… by Fatiha Betscher at Albany in the Bahamas 

The Open Championship winning par of Henrik Stenson and Jordan Spieth were hit with a hardly ever heard before penalty on the final day of the 2021 Hero World Challenge in the Bahamas.

Both players were out in the last group and ended the week each failing to break 70 over the four rounds with Stenson ending 19th and Spieth 20th and in last place on the Albany course

Stenson was this week’s defending champion and finished with a one-over par tally while Spieth, also a past winner, got worst with each day including weekend scores of 75 and 76.

And the duo found themselves being penalised for remarkably playing off the wrong tee at the par-5 ninth hole and each walking off with double-bogey ‘7s’.

The Open Championship winning duo of Henrik Stenson and Jordan Spieth slapped with a bizarre penalty on day four of the 2021 Hero World Challenge

“I’m still not sure which way we played it, but yeah, Jordan and I kept our heads down after finishing out on hole No. 8 and walked to the 9th tee box that we did on Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and put the ball down and hit some beautiful tee shots,” said Stenson.

“Then when we went down to the hole, went down to the balls. The rules official said, did you hit off the right tee box? And we’re like, well, yeah, kind of — and then we looked back and we saw that there was another one forward and left.

“So obviously they switched things around and put 17 on the 9th tee box today and 9 was in a different place and we didn’t pay attention being first out and just motoring along.

“Yes, it was just go back and reload. It was only two shots each, so it wasn’t a big deal. Then we just kind of carried on from there”.

Spieth was just as surprised to be slapped with a penalty.

“I actually didn’t think we were going to get penalized because it’s a charity event, but then I realized there’s world ranking involved and all that,” said Spieth.

“I think the frustrating part for us now is that every other group’s going to be — they’re making sure to tell them, but for us they didn’t. It obviously didn’t matter for us, which is fortunate I think for those guys”.