PGA pro Ben Griffin had an explanation for his rollercoaster round on Sunday during the 2025 BMW Championship. But it’s not one you would have ever expected.
Griffin started his final round at Caves Valley Golf Club in Owings Mills, Maryland, with a four-putt from 4 feet for triple bogey, a drive out of bounds that resulted in a double bogey, and a bogey at the third. He was 6 over for the day but he battled back to shoot 1-under 69.
Griffin scored a seven on the par-4 first hole and a six on the par-4 second. He then salvaged a bogey on the third hole. He was able to lock in and record seven birdies on the final 15 holes to put together a final round 69.
Griffin was 3-under par for the tournament and finished tied for 12th with Rory McIlroy and Harris English in the tournament. Scottie Scheffler won the BMW Championship with a 15-under – two strokes better than Robert MacIntyre and four better than Maverick McNealy.
He said a dose of the supplement creatine was to blame.
Specifically, Griffin said that he filled up his water bottle with a “snowball” of creatine and when he took a sip from the bottle he swallowed a massive chunk, and “overdosed” which threw off his game.
“I didn’t take it until I basically tee’d off on 1. I was at the end of my batch. I had basically a snowball of creatine, so had been in my bucket for a month, and broke it up and put in any water bottle. I’m all good. I’ve taken it on the golf course before. It’s fine,” he said. “I started taking it after my second shot and I accidentally swallowed one of the big rocks in my water bottle.”
Griffin said he was shaking and considered withdrawing from the tournament.
“I’ve never overdosed on creatine before, but I think I did in the moment because I didn’t really drink any water after that,” Griffin said. “I basically just inhaled a snowball. So I started getting super shaky. I’ve never felt like that before and I felt like I had tremors.”
“I four-putted 1 and on 2 I like was freaking out and didn’t know what to do. Like I hit it so far out of bounds.”
His caddie stepped in and forced him to chug an entire bottle of water and reset. By the time he got to the fifth tee, he told his caddie, “all right, let’s get it back to even.”
Griffin reeled off three straight birdies starting at No. 7, and four more on the back nine, including a 55-footer at 17. He finished T-12 at 3-under.
“I’m very proud of the way I bounced back,” he said.
The North Carolina native has two PGA Tour wins in his career – both coming this season. He won the Zurich Classic of New Orleans with Andrew Novak and the Charles Schwab Challenge.