Pro Furious When Phone Goes Off In His Backswing

There are a few ground rules that all spectators are supposed to follow when they attend a professional golf tournament. Paramount among them is either turning their phones completely off, or at the very least, turning them on silent. 

A spectator did neither during Saturday’s third round at the European Tour’s Afrasia Bank Mauritius Open as S. Chikkarangappa teed off on the par-4 16th hole. The phone went off in Chikkarangappa’s backswing.


Chikkarangappa was none too pleased with the breach of etiquette, whipping his driver against the barriers of the tee box despite piping his drive right down the center of the fairway. Chikkarangappa stared down the offending fan before retrieving his driver and heading down the fairway.

Whether he was rattled or not, Chikkarangappa went on to bogey the hole en route to a third-round score of 1-under par. He bounced back on Sunday, shooting a 5-under par 67 to finish tied for second, two strokes behind Kurt Kitayama.