HILTON HEAD ISLAND, S.C. (AP) – Most golfers go their entire lives without hitting a hole in one.
But Ralph Dupps, 75, remembers that his old football coach always said, “Even a blind hog can find an acorn every once in a while.”
Dupps, known to his friends as “Dupper,” felt the joy of that rare sports moment last week in a feat made more extraordinary because macular degeneration has robbed him of most of his vision.
Only 1-2% of golfers make a hole in one each year, according to the National Hole-In-One Registry, and the chances of that happening for an “average-skilled” player are about 1 in 12,000.
The retiree from Tennessee has lived in Sea Pines on Hilton Head Island for 31 years, he said, but has been visiting the area with his wife since 1964. When he’s not golfing – a sport he took up as a child because golfing was a “family thing” – he likes to fish. For 50 years, he also enjoyed hunting and flying planes.