Stenson has a close brush with spectators

dubai — Henrik Stenson may enjoy the luxury of being the Race of Dubai leader and may be sitting comfortably, safe in the knowledge that his nearest contenders are nowhere near the top of the leaderboard.

But the Swede endured some awkward moments, a bit weird really, on the second day of the DP World Tour Championship at the Jumeirah Golf Estates on Friday. A previous winner of the Championship as well as the Race to Dubai, Stenson had a couple of ‘close encounters’ with two spectators at the Earth Course.

After a par round on Thursday, Stenson was trying to make up lost ground when his golf ball was picked up by a spectator on the par-5 Hole 2.

The world No.4 was quite rightly miffed but brushed it aside and carried on with his job. “I don’t know if it was a marshal or who it was. But we hit it right on 2 there, short right of the green, and then we heard someone pick it up,” said Stenson.

“So I don’t know why anyone that enters a golf tournament is picking up a golf ball inside the ropes. That seems a bit weird to me. But it happens, unfortunately. I had to call for a ruling and then we estimate where it was supposed to be and dropped it there and on we go,” he added.

But there was more to come later, ironically enough, involving his 45.93-gram Titleist Pro V1 golf ball.

After knocking off back-toback birdies on the third and fourth, Stenson went on to bogey the 12th. He needed to keep it all together but Stenson drilled his shot into a lady spectator.

Stenson was shocked by what had happened but later learnt that she was fine, after being attended to by paramedics, on hand at the Course.

Nonetheless, the 40-year-old was truly apologetic and said that he would make it up to her. He was also surprised to learn that the woman in question kept saying that he was her favourite golfer.