Kiwi pro golfer Ryan Fox has reflected on fulfilling a lifelong dream which threatened to be derailed by a serious illness.
The 36-year-old was the first New Zealander in seven years to play at the Masters in the US, but little has been seen of him since.
That's because the Aucklander has been recuperating from a serious illness that started during the tournament — and neither his fans or loved ones realised just how sick he really was.
While the world no. 37 battled it out at the Augusta National golf course in Georgia, he was also fighting pneumonia.
"I woke up the Friday morning of the Masters feeling pretty bad, saw the doctors there and they said I've got some kind of chesty thing going on, had a fever, a pretty bad cough," he told Seven Sharp's Hilary Barry.
"A couple days later, started coughing up blood which I kind of figured was not very good. Came home, got told by a doctor I had pneumonia.
"I thought I was sick — I didn't quite think I was that sick."
The latter half of the last day of the tournament saw his symptoms worsen. Despite his illness, Fox came tantalisingly close to pulling off a hole-in-one.
"The breeze is all over the place that day. My caddy's run to the front of the tee and he's sort of standing there throwing grass up and the wind just dies down.
"I feel like yelling at him, going 'get out of the way, I want to hit now!' but there's too many people to abuse him in front of," he joked.
After his caddy returned, Fox recounted how the wind died down with a slope to the right.
"I had it exactly where I wanted to hit it but I had no idea where it was going to come down and thankfully, it landed in the right place and then the reaction from the crowd was pretty crazy," he said.
His dad and part-time caddy, former All Black Grant Fox, said he's "amazingly proud" of Fox's achievements after nearly 12 years on the professional circuit.
"It's a childhood dream come true for him so to see him achieve that, [Fox's mum] Adele and I could be there to see it, his good mates came — we had a great week," he said.
Grant said they "went with no expectations".
"If he didn't make the weekend, it didn't matter — just getting there is an achievement in itself but he played well, got to the weekend which is a bonus for all of us, his mates had a ball — they just added to the whole occasion.
"It was just a great week."
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