MOST golfers dream about the kind of tee shot which would lead to a hole-in-one, but in the case of Bob Dillon there's no need to dream.
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While he might play down his efforts, Dillon now has not one ace but a remarkable four hole-in-ones to his credit.
The most recent of them came at the Bathurst Golf Club in late November when his five-iron shot from the 13th tee rolled into cup.
"I've had three others, this is my fourth. It just goes to show there is an awful lot of luck in a hole-in-one because there are a lot of good golfers - many better than me - that have never had a hole-in-one and here am I sitting with four at the twilight of my career playing pretty dreadful golf," he said.
While he'd "played a bit of hacking around golf" prior, it was in 1965 that Dillon first started taking golf seriously.
Some 10 years later at the Griffith Golf Club, Dillon managed his first hole-in-one. After moving to Bathurst he carded his second ace on a new course when, on Sunday, February 3, 1985 his tee shot on the 16th found the mark.
Dillon, who plays off a handicap of 20, aced Bathurst's 13th hole two-and-a-half years ago and in the last Thursday competition of November, luck was again on his side at that hole.
Bathurst's 13th hole is a 158 metres par three with a lake and four bunkers. Dillon felt his tee shot was not "the sort of shot that a good golfer would've hit" but it still did the job.
He and playing partner John Payne watched on as it found the cup.
"A good golfer would have hit the ball beyond the pin with a bit of back spin and run it into the hole that way. Mine was hit out fairly low and it was just long enough and straight enough and it kept running," Dillon said.
"One of my playing mates, John Payne, called it 20 yards from the hole, he said 'This is going to go in'. It looked like it had exactly the right length and exactly the right line.
"He was playing with me before when I had one and he didn't see it, but he was actually watching this time.
"I have a lot of bad luck on other occasions with bad bounces and balls going in unusual places, but I've had some luck with holes in one."
