2014 BetEasy Australian Masters: Adam Scott’s eagle Ruffels young feathers

When 16-year-old Ryan Ruffels out-drove Adam Scott, the former Masters champ put him back in his box by making eagle.

If you think the current batch of Australian golfers are doing great things on the world stage, just you wait until the next bunch get a few years older. Among those touted to be the future stars of Australian golf is 16-year-old Victorian Ryan Ruffels – son of former Australian tennis champion Ray Ruffels.

The young Ruffels has played in a number of big golf tournaments including last year’s Australian Open where he finished as the leading amateur. But today he got a taste of the pressures of a big gallery when he was grouped with Adam Scott and Geoff Ogilvy for the opening round of the 2014 BetEasy Australian Masters.

“I felt like I belonged but I was freaking nervous.” Ruffels said after his 3-over par round in blustery conditions. “Yeah, that first tee shot, I was kind of like — it was irons only on the range. I was like, we are not hitting 3-wood yet. I’m shaking like anything.”

As he got more comfortable, Ruffels conceded that he felt good about out-driving Adam Scott on the par-5 sixth hole at Metropolitan Golf Club.

“It’s 370 down there. I don’t know what happened. I was like, if I can’t out-drive him here, I can’t out-drive him at all.” Ruffels said. “That’s as much as I’ve got. We got up there and I was quite a bit past him. I had 104 I think to the flag.”

Ruffels went on to make birdie but Scott, who was obviously aware he had been out-driven by the youngster, had a couple of words to say to Ruffels as they walked off the green.

“Then he eagled the hole, so he’s like, “Just look at the scorecard, Mate.”. That shut me up.” Ruffels said smiling to roars of laughter in the media tent.

As they say; drive for show, putt for dough.

Ruffels is a very likeable kid that is still very much coming to grips with the idea that he may be good enough to compete with the best in future years.

Listen to full Ryan Ruffels interview:

A few more highlights from his post round press conference:

Q. When you roll in the bomb on 17, to get that roar and bit of a fist-pump.
“The fist-pump came out of nowhere. I didn’t mean to do that. It was kind of like, what just happened sort of thing. Yeah, I hit that putt and it was going so fast but I was kind of like, this has to be unlucky to miss the hole. It was on such a good line. It went in, and to hear everybody get behind me a little bit there was awesome. I’ve never heard a roar like that for me before. The fist-pump was out of nowhere. I just laughed.”

“I’m just pretty happy to be out on the golf course. My friends are at school this week and I’m not and I’m playing with Scotty and Geoff. It can’t really be too bad. I guess that’s where my good attitude comes from. I mean, every bogey is still better than every test I’ve got to do back at school.”