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Nov. 14,
2003
Hank Kuehne had his best year ever on the PGA Tour this
season, making 14 cuts and earning over $800,000.
But it's fables of his driving prowess for which he's
best known.
The 28-year-old set a PGA Tour record this year for
driving distance at 321.4 yards, beating out perennial long-hitter John
Daly, who improved his distance 7.5 yards from last year when he won the
title.
"I think it's funny to me how interested everybody is,"
said Kuehne, who will play with Jeff Sluman in the Merrill Lynch
Shootout beginning today. "You come out and hit one (and it's like) how far
it'd go?, how far it'd go?, how far it'd go? I think it's fascinating
because it's just the way I play golf. I step up there and I'm trying to
hit the ball down the fairway. I never hit it as hard as I can."
 | | Kuehne, the 1998 U.S. amateur Champion, has four top-10 finishes and more than $800,000 in earnings this year. |
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Kuehne's recent feats include reaching the par-5, sixth
hole, which plays 558 yards tee to green, at Bay Hill Golf Club in Orlando,
reaching a house 320 yards away on top of the uphill driving range in
Castle Pines, Colo.; and driving his ball over the 323-yard, par-4 14th
green in the PGA Championship at Oak Hill Country Club this year.
At Bay Hill, Kuehne was playing with former tour player
Andy Bean and two others. The sixth hole was playing downwind and Kuehne
hit his tee shot about 130 yards short. Keuhne mentioned to Bean that he
thought he could drive over the dogleg left, and cut 200 yards off the
hole, though still leaving the green 350 yards away.
Bean challenged him, so Kuehne told Bean to stay on the
green and he would go back to the tee. Keuhne hit his tee shot over the
lake instead of playing to the fairway that swings around the water.
"He went on the green and I went back to the tee and I
ripped it," Kuehne said. "And he's looking at it and he's looking at it,
he's looking at it, he's looking at it. He's like 'It's not going to get
here, it's not going to get here.'"
Then Bean watched as the ball sailed over his head.
At Castle Pines, home of PGA Tour's The International,
players were trying to hit a house at the end of the driving range. The
range there goes uphill.
"That range, you hit 5-irons on it, and it looks like you
bladed it because it goes so far uphill," he said. "It's 320 to the roof
probably, but that's a really, really long way uphill.
"We were hitting off pencils and everything else, teeing
them up there trying to hit it as high as you can and as far as you can,
getting them up there."
Only Kuehne was able to hit the house.
"I knocked it off the roof, all over the house," he
said.
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