Last week’s Charles Schwab Challenge marked the end of a 13-week-long hiatus on the PGA Tour. Aside from the most obvious peculiarity of the tournament — the striking absence of fans lining the course and in the grandstands — the players and caddies were also subjected for the first time to an unusual procedure: rigorous Covid-19 testing.
The process, which is in place again this week at the RBC Heritage, in Hilton Head, S.C. (and beyond), begins with a temperature check. If cleared, the players and caddies then move on to Covid-19 testing, where a six-inch-long nasopharyngeal swab is inserted into their nasal cavity for 15 seconds, and subsequently sent to a laboratory for processing.
If either a player or caddie were to fail the test, they would not be permitted to participate in the tournament and immediately sent home.
In a video posted to his Twitter and Instagram feeds, Ian Poulter illuminated what the swab portion of the testing looks like in action. The video — which has nearly 400,000 views on Twitter — shows the Englishman reacting to the swab with pained face-rubbing, foot-stomping, vigorous head-scratching, before concluding with 10 slaps to the side of his head and a hearty laugh.
Poulter posted: “Have you ever wondered what Corona Virus testing in sport looks like…bet you don’t want to know what it feels like!”
“I’d like to call that the sweet spot,” the tester told Poulter from offscreen after removing the swab.
“Ah, no, you got the money spot … you got it,” was all Poulter could muster in response.
For the second straight tournament, the PGA Tour reported no positive coronavirus test results among attendees of the events. According to Bob Harig of ESPN, the Tour has administered a total of 954 tests between Colonial and Harbour Town.
TWITTER REACTIONS
The video of Poulter having a coronavirus test quickly spread on Twitter, with over 1700 retweets and 10,000 likes. Hundreds of people commented on the tweet, so check out some of the replies below, or click the original video to see more.
“No thanks” Clearly done by a Spurs fan,” said Lee Westwood.
“Is that covid or brain test, defo negative on the latter.”
“Had to go through it back in April. The test was worse than the virus.”
“I think I’d prefer you to drive a ball into my nuts from 10 metres away.”
“Had it done a couple of times now, horrible, horrible test…”
“Had to have it for a medical test, best description is putting hot sauce on a Q-tip and trying to reach your brain. Was 10 minutes before I could see through the tears and drive away (drive up testing site).”
This is nothing compared to the sinus surgery I had in the mid 90s. The doctor told me I would not want to do anything for a week. The worst part was four days after the operation when the doctor extracted the ribbons of gauze from both nostrils. It felt like my eyeballs were being pulled out through my nose. I had a second surgery several years ago with a much improved process. I think this Covid-19 test is similar to what happens in my semi-annual checkups — not fun.
It’s exactly the test the rest of us had to endure to find out our status
All of us go through that same test. Yours is especially painful such as to warrant a video on it?