5 Things: Golf’s world record, Vijay out of Rio and Lowry gets wed

1 A solution to the slow play dilemma

When push comes to shove the big boys on the European Tour can press the fast forward button and get a move on.

More often than not the Tour puts together some very entertaining pre-tournament videos and this is particularly entertaining, strangely so.

Three quartets from France, Denmark and Spain came together to try and break the Guinness World Record for the fastest hole in the game but the hole must be 500 yards or longer.

The par-5 4^th at Valderrama was the venue and the French quartet of Romain Wattel, Alexander Levy, Gregory Havret and Raphael Jacquelin almost halved the previous best with an incredible effort of 34.8 seconds.

Shot of the day went to Alex ‘Be Good’ Levy. Highly commended goes to Morten Madsen and Thorbjorn Olesen.

You can watch all the high jinks here..

[skylab_video id=”32600″]The Fastest Hole of Golf[/skylab_video]

2 “I would like to play the Olympics, but the Zika virus, you know and all that crap…”

Vijay Singh will not be part of golf’s return to the Olympics. The Fijian had been looking forward to playing but has now had an about turn and won’t be in Rio in August.

His reasoning was odd and a bit jumbled, to say the least. The 43-year-old is eligible for the 60-man field but he told GolfChannel.com that he won’t be going for gold after all. “The timing of it, you know I have to focus over here (on the PGA Tour). I would like to play the Olympics, but the Zika virus, you know and all that crap,” Singh said.

“It wasn’t that difficult . I feel bad, I wanted to play and finally decided against it. It’s in the middle of the Tour over here and I’m trying to figure out my game.”

Miguel Angel Jimenez, who would need something very special to overhaul Sergio Garcia and Rafa Cabrera-Bello, has also pulled out.

3 #hangitupmike

This is a real rarity in the heady world of professional golf. One player ‘calling out’ another which in normal parlance means that they took exception to something that happened and named and shamed them.

South African Dawie van der Walt was the second alternate at Hilton Head but couldn’t get into the 132-man field. Mike Weir was playing on a sponsor’s invite and then withdrew after opening with a 78.

Van der Walt then Tweeted this…

“Gota (sic) love a guy who gets an invite into a Tour event and then WD after the first round #hangitupmike”

Which he then deleted hours later.

Weir did not give any reason for his withdrawal but then Tweeted himself the following day and then cut van der Walt some slack with a message to his new admirer.

The Canadian has now either withdrawn or missed the cut in each of his last 24 starts.

Feel bad about wd yesterday just recovering from bad flu bug that was going around our augusta house! Good luck to all team rbc players!

— Weirsy (@MikeWeir) April 15, 2016

@Dawie1983 everyone makes mistakes…best of luck out there!

— Weirsy (@MikeWeir) April 16, 2016

4 Is Stricker the next Ryder Cup captain?

Steve Stricker will lead the next US Presidents Cup side at Liberty National in 2017.

The American will be taking over from Jay Haas after he led his side to a one-point win in Korea. Nick Price was the losing captain in both 2013 and 2015 and the Zimbabwean will get another go in charge of the International side.

Stricker was an assistant to Haas last year and, while he might not be seen as a natural, motivational leader, he is certainly respected by his peers.

Jim Furyk, who will be one of Davis Love’s assistants at Hazeltine along with Stricker and Tiger Woods, said: “He would be a good potential Ryder Cup captain, as well. The experience is good. The Presidents Cup is now closer to the Ryder Cup in total points.

“You have to sit guys. It creates some difficulties in parings when you have to do that – how to sit folks, how to match up guys, how to make sure that everyone has experience with their partner. It was easier when everyone played. I think that experience will be good, and he has a bunch of experience.”

The Americans lead the overall competition by a ridiculous margin of 9-1-1.

5 Lowry’s big stop-off in Big Apple

Danny Willett wasn’t the only player to enjoy his return from Augusta as Shane Lowry stopped off in New York to get married.

Lowry had his long-term fiancée Wendy Honner caddy for him at the Par 3 and they had been expected to tie the knot later in the year. But their local radio station, and Lowry’s Twitter account, confirmed that things had moved forward.

Lowry will return to action at Quail Hollow on May 5.

???❤️ pic.twitter.com/hmqEwhZPcN

— Shane Lowry (@ShaneLowryGolf) April 13, 2016