Paige Spiranac has spoken out after she was accused of cheating in the Internet Invitational golf tournament, where a bunch of influencers competed in the event with a $1 million prize.
In the end, the 48 players were whittled down to a team of Spiranac, Frankie Borelli of Barstool Sports and Good Good Golf's Malosi Togisala going up against Francis Ellis and Cody ‘Beef’ Franke of Barstool Sports and Brad Dalke from Good Good Golf.
However, on the ninth hole, as Togisala was getting ready to take a shot from the rough, others pointed out that Paige was stepping on some long grass in front of the ball.
For clarity, the rules of golf say that you must not 'move, bend or break any growing or attached natural object' on the course.
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The other players brought this up to Spiranac, who said, 'I thought you could do that, I didn't realise you couldn't do that' and pointed out that she didn't move the ball, with her insisting, 'I wasn't trying to cheat' and breaking down in tears.
In the end, the other team won the event anyway, but Paige has now spoken out to say that in the aftermath, she had received 'the worst hate I’ve ever received in the 10 years of me doing this'.
She said on her Instagram Story that she had received 'tens of thousands of death threats' which included 'people telling me to kill myself' and 'the most vile, horrendous stuff' which she could have sought a restraining order over.
Paige said she'd taken a break from social media for a few days and didn't speak about it until answering questions through her Instagram stories, explaining that she 'just needed to remove myself for my mental health'.
As for the accusations of cheating, she said: "I would never intentionally cheat," adding that she was 'painfully, painfully embarrassed that I did not know this rule'.
"In all of my years of playing golf, I have never been accused of cheating," she said. "I went to identify the golf ball, and when I did, I pushed some grass to the side, and then, a couple of feet back, I pushed some grass aside. I never stomped down the grass. And I thought high grass was a loose impediment.
"If the ball didn't move, if the lie didn't change, the grass didn't bend or break, or get ripped out of the ground, then it was totally within the rules.
"There were so many cameras on me. There were so many people around me. I mean, to blatantly cheat with that many people around, that many cameras around would be insane.
"So I made a mistake, I learned now it was was a rules infraction, and I'll never do it again."
She also thanked the people who'd been in touch to see how she was doing, telling them, 'all the support really means so much to me'.
Topics: Golf, Mental Health, Sport, Viral
Joe Harker