OWINGS MILLS, Md. – Taking creatine is part of Ben Griffin’s daily pre-round routine. But what happened to Griffin on Sunday of the BMW Championship is far from normal.

Griffin revealed after his final round that he accidentally swallowed a large “rock” of creatine just moments after teeing off, which caused him to become super shaky and led to his disastrous start to the final round. Griffin was 6-over once the effects began to wear off after three holes. He played the final 15 holes in 7-under to shoot a miraculous round of 69 and finish tied for 12th.

How did it all happen? Let Griffin explain.

“I've taken it on the golf course before. It's fine," Griffin said. "I started taking it after my second shot, and I accidentally swallowed one of the big rocks in my water bottle. 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. 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 (No.) 1 and on (No.) 2, I was like freaking out and didn't know what to do. Like, I hit it so far out of bounds.

“Luckily, my caddie stepped in and made me chug a whole water and tried to calm down a little bit,” Griffin continued. “I hit the other one in play, and then I was fine. I ended up making, whatever, a double on that hole and bogeyed the next hole. It was probably more just a little bit flustered. I was fine after the second shot on two. And then it was — I felt good so I went about my day and got it back to under par. But, yeah, pretty crazy story. I don't think I'll be taking too much creatine in the future. I will take it, but not in the amount that I probably did on the golf course, which wasn't probably a healthy amount.”

Griffin said the thought of withdrawing crossed his mind as he felt the symptoms. Griffin said he normally takes 15mg of creatine daily and that the rock alone was likely more than 15mg, which he swallowed whole and didn’t wash down with water. Griffin four-putted the first hole and made triple bogey and then double bogey on the second hole after hitting his tee shot out of bounds.

Griffin spent an extra minute on the third tee box to compose himself before opting to continue his round. He went on to bogey the hole, but he set a goal from there: Get back to even-par.

How about one better? Griffin made three straight birdies to close his front nine, added another at the par-3 13th, then rattled off three more from Nos. 15-17, the last of which put him under par for the day.

“I was physically shaking like I've never felt before,” Griffin said. “And I don't normally miss a lot of short putts. It was really a weird situation. I'm very proud of the way I bounced back. I told (my caddie) on four, I'm going to get back to even par and got back to under par. Pretty cool. Pretty proud of myself. Excited to go to the TOUR Championship.”

Griffin had an outside chance of automatically qualifying for a Ryder Cup spot with a great round on Sunday. Griffin believed he needed to shoot 8-under 62 to do it. He “basically did that on the last 15,” but instead will have to rely on a captain’s pick from Keegan Bradley.

“You got to do better on the first few,” Griffin said. “Lesson learned.”