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Aces are high for this guy Using an unorthodox swing, Rogue River resident Ed Irvine has recorded 17 holes-in-one By TIM TROWER GRANTS PASS - The Ed justifies the swings. Yes, you read correctly. The means by which Ed Irvine, a golfer, gets from the tee box to the cup is overshadowed only by the end result - a lot of holes-in-one. Irvine, a 76-year-old retired machinist who lives in Rogue River, has 17 aces. He's gotten them using a swing of such economy and efficiency that onlookers alternately wonder how he achieves success with that swing, then decide that swing is precisely the reason. Irvine's most recent ace, his third in about seven months, came March 19 on the eighth hole at Red Mountain Golf Course. Playing 77 yards to an elevated green that seems no bigger than a manhole cover, he made his 12th hole-in-one at the par-3, nine-hole tract. As often happens with him, a missive from the course hailing the feat could not avoid mention of that "famous yet unorthodox" swing. Later, in a phone call to his home, Irvine's bride of 57 years, Flo, chimes in that her husband has been a natural since taking up the game in 1965. Their new son-in-law gave him a lesson, and Irvine promptly beat him the first time they went out. "He started right out golfing like that," says Flo, who has two holes-in-one to her credit. "He can't seem to turn back farther. I go all the way back, but he doesn't." A couple days later, as Irvine prepared to play a round at Red Mountain, a group comes upon him. "Mr. Ed, Mr. Ed," a woman queries. "Is it 17 or 18 now?" Then, turning to Irvine's companions and without prompting, she exclaims, "I don't know how he does it. He doesn't even take a full swing!" To all of this, Irvine shrugs. He wonders about the fuss over his swing and offers that he's "been lucky" to make so many aces. To be brief, which is the only way to describe Irvine's swing, it's like a finger poke to the chest: short, punchy, gets your attention. Some people take bigger backswings with their forks and are only slightly more accurate. Just when the swing seems to be gaining steam, it reaches its vertex about shoulder height and heads the other direction. It's a Type A swing in a Type B game. HOLES-IN-ONE by the numbers 39.76 Average age of a hole-in-one golfer. 14.48 Average handicap of hole-in-one golfer. 16.76 Number of years playing golf. 73, 27 Percent of hole-in-one golfers by male and female. 85.35 Percent of golfers who register first hole-in-one. Saturday Day most holes-in-one occur. Wednesday Day least least holes-in-one occur. June 9, 2001 Date most aces occurred. 150.31 Average yardage of aced hole. 7 iron Club most often used. - From holeinone.com "He doesn't really wind up," says course owner Brad Vandehey. "It's a very short, consistent backswing. He punches the ball and puts spin on it and it stops right around the hole. It's amazing how many holes-in-one he's had, but he's around the hole about 50 percent of the time." What better way is there to make history repeat than with a repeatable swing? There are drawbacks, of course. After his 16th ace, he sent family members copies of a story about it in the paper. No sooner had relatives opened their mail than the phone rang. "I had to call and tell them, 'That story's obsolete. I just got another one,'" he laughs. Too many more and he may have to build an annex to his home. He has four plaques, nine ball-holders and many newspaper clippings chronicling his holes-in-one, from the very first ones at municipal courses in Kenosha, Wis., where he lived much of his life, to the most recent. "I have a small corner of the living room for them," he says. "Well, not that small." Two of them happened in Kenosha. After retiring in 1984 and moving here - Flo is from California - in 1987, he notched two at Illinois Valley in Cave Junction, one at Laurel Hill in Gold Hill and the Red Mountain dozen. Irvine plays mostly par-3 courses these days, which increases his opportunities for holes-in-one. That said, it should be noted that hitting the relatively small, horizontally challenged Red Mountain greens - let alone holing out - presents a test that would be appropriate in a carnival booth. When he does venture to larger courses, Irvine holds his own, having shot 77, 78 and 80 his last three visits to Dutcher Creek here. That Irvine would have stories written about him and his golf game is a bit ironic, given he and Flo's perception of the game years ago. They worked four-day weeks, 10 hours a day at the same machine shop in Kenosha. "We thought it was kind of stupid," Flo says of golf. "We'd drive by and see people chasing those little white balls. It seemed odd to us, but several years later, we tried it and we liked it." They were playing together when Ed recorded his first ace in the mid-70s at Washington Park Municipal in Kenosha. "I'll never forget that shot," he says, noting that the fifth hole, which his group was on, paralleled the sixth hole. "I had just hit my shot on No. 5, when somebody on No. 6 hit and yelled, 'FOUR!' "The ball was coming in our direction and we all ducked. We never knew what happened to my ball until we got to the green and it was in the hole." His group trudged down a valley, then up to its green. Once there, says Flo, "The people on six, they yelled out, 'It's in the hole! It's in the hole!'" Sure enough. Most of the aces don't stand out, says Irvine, other than they're aces. "A hole-in-one is pretty exciting in itself," he says. There were witnesses to 16 of the 17, says Irvine, and even on the exception, there was a group behind him that apparently saw him pick the ball out of the hole. Is Irvine done getting aces? It doesn't sound like it. "I'm looking forward to Nos. 18, 19 and 20," he says. His hurry-up swing could get him there quickly. Reach sports editor Tim Trower at 776-4479, or e-mail [email protected] Mail Tribune Home | Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. | Dow Jones & Co., Inc. | Privacy | Contact Us Copyright � 2001 Mail Tribune, Inc.