Very cool.  Looks like a great hole on paper, I'm sure the pictures make it greater, and your description helps a lot also.

But again I am troubled.

The course description itself says:

"This par 4 features yet another[/b] downhill, narrow driving lane with severe fairway bunkers right and left."

Bold italics added by me of course.  

Is this repetition somehow part of the greatness?  That is, the intensification of pressure on the golfer as the course goes on - or something like that?

I'm working under the assumption that the course is as truly great as its proponents say.  I just continue to have trouble understanding it, as repetitiveness is usually not a sign of greatness.

Please explain... and bear with me.  

Let me put it another way:

Do you find the 9th and 10th at Pebble to be repetitive?

Ditto Tom

I don't find 9 & 10 Pebble to be repetitive, either, but a simpleton could describe each as long par 4s with the ocean on the right.

As for the rest, I give up.

Tom, the biggest difference between 1 and 10 is that just about anyone can hit it over the hill on 10 and then fairway has some great kicker undulations in it that 1 doesn't have.  The unfortunate part of that is the huge number of divots on the left side of the fairway where many of the balls end up.  The green is more severe than #1 and the bunkers have a big effect that you don't see on #1.

As I mentioned on the thread about Hinkle's tree, this fairway has been narrowed on the left short of the first bunker supposedly to discourage players on 11 from hitting there.  It definitely looks ugly now.

A friend who officiated at the 1994 US Open told me he went out there late on Wednesday that week and saw Vijay chipping dozens of balls from the back left of the green because he knew that is where most shots would end up.

The yardage info:




The overhead:

It is probably the ultimate penal design in that regard.  Even if penal isn't your style, I think you have to admire the ultimate version of it.


Now THAT I can understand - that resonates with me.  That's kinda how I thought about Oakmont all along.

But I thought George didn't accept this; or at least said the "ultimate penal" description did the course an injustice, sold it short, etc.

And that's why I am having difficulty understanding WHY it rises to greatness - and remember I do accept that it does.

Ultimate penal - combined with the history/tradition, fun shots to be played, never going over the top in terms of stupid penalty shots, etc. - that works for me.

Can we just leave it at that?

Bogey was the target score in early golf.  

It tended to be equal to today's par on easier holes and one over par on harder ones.  Eventually it came to have its current definition.

Read: http://www.scottishgolfhistory.net/bogey_par.htm

Tom H,

I am with you on this.  I understand the ultimate in penal golf idea and can see how that is 100% correct thus far.  I am still trying to see how it is anything beyond that.  

I was reading JVBs comments and something popped into my head.  Of all the courses that Perry Maxwell ever saw in his life, and he toured most of the country at least a couple of times over, Oakmont is the only course I can find him saying anything negative about.  He felt it was way over the top and was an example of what golf in America should not be about.  Tons of bunkers and ever-increasing costs.  

Personally, it looks to me like the poster child of what the USGA has dictated to the public what championship golf is all about.  Just with some wonderful green complexes thrown in for good measure.

George,

Please continue the series.  I think 11 might be a watershed hole as it doesn't seem to have the same bunkering scheme as most of the other holes thus far.  I am learning a lot about a course that I think is one of the true gems of American golf architecture.  It should be treasured for what it is and perhaps just accepted that way.

TomH and Chris:

I can certainly understand why you guys are struggling to understand why Oakmont is such a great golf course when it is so often described as "penal", a course with constant bunkering or hazards on either side of not particularly wide fairway corridors etc throughout.

Well, in my opinion, and to be very honest, part of the reason you may not be able to understand it is that most everyone who participates on here has become completely conditioned at this point to assume a golf course that is designed this way and described this way can NOT possibly be a world class course and world class architecture.

In  a word that is just not so. A course that penal in that way can be great and Oakmont proves it. People on here really do need to rethink some of the almost Pavlovian responses they have to certain words and certain architectural ideas, and if any thing is proof of that fact, it's Oakmont.

There's no reason to make excuses about it or rationalize it---it can be really penal on either side, not everywhere but in surely enough places to get your serious attention.

I've said many times on here that Oakmont may be the most "center directed" course strategically I've ever seen, although in many ways some of the holes of both Royal Port Rush and County Down remind me that way of Oakmont.

in my opinion, the basic strategy for really good players is to simply pick as much club on the tees as you can stand and you think you can keep on those fairways some of which actually filter the ball right into bunkers positioned topographically to receive them.

That's the theme of Oakmont, that's the essence of its over-all strategy---eg what is the longest club you feel you can hit accurately? The course is the ultimate in "distance options" not "directional options"!

So forget about the standard refrain on here that a "penal" or strategically "center directed" golf course can never be great. Oakmont proves it's possible and has always proved that.

Sure great players have complained about its excessive difficulty such as Jones and many others and Chris mentioned Maxwell too.

Fownes was a total "difficulty" freak, but so was Leeds at Myopia and Crump at Pine Valley and probably even Macdonald at NGLA, and they didn't do too bad with those courses.

The point I'm trying to make is that it is certainly possible to have a great course, great golf architecture that is excessively penal and almost frightfully difficult "center directed" strategically with choices that are basically only "distance options" and Oakmont is one of those. Maybe a course like Carnoustie is too, that seems to be its reputation.

I have no doubt at all that if either of you could actually see it and play it you'd understand.

This was always meant to be one of those super "shot-testing" golf courses and designs. There never were 2-3 different optional routes on that course to get to the same place, you pretty much always had to suck it up and hit as much as you dared as straight down the middle as you possibly could or pay a potentially high price.

Oakmont is a perfect example of the "Big World" theory---eg there needs to be different things out there for different purposes.

As to this extreme "center directedness" and basically only "distance options" off the tee, hole #10 just may be the most interesting of them all. If you could see the variations in the fairway topography as you proceed along it you'd understand why.

Again, as long as this golf course will be in the US Open in June, if the course is really firm and fast and running I think you will see a repeat of Wood's Hoylake "whole tournament" tee shot strategy. I think if he played a long iron off the par 4s and par 5s for 72 holes as accurately as he did at Hoylake he'll win here too.

 

TEP:

Many thanks, that says a lot. Just do understand a couple things:

I've made it very clear I believe it's great and I am having no pavlovian responses to any words.  I said right on here that if it's the ultimate penal, that's fine by me.  And it's not the "penal" aspect that is making me ask questions, but the repetitive nature of the hazards.  I do NOT know the course - never seen it, never studied it - I am taking pretty much all I know from seeing it on TV over the years, and George's series of threads here.  These threads do seem to indicate a repetitive aspect of the course - narrow landing areas, pinched on both sides by severe bunkers.  I believe I understand better from your post why the course succeeds to greatness even in the face of this repetitive nature - but just do understand that THAT is what I was asking about - I was making no complaints about penal golf courses either generally or this one specifically.

So thanks for the response - that is very helpful.  Just do be careful casting these apersions.  

TEP:

Very cool - very fair answer.  So the course really ISN'T repetitive.

But bear with me from 3000 miles away with no ability to travel... these drawings and pictures and what I see on TV are all I have.  Thus my reliance on you locals.