Charley Hull in the first round of the women’s Olympic golf event.
Getty Images
Earlier this year, English golfer Charley Hull has gone viral less for its capacity than for its relativity.
Hull’s moment of internet glory came in late May, when This media shared images She signed autographs at the U.S. Women’s Open with a half-smoked cigarette pinched between her lips. The idea of a professional golfer casually shooting a dart during one of the biggest tournaments of the year has proven irresistible to golf viewers and beyond, as indicated not only by the millions of views the video has racked up on Instagram and X, but also by the clip’s widespread media coverage. A GQ title“Charley Hull smoked cigarettes throughout the US Open.”
But what gets overshadowed by all the buzz about Hull’s appeal as one of us is that she played well that week in Lancaster, Pennsylvania (a final-round 67 propelled her into the top 20), as she has for most of the season. A month after the U.S. Open, Hull, 28, tied for 16th at the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship at Sahalee, a wooded spot east of Seattle. A week later, she teamed up with one of her best friends and fellow Brits, Georgia Hall, at the Dow Championship, an LPGA team event in Michigan. (This came just days after Hall and Hull were confirmed as part of the team that would represent Britain at the Paris Olympics.) The girls’ good spirits translated into good scores, with the Brits finishing joint fifth. Hull was in fine form.
Then… she stumbled.
Literally.
After the Dow, Hull was scheduled to play the following week in an Aramco Series tournament at home in England. Hours before flying to London, she slipped getting out of the shower and thought she had torn something in her right shoulder. Hull tried to play through the pain at the Aramco, but after only six holes, she retired. An MRI showed no evidence of a tear, but she had arthritis in her shoulder joint. A week later, Hull played in the LPGA’s fourth major of the year, the Evian Championship in France. After two up-and-down first rounds (79-69), she missed the cut by six points. Needing rest, Hull took about 10 days off, then resumed training for what would be her second appearance in the tournament. Olympic Games.
At her pre-tournament press conference in Paris on Tuesday, Hull was not asked about her shoulder. But one reporter inquired about Hull’s unexpected social media outburst and asked if she was comfortable being “famous” for her smoking.
“I haven’t been on Instagram in four or five months,” Hull said. “I just let my agent handle it. I’m just focusing on my golf and spending time with Georgia off the course.”
Here’s how the rest of that exchange went:
Do you smoke on the course?
Yes, I smoke on the course. It’s a habit, but I won’t do it this week. Yes, it’s just something I do.
Why don’t you do it this week?
I don’t think you have the right.
It’s true ?
Yeah.
Will this affect you? Will this help you?
Yes, I think so. Because it relaxes me a little. But that’s how it is.
Hull was right about smoking ban, official says 2024 Olympics Spectator Information GuideSmoking is banned at Olympic venues — including Le Golf National — except in designated smoking areas. (The list of other Olympians affected by this rule is short, but it’s not nonexistent. Ask Shoko Miyata, the top women’s gymnast and captain of the Japanese team, who was kicked off the Japanese team last month over allegations of underage smoking, which violated the federation’s code of conduct.)
How a cigarette turned Charley Hull into a cult heroine at the US Women’s Open
Zephyr Melton
The most interesting question Hull was interested in was whether her inability to smoke would impact her game, as she thought it would. Hull didn’t start smoking because she thought it might give her a competitive advantage. She said at the US Women’s Open She picked up the habit last year to kick another vice: vaping. “Even though smoking isn’t better than vaping, it’s just that you can vape inside all the time,” she said. “I figured if I was going to smoke, I’d go outside and smoke a cigarette.” Soon, smoking became a regular part of the routine on the Hull course.
But not this week in Paris, where Hull’s quest for gold began at 9:44 a.m. local time on Wednesday alongside Australia’s Hannah Green and American star Rose Zhang.
If Hull was hoping for a smooth start, she picked the wrong course. Narrow and waterfront, Le Golf National exposes poor ball-striking with ruthless efficiency. As Viktor Hovland said last week, “If you’re struggling, it’s going to kick your butt.”
Hull woke up on her first swing, a tee shot that hit the lake left of the first fairway, leading to a double bogey on No. 6. She calmed down with pars on the next four holes, but then made bogeys on Nos. 6, 7 and 9 to turn in 41. Four more bogeys followed on Nos. 10, 11, 13 and 17 for a 40 over the last nine and a nine-over 81 at the start, which left her third from last in the field of 60 players. Hull was unsteady throughout her bag, but in terms of strokes gained, nothing cost her more than her short game and putting; in both categories, she finished last in the field.
“I feel a little rusty,” she said afterwards, adding that she had found herself in bad positions too often. “I hope I can shoot nine under tomorrow.”
As for the lack of nicotine, had it bothered her as she thought it would?
“No, not at all,” Hull said. “It’s just because I was injured. I don’t think a lot of people realize that I sat out the Aramco Tag Team Series, and I took about 10 days off and had an MRI and everything. I think that’s 100 percent the reason. Not because of the smoking.”
She also said she tends to struggle on courses without trees, due to the lack of aiming points.
Whatever the cause of Hull’s poor form, she said her overriding emotion coming off the course was frustration. “I wish I hadn’t showered before my flight now,” she said. “It really pissed me off.”
But she is also confident that now that she knows the course better, she will show improvement on Thursday.
“This year I felt like I had a really good season, really consistent, I had some top 20s, a few top 10s and I was really focused,” she said. “When I get injured it makes me lose confidence, not in the way I play, but mostly mentally. But I feel like after a few rounds I’ll be back.”
