architectural defense against the new ball

[rj struthers]

just starting to drag this thru my mind, but I think one could do a better job designing and defending against length but it isn't easy. The new ball just doesn't go far it also goes straighter, given enough skill(speed)and the new equipment. Sidespin has seemingly been curtailed, as fewer pros work the ball.I'd likee to throw this one out to the crew and then post later. I think the key lies in forcing the ball to bounce!

[aclayman]

Yes, and bounce into some healthy rough. Thats what Tiger said about the 15th at Lytham. He thought that the cross bunker placed there to stop the long hitters was not proper design.  

[Patrick_Mucci]

RJ,

Cross bunkering !

Small greens !

[TEPaul]

I thought Smyers's ideas about length and design was a very good one. Let them hit it far if they want to but keep ratcheting up the risk the farther they try to go.

This could actually have a bit of a feature doubling effect too. Some of the features that may make really long hitter think more about cutting down on max distance for safey's sake may double as features that make the higher handicapper think more on their second shots.

Athough probably not intended, this is something that some of Ross's cross features are doing right now.

[user--name]

grass bunkers instead of sand bunkers...with todays equipement a sand shot, even out of a ten foot bunker is routine for the pros...now make that same ten foot bunker a grass bunker and we've got something...mind you a sand bunker does a lot in the beauty part of the course....but im telling you, im a member at a club with a good amount of grass bunkers, and when the rough is a decent height, just forget about getting the ball close

[RJ_Daley]

Maybe the ideas of racheting up the feature involvement in the long hitter zone will start to play a bigger role in site evaluation for potential designs.  Anotherwords, when evaluating a site for natural terrain features that would make good greensites, the designers will have to assign even greater weight to the terrain that would receive the long ball off the tee to identify characteristics that would make the lie, carry, angle, approach, skyline, wind prevailing etc., that much more challenging in the 270-320zone, whereas the 220-270 LZ more mundane.  Firmer green maintenance would seem to be another factor.  The guy who hit the 230 drive has 190 left and a firm apron with a reasonable run-up area to roll it up, but the guy that hits it 280 and has a 9 iron or wedge left has a firmer dance floor to negotiate his lofted approach and perhaps more collection-chipping areas to bound into and crowned greens to deal with the bounce factor at least somewhat equalizing his chances of the rub of green/tough bounce with the more difficult long approach.

[RJ_Daley]

come to think about it, I have just described some of the conditions at Wild Horse...

[ForkaB]

Dick

You are damned close to a very elegant statement of what a golf course should be.  Just add something in there about how the bold tee shot should be rewarded with a chance to stiff the pin with a cleanly struck aerial shot, and you're even closer....

Waxing lyrical, nostalgic and very emotional while watching the Roy Orbison concert where he is backed up by Raitt, Costello, Springstein, laing, etc.

Rich

Life is short....

[RJ_Daley]

Rich, I'm shocked at just how far behind the times you Nor Cal folks are...  We had that "Black and White Night" on our Wisconsin PBS last week, as a repeat of a repeat - and we got the video from the PBS station in Kearney, NE  

[ForkaB]

Dick

Have seen it before, more than once, but then and now and whenever I see it again I will never stop marvelling about how beautiful and ephemeral our life can be.  Much the same feeling as I have every time I step onto the first tee on far too many great golf courses.......

Rich

[TEPaul]

Here's an interesting thought about an architectural defense against the new ball. Pine Valley is. I was just thinking what a guy like Woods would do off the tee at Pine Valley. Logically Woods would really only need to or want to hit maybe one driver at Pine Valley and that would be on #15. A couple of holes like #1, #6, maybe #16 or #18 would not penalize him if he hit a driver but he probably wouldn't want to risk running into trouble through the landing area with a driver even on those holes.

Would any of you consider the kind of design that Pine Valley is a defense against real length or would you consider it outdated? One driver in a round is not exactly what Crump had in mind, I'm sure.

[Matt_Ward]

TEPaul:

The key at PV is the greens. When they are rolling like marble it takes a top player to keep his wits and control.

Yes, Tiger would probably do exactly what you've said. My reaction? So what!

The player must ADJUST his game to a specific course. Look how successful the set-up was at Lytham. You didn't need hay rough, but you need to pinch in driving zones, while still permitting players to take the bold play. Lytham did that so well.

The key in combatting this onslaught of long hitters and the very real possibility in making classic courses obsolete is not to follow the Fazio lead / re: ANGC. That is sheer lunacy -- you are only feeding the fire by extending the course and giving Woods, Duval and Mickelson even more opportunity to grab green jackets. Since these gentlemen are hitting only short irons today that will mean just one or two clubs more for them. What about the Loren Roberts of this world??? Unless that type of player one putts everything and makes a few other spectacular plays they will be nothing more than bystanders. Today, these same type of players have a shot on courses that are in the range of 6,800 to just over 7,000 yards. When you make a course in excess of 7,300 yards at or near sea level you can kiss good-bye their opportunities for victories.

It's not the ball, but how courses can be properly set-up. Adding length for lengths sake is not the answer. Changing tee angles can also be helpful. Take the 18th at ANGC. If the club moved the tee right of the existing championship tees say by about 10-15 yards you would force players to truly make a fade shot or in most cases land in the existing fairway bunker.

I agree with Pat that cross bunkers is good and greens that are somewhat smaller.

I would also recommend having scattered bunkers featured in the fairway (i.e. like the links courses in UK & Ireland) to keep players from doing what rj struthers has said which is getting away with the straight ball effect. When wind conditions come up the nature of what bunkers are in play will determine how aggressive or timid the player will be. Look how marvelously St. Andrews is in this regard.

I also believe that having bunkers flanking fairways is a waste of time. These bunkers only serve to stop balls from rolling into more precarious positions. As a related item it's long overdue for designers to make bunkers a hazard -- not the cat traps you're seeing this weekend at AAC and the PGA. Not all bunkers should be 1/2 short penalties. Some might even be more and therefore avoided at all costs.

Green contouring also needs to be strenthened. I believe current architects such as Tom Doak and others are including this element and it should be continued. Watch the players at the PGA and they are quite happy to land anywhere on the green and two putt with a routine effort. Getting to the green is one part -- the next part should be to test the nerve. That isn't happening in Atlanta.

One last note -- shave the banks around greens (ala Pinehurst #2). Playing shots from high grass around the greens in usually more about luck than skill. Change that around and make players actually think instead of automatically pulling out the lob wedge.

Sorry for my soapbox ramblings ...

[RJ Bay]

Narrow the hitting areas in the 270-320 range, Allow players to hit driver but if isn't erfect eave them with an awkward or hanging lie (TEP #8 Pine Valley)and most interesting to me would be to build some greens that fall or run away from the player, allowing for bounce and roll to knock it close. A Pro V will not hold like a balata, and most of the young players are quite unfamiliar with the bump and run. Build short but semi unreachable short par 4's where only the longest hitters best shot will run on, anything else leaves a tricky pitch over a real bunker, leave the 100 yard shot on the same hole easier. Design greens where short siding is really bad, so as to force players to work the ball to get short birdie putts, working typically involves more hands, thus more margin for error, and as the PGA shows us again, firm and fast is better!  

[Mike_Cirba]

Although some of the ideas mentioned here may work to effectively slow down the longest hitters, I think the problem is that we are in effect penalizing the long-hitting driver by saying he also needs to be straighter than the shorter hitter.

Is that rewarding excellence, or simply creating artificial barriers to the person who is hitting superior shots?

I would hate to see a whole slew of courses built or maintanined in a way that fairways are 50 yards wide at 200 yards from the tee, and 20 wide at 280 plus.  Is that what we're really arguing for here?

The problem is the ball until it is rolled back and permanently controlled at serious, reasonable levels, there aren't a lot of palatable alternatives.

Yes, we can build a cross-hazard on every hole at 280 from the tee, and make that be the great equalizer, but if we are handcuffing everyone to make them separate but equal, then where's the risk and strategy in that?

[Patrick_Mucci]

TEPaul,

For over twenty (20) years many good players have kept the driver in the bag on most of the holes, save for perhaps 13 and 15.

Watching the PGA today, and seeing players other than Tiger Woods hit 6 irons 207 yards is eye opening.  

On a 454 yard hole, Mickelson hit a 2-iron off the tee, and I think the announcer said he did that the previous day and hit 9-iron into the green.

Rather than have every club spend a fortune to defend the longer ball through architectual impediments, I think dialing back the ball makes the most sense.  Unfortunately, I think there is a lot of "show time" resistance to it.

[RjBay]

Mike, always respect your opinion, but right now it doesn't appear that the powers that be can or will be inclined to fight this issue. If you slow down the ball, which only performs miracles for those with 100mph swing speeds, isn't that penalizing them for being superior atheletes. Someone has to draw a line in the sand and for now it has to be architects and superintendents, who really can make a difference.

[Mike_Cirba]

Rjbay,

First of all, I'm sitting here in regret that I listened to the negative weather forecast for today, because I should have spent the afternoon at Twisted Dune.  I just read Matt Ward's review of it in Jersey Golfer yesterday, and am really looking forward to seeing it.  

I promise to get there around Labor Day, and will give you a heads-up prior.  I'm really hearing some excellent things.

Ok..back to the matter at hand.  

RJ..I hear what you are saying, and if I were designing courses or maintaining them, I'd probably be scratching my head as well in thinking of ways to protect some of the integrity of the game against the tyranny of pure length.  As I think about it, most of the things you and others have mentioned would work, but all in moderation and variety.

I'm philosophically opposed to "bowling alley golf", in the US Open or elsewhere, and the idea of every hole narrowing hourglass-like from 200 to 300 yards just seems to be boring and almost socialistic.  

Instead, if pressed to add something of value to this discussion, I like the idea of a bunker complex, mid fairway or guarding a preferred side, right in the long driver's range.  I'd prefer to introduce choices for the longest hitter, but I'd also argue that those type of strategic bunkering complexes should also exist at the 200-220 yard range to make golf more interesting for the weaker player.  

I'm also a big fan of gravity, and think generally that Pete Dye's designs (WHEN they are maintained firm and fast, with grass cut short around the green complexes, as TPC Sawgrass used to be), do a great job in making the better player THINK, generally causing indecision and uncertainty.  

All in all, it's most important that a course play very firm and fast "through" the green.  As Herbert Warren Wind argued, anybody can play a soft course...it takes a real golfer to handle a racy one.

These type of courses face a real uphill battle however.  We are fighting the idea that golf is supposed to be fair, courses are supposed to be uniformly green, bunkers aren't supposed to be anywhere within the fairway width, and green complexes are supposed to hold any kind of indifferent shot.

As a golf course owner, I'm sure you are hearing those type of comments from players visiting your club.  I hope I don't sound too discouraging, but I'm frankly seeing the industry tide sweeping away much of the type of golf we love.  

[Don_Mahaffey]

To combat the advances in technology golf course design needs to be more forceful in dictating how a hole is played. I don’t think a 450 yd hole should have a 50 yard wide fwy at 250 and be 20 yds wide at 300, but it should have some movement and some slope to steer an off line 300 yd drive into the rough or other trouble. Leave the option there, but increase the risk. Basic principles, methinks. Throw in some short par 4’s where the driver is left in the bag, two irons don’t get used enough anyhow. And, start building some severe greens. The hell with the notion that because of today’s grasses we need to build softer greens. Get away from using tiers with level “cupable” areas and build some greens that ebb and flow and require shots to spin a certain way to get close to the tournament placements. And, what’s wrong with greens that slope away from the fwy. Build me some greens like the 10th at Prestwick and we will not spend all our time talking about how far the ball goes. The modern ball does not spin as well as balata, make the players who choose to use a lower spin ball pay the price. And above all, don’t listen to whiny golfers who tell you the course is too difficult because the greens don’t hold, the rough is too long, the bunkers are in the middle of the fairways, or any of the other dribble I hear on a daily basis.

[Patrick_Mucci]

The cost to architectually alter courses to defend them against the longer ball, and the disruption of play, will prohibit this type of project from ever happening at the average golf/country club.

But, that's just my opinion, I could be wrong.

[herrstein]

we waste our time- and essentially fall into the hole with the rest of them- to argue about how to architecturally defend against the distances the current ball is being hit.
It's already too far, and now the balls are not just helping the high swing speed player (as the original 384 Tour ball did); the average Joe is hitting the Pro V1 longer too.
The main problem with the ball's ability to fly so far is, we have to build longer courses. In a game designed around walking, and which already struggles attracting new players becasue it takes 4 hours to play, we are making the course too long to comfortably, conveniently, or quickly walk.
And that is how the new balls will kill the game.
As I have said before: I can walk Lookout Mountain GC, holing every shot, in 1 hour 52 minutes. Much as I love Black Creek and The Honors, I can't do them in less than 2 hours 30 minutes.
On those courses, even from the back tees, when hitting the ball well there is no par 4 hole that is longer than a driver and a 6 iron, for me (normal conditions). No way to keep Mickelson, Tiger, et al from hitting 2 iron/ 9 iron or 3 wood/ wedge. Even two  of the par fives at The Honors wouldn't require long irons if played as par 4's.
The horse is already out of the barn.
Roll back the OAD.