In golf

Golf

Golf is a precision club and ball sport, in which competing players use many types of clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a golf course using the fewest number of strokes....

, a hole in one or hole-in-one (also known as an ace, mostly in American English

American English

American English is a set of dialects of the English language used mostly in the United States. Approximately two-thirds of the world's native speakers of English live in the United States....

) is when a player hits the ball directly from the tee

Teeing ground

In golf, the teeing ground is the area at the beginning of a hole from which the player's first stroke is taken. When referring to the area, the terms "tee", "tee box", and "teeing ground" are often used interchangeably....

 into the cup with one shot. This is most possible on a par

Par (score)

The word "par" is a term in the game of golf used to denote the pre-determined number of strokes that a scratch golfer should require to complete a hole, a round , or a tournament...

 3 hole. Longer hitters have accomplished this feat on shorter par 4 holes. Nearly all par 4 and par 5 holes are too long for golfers to reach in a single shot; a hole in two on a par five (or a hole in one on a par 4) is known as an albatross, and is significantly rarer than a hole in one on a par 3.

Holes in one are extremely rare, and while it depends largely on the golfer's skill, there is often also a great element of luck involved, although skill definitely increases the probability.

Occasionally special events host a hole-in-one contest, where prizes as expensive as a new car, or cash awards sometimes reaching $4 million are offered if a contestant records a hole-in-one.