georgia without any golf clubs but ventured into the garage of his rental house and found a set owned by the son of their landlord.

Another challenge came with actually finding a way to Gate 3, Augusta Golf Club, to take up the invitation on Monday.

The club made it clear that arriving via a cab for such an auspicious moment would not do and so Tucker, who had never driven in the United States before, hired a car and picked up Blake on the way.

“It was like ‘Driving Miss Daisy’. It was quite a fraught trip just to get to the course and then I was worried I would take out a magnolia tree on Magnolia Lane,” he said.

Once there, however, the geniality of the club came to the fore.

Tucker was shown to the Champions’ Locker Room — he used the locker of Fuzzy Zoeller, who won the Masters at his first attempt in 1979 — and then invited to breakfast.

A visit to the pro shop was also in order. Tucker is right-handed but he putts left-handed, not that it mattered because the borrowed kit was without a putter.

The club pro recommended the latest model Scotty Cameron putter but it scarcely did him any favours, with the Brisbane-based media specialist having 40 putts in his round of 92.

Aside from the magnificence of the course, a couple of memories stand out for Tucker.

His caddie was named Warren Leffler, who had played on lower-tier tours and, “after some prodding from his fellow caddies”, divulged that he had once scored an albatross on the 500m 15th name Firethorn.

Playing alongside Tucker and Blake was a professional named Bob Casper, whose father Billy Casper won the 1970 Masters and also two US Opens in a successful career.

Bob Casper, “a lovely man” who shot 33 on the back nine, had brought a decent camera for the round which allowed Tucker and Blake the chance to secure treasured photos of their day.

But he also relayed stories about his dad, a prolific tour winner who died in 2015, and said that after his playing days were finished, he would proudly wear his green jacket to Augusta and position himself near the clubhouse, happy to talk to anyone who walked by.

“He just loved the community that that club is,” Tucker said.

“We only see it during the tournament, but for the week of the Masters, it is a wonderfully welcoming club. All the members will do you any favour you can dream of out on the course.”

The 11th hole, a 475m par 4 named White Dogwood, surprised Tucker, who said “it is a much better hole than you really would have seen on TV”.

If a player is fortunate to drive straight, Tucker said; “You do see the whole panorama of ‘Amen Corner’ in front of you. It is a patch of sacred ground for golfers and from that perch, midway down the 11th hole, you can see the whole of Amen Corner.”

Tucker got on a roll when parring 10 through 12 and had a 30 foot putt for birdie on the 13th, only to four putt.

Among the highlights was trying to mimic the famous shot Watson hit a day earlier in the playoff to clinch a remarkable win.

“The caddies show you where all the great shots were hit, from (Phil) Mickelson’s shot from the trees on the 13th to where Larry Mize chipped in on the 11th,” Tucker said.

“But it was the year Bubba Watson played his freak curveball shot from out of the trees on the 10th, on the playoff hole. A right-hander could never play that shot and it had to be a crazy, one in one-thousand curveball from a left-hander to do that, and you can’t imagine there being a better shot ever played at Augusta. It was just impossible to comprehend.”

Julian Linden (2011)

News Corp Australia

First course: Bathurst Golf Club

Primary course: Wollongong Golf Club

Handicap: N/A

Score: Did not score

For a moment on Julian Linden’s first visit to Augusta in 2011, he was on the cusp of the greatest sporting experience an Australian golf fan could imagine.

Based in New York at the time as Sports Editor for the Americas for Reuters, Linden’s good mate Larry Fine had entered him in the ballot for Augusta and, to his astonishment, his lucky number came up.

But through to the 72nd hole on an spine-tingling Sunday, the possibility lingered that Linden might be about to report on an Australian first as Adam Scott and Jason Day launched dynamic bids to secure the Green Jacket.

“One of the tricky bits about winning the ballot is that you are so excited about playing the course, it is almost hard to concentrate on the final round of the Masters, which you are supposed to be covering,” Linden said.

“It was a day when Adam Scott and Jason Day both made a great charge and I think they teed off on the 71st hole as co-leaders. So I thought all of my chickens were coming home to roost, but that was the year that Charles Schwartzel reeled off birdies on the last four holes to win.

“So while I was excited, there was also an air of disappointment because I had been so close to seeing an Aussie win, an Aussie break that drought. It was like, ‘Oh no, the Masters curse continues.’”

The Bathurst bulldog was so unprepared for the prospect of actually playing at Augusta that he was forced to source everything before his round on the Monday morning.

He opted against drowning his sorrow at the near-miss by Scott and Day at Tbonz and was in bed reasonably early awaiting a 7am alarm and a dash to a local golf club to hire clubs, purchase golf clubs and source suitable clothing for the round of a lifetime.

“Every other day as a journalist, you come in through the public entry, which is on another road, but when you have a ticket to Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory, you come up the driveway of Magnolia Lane … and it is like driving to the White House. It is phenomenal,” he said.

“When you win the lottery, you get to use the Champions Locker Room, the place where only Tiger Woods and Jack Nicklaus and Nick Faldo, whoever, are allowed into, so it is an amazing privilege.”

After enjoying a southern breakfast, Linden said, players head to the practice fairway, where their caddie, clubs and a pyramid of 100 balls are waiting.

Waiting at the first tee is the club chairman, who welcomes the players and poses for photographs.

Players still feeling peckish after breakfast or seedy after a later finish at Tbonz can order steak sandwiches or burgers at different stops, while enjoying a beer or two during the round is far from frowned on.

Photographs for social media are a no-go but personal shots are allowed, so too any that might feature in a news article about the experience.

“It is such an experience you want to do everything while you can and it gets to the point where there are a couple of holes with toilets on there and you want to go just to see what they are like. Not surprisingly, even the toilets are magnificent,” Linden said.

“I’m pretty sure it is the 12th, because blokes have been on the course for three hours and they are going to want to have a slash.”

Linden is an occasional golfer and rather than test his ability against the card, he ultimately opted instead to take up the offer from his caddie to play shots from areas where the greats of the game had created memorable Masters moments.

“You get seduced by the beauty of Augusta but it has got teeth that bite you all the time,” he said.

“The first thing that strikes you about the course is how wide the fairways are. Everything about the course is perfectly pristine and gorgeous and wonderful.

“The first fairway, it seems like you can’t miss it. It is as wide as a football field. But it turns out that you can. And because there are a higher number of doglegs than usual, if you slice and go right, you make these holes so much longer than usual.

“We played some shots from famous landmarks … and there are a number of holes there where it is like a mirage. You aim left for it to come back right, even though your eyes are telling you something different. It is very tricky.”

The 18th is also especially challenging, Linden said, and not just because of the test it provides your golf. There is also the sinking realisation that, having loved every aspect of the course, the prospect is very real you will never get the opportunity to play Augusta again.