Humans can naturally be a bit mischievous.
And such is the case with even the Apollo 14 astronauts, who smuggled the head of a
six iron to the moon in one of their utility pockets to have a quick game of golf, much
to the amusement of the TV audience watching the moon landing live at their homes.
The Guinness world record for the longest golf drive stands at 515 yards, hit by Mike
Austin.
Unofficially, the longest drive hit in a pro tournament goes to Carl Cooper at 787 yards,
whose shot hit a downward running concrete path and took off, taking lots of fortuitous
bounces before finally coming to a rest.
But let’s have a look at the longest golf drive perhaps ever, by Alan Shepard, who coincidentally
is also the first American in space.
Alan Shepard takes four shots in all.
The first shot doesn’t have such a good connection, and instead gets a lot of rubble.
The second shot is a slice, the ball rolling a few feet away from him.
He retrieves the ball and hits it again.
It goes a little bit further, but still not very far.
He then drops his third a final ball, and this time makes a good connection, sending
it “miles and miles” as he said.
Chances are it didn’t go miles, but estimates have suggested that a good connection with
the ball, combined with the moon’s low gravity and no atmosphere, the ball would have been
sent one mile, or 1760 yards!
Should he have had a more mobile spacesuit, a double handed swing would likely have been
able to achieve over two miles!
And that’s not all they did, Edgar Mitchell, the other astronaut, threw a makeshift javelin.
Upon reaching the Lunar Module, they took a photo of the crater that the javelin and
one of the golf balls landed in.
To me, I think it’s good to see a bit of childlike curiosity even on super serious
missions like the moon landings.
So, there you have it!
The unofficial longest golf drive ever… happened on the moon of course.
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