There’s Aces, but This One Is a Hole Other Story

Like most golf professionals, teaching pro Mike Malaska has made a few holes in one. But last week at Aliso Creek, Malaska knocked in an ace that was extraordinary.

It came on the 308-yard par-four third hole during a skins game after a tournament to raise money for the Laguna Beach High golf program.

Malaska, who lives in Salt Lake City and works for the Nicklaus/Flick Golf School, used his driver and hit over the trees on the slight dogleg left hole. He didn’t see the ball roll in, but he’ll eventually get to view the shot because it was caught on videotape.

A camera crew from Cox Communications taping the event for a future cable telecast was set up behind the green.

“I haven’t seen the tape yet,” Malaska said, “but I’m told they got the ball in the air, landing, rolling on the green and going into the hole, so they got the whole thing.”

Malaska, 43, who played in the U.S. Open in 1982 and 1986 and the PGA Championship in 1988, thinks it’s a historic tape.

“It was amazing,” he said. “I’ve played a lot of golf and been in a lot of tournaments and watched a lot of golf. I know there have been other holes in one on par fours, but I don’t ever remember seeing or hearing of one caught on tape.

“Most of those things are like fish stories or it’s one of those things where the older you get, the better you were.”

Malaska won a $100 skin for the shot but eventually lost the skins game. Kelly Manos, an assistant professional at Big Canyon, won $1,300 with a birdie on the ninth hole. Gerry James (MacArthur Place), Dave Cook (San Clemente) and Larry Brotherton (Aliso Creek) were the others competing.

The big winner, however, was the Laguna Beach golf team. Brotherton said about $8,000 was raised, helped by a $1,750 auction bid for the ball--autographed and dated--that Malaska pulled out of the cup after his albatross.