What are our “Long Hitters” favorite Courses?

[Pete Lavallee]

OK, lets call a “Long Hitter” someone who drives it 270 and can hit a 150 yard PW and a 200 yard 5 iron. We must have quite a few here on GCA. What are your Top 10 favorite courses. Does a course need to challenge your distance to get high marks?

[Tom_Doak]

Pete:


Great question!


I don't qualify but I look forward to hearing the responses.


Brooks Koepka's favorite course is The Old Course at St. Andrews.  He did not mention "rewarding distance" as a reason he loved it.

[jeffwarne]

Well I can drive it 270 but I can't (don't)hit a PW 150....though some of these sets have 43 degre PW's (about my old 8 iron)


I just finished an interview about my favorite courses and after looking at many of my old pictures-I think it's Durness...
Terrain, topography, epic, varied scenery in ALL directions, blindness, vastness, simplicity
easily the course I want to return to the most.
about 2800 yards-can't say it felt short and many thrilling shots.
But I didn't even keep score the day I was there.


Sometimes a shorter course can favor a long hitter-Goat Hill (2500 yards) is very difficult if you can't drive it long enough to see where you're going on your next shot, and if you drive it far enough you catch a downslope on several holes.I always keep score at The Goat.


TOC definitely favors long hitters-look at your Open winners who hit it past a lot of the trouble.
Zach Johnson notwithstanding, but he's long by 1978(Jack) standards as is everyone.


But I'm a bad example and besides, I'm usually quite short compared to those in my group. I had a guy hitting 300 yard driving irons today-although a couple of my drives were close to his iron


I'd say we need to move the bar out to 300 yards, there are a few in here.

[John Kavanaugh]

Pete:


Great question!


I don't qualify but I look forward to hearing the responses.


Brooks Koepka's favorite course is The Old Course at St. Andrews.  He did not mention "rewarding distance" as a reason he loved it.

When asked what is my favorite course I also answer TOC. Not so much because it is as it's the least douchie course on Earth.

[James Brown]

My good drives go 270 and I am definitely not a long hitter.  I think for the purposes of this discussion, long hitter means someone that can hit it past 300 yards repeatedly.  If you can’t hit it 320 nowadays you are not long at the collegiate level. 


Torrey Pines South is the most long-hitter course I have ever seen.  Especially in the summer when the rough is down.  TPC Scottsdale is the other. 


And TOC is the ultimate long hitters golf course.  You just also have to have great touch from 100 yards and in to win there. 

[Anders Rytter]

I believe i fit the purpose of the thread


Was about to say Old Course, but i think that Ballyneal is my favorite course, if i have to choose one.


In regards to the question about having to test the distance the answer is “absolutely not”. The most fun is when you can hit driver, but dont have to.


I dislike when the par 5’s are extremely penalizing for long drivers, basically taking the driver out as an option, that is quite often the case.

[Ben Hollerbach]

I'd meet the "long hitter" requirements with modern clubs, being that I play the majority of my golf with hickories may skew my opinion compared to others

My favorite courses are typically ones that actually negate any length advantage I may have in favor of accuracy and ball placement.Of all the courses I have played, Lahinch is my clear cut favorite. Courses such as Lookout Mountain, Mid Pines, French Lick, North Fulton, and Belvedere are the type I often gravitate towards.

[Kevin Stark]

I qualify as "long" by Pete's definition (barely), but that's well short of where pros and college kids hit it these days.


I tend to like courses where length is part of the risk/reward. For example, when attempting to hit it over a bunker, you gain access to a better line to the green, a shorter club to get there, etc. but there is a penalty exacted when not pulling off the shot. What I find boring is when it's bombs away to clear all the trouble and there is no consideration about the risk in doing so. All of the great courses have an element of risk/reward for long hitters. I'm not sure if Tom thought about this specifically, but I thought PD and OM were excellent in this regard and the questions were different depending upon the wind direction, tee placement, and pin position on any given hole. A local example would be Crooked Stick; it has favored bombers but only ones who could pull off those shots. (E.g. Dustin Johnson's line on #14 when he won there.) That said, my answer would probably be different if my livelihood was based upon having the lowest score.


Update: The OP asked what my top ten courses I've played are. My sense after writing this is that the reward for long distance is orthogonal to whether I love a course or not.


1. Portrush
2. Old Macdonald
3. Pacific Dunes
4. Muirfield Village
5. Camargo
6. Bandon Trails
7. Bandon Dunes
8. Pasatiempo
9. The Loop
10. Mid Pines


Honorable Mention: Wild Horse, Pine Needles, Spyglass Hill, Crooked Stick, Victoria National, Broadmoor (Indy), Olympia Fields North, Streamsong Blue, Portstewart

[Mike Wagner]

My favs are all most of the usuals.  If a guy scoffs at a great course because it's short and he's long, he aint that good ..

[Tom Bacsanyi]

I found Old Mac, Pinehurst #2, and Torrey Pines all very comfy for my "long and wrong" game.

[Tom_Doak]

I tend to like courses where length is part of the risk/reward. For example, when attempting to hit it over a bunker, you gain access to a better line to the green, a shorter club to get there, etc. but there is a penalty exacted when not pulling off the shot. What I find boring is when it's bombs away to clear all the trouble and there is no consideration about the risk in doing so. All of the great courses have an element of risk/reward for long hitters. I'm not sure if Tom thought about this specifically, but I thought PD and OM were excellent in this regard and the questions were different depending upon the wind direction, tee placement, and pin position on any given hole.


Honorable Mention:  Streamsong Blue

Kevin:


Thanks for your post.  It's nice to hear that someone thinks we are doing a decent job of making our courses interesting for long hitters.  A lot of people dismiss Old Mac as too wide and it doesn't matter where you drive it; some players at the Scottish Open said the same thing about The Renaissance Club.  [Straighter hitters want their opponents' every off-line drive to finish in a bunker or thick rough, which is not a realistic solution for a golf course that is intended for club members or the public at large.]  I disagree, but everyone is entitled to their opinion.


I was particularly interested that you singled out Streamsong Blue.  Have you played the two other courses?  Both of them are longer and more difficult, and the low-handicap panelist types tend to prefer them, although only by a small margin.  However, the two people I know best who work at Streamsong see it much differently, noticing how often a careless long drive is steered by the contours into a difficult spot.


As you allude, it is a great advantage to build courses in windy spots where the ease of carrying a certain hazard will change from one day [or even one hour] to the next.

[Dan_Callahan]

I’m roughly in that category, and my favorite course (by a big distance) is Dornoch. Second would probably be Shinnecock. After spending the last three weeks in Ireland, I’m increasingly enjoying courses in the 6,500-yards range, where a low, straight 2-iron is often far more effective than a bombed driver. It’s just such a different game than what I face day to day in New England. Flighting the ball low or high depending on wind, starting shots off the green to let the wind bring them
back, and after a prolonged dry stretch, playing Connemara and trying to land every approach shot short because a ball that landed on the green would jump long every time. I felt like some thought went into every shot, rather than simply determining a yardage and trying to hit that yardage.

[Thomas Dai]

Nice line above, and an aspect often not appreciated by players - “..how a careless long drive is often steered by the contours into a difficult spot.”
Atb

[Tom_Doak]

Nice line above, and an aspect often not appreciated by players - “..how a careless long drive is often steered by the contours into a difficult spot.”
Atb

It is in fact NOT APPRECIATED by players when it happens to them, and they'd failed to notice the possibility beforehand.

[Thomas Dai]

Nice line above, and an aspect often not appreciated by players - “..how a careless long drive is often steered by the contours into a difficult spot.”
Atb

It is in fact NOT APPRECIATED by players when it happens to them, and they'd failed to notice the possibility beforehand.

Yes, and some still don’t learn and thus repeat the same mistake again and again etc in the future and whinge accordingly! Bobby Jones quote about the inches between the ears comes to mind!
Atb

[Kevin Stark]

Tom --


I have not played the other courses at Streamsong. The day I was able to get there I only had time for 18 and that was the one we chose. It was before the Black had been built; we kind of flipped a coin on which one to play. That said, how hard a golf course is has little to do with decisions about where I want to play.


Actually one of my favorite characteristics of OM was how when you did hit it offline, it was still in play but you really had no angle to get to the flag and you were hustling to make par. I'm not sure if that's a defining characteristic of my list of favorite courses, but it's something I really like in a golf course. Chip out golf is boring as hell. A good example I remember very distinctly is blowing it right on hogs back and having no way to even see where I was going much less go at the green (from the fairway, no less).


I like playing places where there are a variety of ways to score well. Like I said before, my opinion would probably be different if I made a living playing this game, but I like it when everyone in the group has a fighting chance if they play their game well. My dad hits it nowhere these days due to old age but he still putts the eyes out of the ball. I want to play with dad as long as he can play. I'd much rather do that than hold a pencil and scorecard.

[Philip Caccamise]

Nice line above, and an aspect often not appreciated by players - “..how a careless long drive is often steered by the contours into a difficult spot.”
Atb

It's a relatively short course at 6,000 yards, but the Eden Course at St. Andrews has that characteristic.



OT: if they could find a way to redo the "pond" holes, that course could be special.

[Matt_Cohn]

OK, lets call a “Long Hitter” someone who drives it 270 and can hit a 150 yard PW and a 200 yard 5 iron.

As may have been stated already, those numbers don't go together — replace 270 with carrying 290+ and rolling out to 310-320.


I carry it 265-270 with a driver, 185 with 5-iron, and 130 with pitching wedge, but I'm a short hitter compared to good college players and just medium by mid-am standards. Golf courses get really long for me around 7,300/72 and maybe 7,100/70. For example, if I play Harding Park from the PGA Championship tees (~7,250, par 70, not firm), it feels like a struggle and would be to my disadvantage in a tournament.


But for a guy who hits it 10% farther than me, the equivalent would be a golf course feeling really long at over 8,000 yards for a par 72. In other words, it never happens. The result is what we already know — the longer you hit it, the longer you want the course to be.


I think a long hitter is less likely to enjoy a tight 6200 yard course. But the long-hitting college kids I know are not, as a rule, equating length with enjoyment.