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Tim Harford explains the numbers and statistics in the news and in life

Tim Harford explains the numbers and statistics in the news and in life.

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More or Less: Just How Rare is a Hole-in-One?

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06/01/2018 GMT

Just How Rare is a Hole-in-One?

BBC World Service - More or Less, Just How Rare is a Hole-in-One?

Why it is not as simple to work out as you think

Why it is not as simple to work out as you think.

There are golfers who could go an entire lifetime without getting a hole-in-one. Even in the professional game they are unusual. Recently the BBC reported a pair of amateur players who each scored one - one after the other. It was reported widely that there was a 1 in 17 million chance of this happening. 

We speak to maths writer, Rob Eastaway, who explains the difficulties of trying to work out the chances. If you consider the number of people playing thousands of rounds, perhaps it is not so surprising that someone will achieve one. But on the other hand – it is not like a lottery where there is an equal chance of scoring a hole-in-one with each stroke. This ambiguity leads us to tell the story of the Hole-in-One gambling gang who used maths to beat the betting industry.

(Photo: Man playing golf / Credit: Shutterstock Image)

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