At last week’s 3M Open, Lucas Glover learned what Paul McCartney discovered almost 60 years ago when he appeared barefoot on the cover of Abbey Road: Take off your shoes in a strange place, and people will talk.
And when enough people talk, they will inevitably lose track of the facts in the system.
In case you missed the wrong chat, let’s take it back.
In Sunday’s final round at TPC Twin Cities, Glover rolled in a birdie putt on the par-4 10th hole, then took off his golf shoes before stepping into the cup to tee off. The move immediately sparked speculation on the Golf Channel and beyond that Glover – an outspoken critic of AimPoint’s green learning method – was making another statement about the controversial process.
He wasn’t there.
On Monday, the former US Open champion took to Instagram to set the record straight.
“Alight, let’s get this straight,” he wrote, before explaining that his shoe moves had nothing to do with AimPoint. Instead, he said, it was because of a complaint he received about wearing braces.
Glover has been a metal-spiked man since he first joined the Tour 23 years ago. Sunday’s round, he said, was the first time he had been contacted about his shoes, during the competition. Stranger still, he noticed that the person who came to him was not a player but an official.
“First of all, it’s not an official place. I wasn’t breaking the law,” Glover wrote. “Secondly, there were people in the groups in front of me and behind me wearing weights.”
Glover described going barefoot as “showing off,” but said it had nothing to do with AimPoint. Rather, he explained, it was his way of approaching the hole without scraping the grass.
To make sure no one missed the message, Glover kept coming back to the same refrain about the 2019 rule change regarding spike marks.
“Did I mention that we can finish them now?”
Actually, he had.
Glover also said he was surprised that someone was linking his actions to AimPoint.
“My demonstration yesterday had nothing to do with AimPoint,” he wrote. “I don’t know how anyone came to this conclusion.”
More than anything, though, Glover said he regrets that the episode became a story at all, especially on a day when 21-year-old Jackson Koivun claimed his first Tour win.
“My biggest disappointment in all of this is that a small group is talking about this, which is not an issue, instead of Jackson Koivun,” Glover wrote.
His description should lay out the theories of AimPoint. But if Glover wants to avoid another round of the same conversation, he might consider doing what John, George and Ringo did Abbey Road and put on his shoes.
