Wise able to complete his round despite being struck on head by wayward drive
Aaron Wise was struck in the head by a wayward drive from Cameron Smith as he bent over to look at his ball on the seventh fairway.
The American, who still had three holes to complete having teed off on the 10th, admitted there was “ringing in my head” after the incident, which saw the ball bounce off his cap and continue another 50 yards down the fairway.
He went on to card a 72 and ended his second round at one-over par. Smith, who shouted “fore”, had been driving from the adjacent second hole.
“I was walking down seven, surprised my ball was in the fairway, and then next thing you know, I mean there’s a little bit of ringing in my head,” Wise said. “I was down on the fairway. But you know, that happened for maybe 20 seconds, and I was pretty normal after that.”
Wise went on to par the hole and last night looked well within the cut mark. “I had a great up and down on seven and eight,” he said. “You know, obviously, there’s a lot of adrenaline in the body after something like that happens. I was just trying to calm myself down and get back to being somewhat normal for the last few holes.”
Wise was pictured holding a water bottle to his head on the course and was later seen with an ice pack in the scorer’s tent.
“Thankfully, he’s fine,” Joel Dahmen, his playing partner, said. “It was a glancing blow, but the ball took off another 40 or 50 yards down the fairway. It ended up in the rough. You could hear it. All the spectators heard it. It was loud.”
Dahmen was adamant that Smith was not to blame. “It was so far away, and there’s so many people and the wind is blowing,” the American added.
“You’re not going to be able to hear it if anyone says ‘fore’. I don’t fault Cam for that at all. One hundred people could have yelled ‘fore’, and you wouldn’t hear it.”