The West Course at Wentworth will host many of the world’s best players for the DP World Tour’s flagship event, the BMW PGA Championship, this week, including World No.3 Rory McIlroy.
However, even though the field is stacked with high-profile players, including many more PGA Tour regulars, any of them would do very well indeed to match the achievement of former world champion boxer Tony Bellew on the first hole of his appearance in Wednesday's BMW PGA Championship Celebrity Pro-Am.
Bellew was grouped with DP World Tour pro Matteo Manassero, TV personality Sam Thompson and actor Gwilym Lee during his round, and it didn’t take him long to make an incredible impression on them and the crowd when he made an albatross with just his second shot of the day on the par five 473-yard first hole.
That inevitably led to wild celebrations, although it’s questionable whether they were quite as magnificent as the moment of brilliance Bellew had just produced. First, he was wrestled by his caddie before he recovered well with a forward roll and a celebratory salute to the crowd, after which he picked up his caddie to embrace him!
Still, it is unlikely that the former British, Commonwealth, European and WBC Cruiserweight Champion Of The World will mind too much about that given what he had just achieved at one of the most renowned courses in the UK. After all, many pros who dedicate their life to the game never achieve an albatross, so for Bellew to do at all - let alone at Wentworth - was quite the feat.
Of course, you don’t get to achieve what Bellew did in the boxing world without serious dedication, and in an interview with Golf Monthly in 2023, the Englishman hinted at how competitive he is, even taking that spirit onto the golf course, when he vowed: “I will not stop until I get a single-figure handicap.”
While it's unclear whether he has reached that target yet, if his moment of magic at Wentworth is anything to go by, his efforts are paying off.
The only question now is, how can any of the professionals teeing it up in the BMW PGA Championship over the coming days possibly top that?
Other famous faces in the Celebrity Pro-Am included former soccer star Gareth Bale, ex-England cricketer Stuart Broad, actor Tom Holland and tennis legend Andy Murray, who played with Robert MacIntyre.
The BMW PGA Championship takes place between 19 and 22 September.
