[Lance Rieber]

I think that the way to combat the length factor for players is to get the  greens as firm as possible and still be playable, and let the rough grow to a height that is a deterrent for the players.  If they hit it into the rough they can't stop the ball on the green unless they run it up.  Make it so they really do think about the tee shot as more than hitting it as hard as they can. I don't mind seeing someone hit irons off the tee every hole, to me that shows patience and thoughtfulness on how they are going to play the course.  It also is so hard to do they might just want to take the driver out, and if they pull it off they will have a better chance at a birdie, or at least a shorter shot into the hole.  Nobody on tour now cares if they hit the fairway or not because a short iron out of the rough is easier than a middle iron from the fairway.    
     I don't see how lengthing the course will make the shorter hitters more of a factor unless the rough is high. you have to have a penalty for missing the fairway.  Just my opinion.
Lance

[Jeff_Mingay]

I'm seeing it like Tom Doak. It's not just the pro game, Tim.

My 53-year old father, who's been a single-digit handicap his entire golfing life, told me he hit a couple near 300-yard drives last week, with some newfangled driver he borrowed from a friend.

He agreed, had he been using vintage woods, this would have been impossible. So, give that same newfangled driver to a 25-year old, single-digit handicapper, and how far will he smack it, well-struck? A few yards farther than my old man, for sure...

The ball is being permitted to travel way too far. Period.

And, I say, if this trend continues, shorten courses and strengthen the contouring in and around the greens.

[Pete Lavallee]

And, I say, if this trend continues, shorten courses and strengthen the contouring in and around the greens.

Great point, lengthening courses encourages manufactuers to build euipement that goes further. Perhaps playing shorter courses could be the start to moving away from "distance at all costs" equipement. More green contouring could lead to a need for a more workable ball to access difficult hole locations; which could lead to a reason for manufactuers to buy into an acceptance of a spin limit on balls that are just too hot.

[jeffwarne]

Jason:

The most interesting events always seem to be had at the shortest courses they play.  You may not like watching them hit irons off the tee, but at least they have to think about what they're doing.  If I wanted to see them hit 14 drivers, I'd go to the practice range.

If they would just take the equipment back to where it was thirty years ago, then you'd get to see the players hitting the shots you yearn for.  It may be unlikely to happen ... but it's more likely than having a bunch of modern architects building courses as good as Muirfield, Merion, et al.

Had to bump this for Jason.


Simple wisdom 12 years ago, bluecoats may not be -yet-but it seems many golfers, including more than a few pros are agreeing with
this simple logic

[Sean Ogle]

My issue with this concept, all comes down to practicality.


Sure you can build courses approaching 8,000 yards + and challenge the pros, but what about the fact that most courses that do that won't ever host a PGA tournament.


And many would be lucky to even host a sectional qualifier or something on that level.


So you're adding substantial expense, to create something that 51 weeks (and most likely 52 weeks) out of the year won't get used.


I think you're better off designing trickier greens, and making courses difficult in other ways.


Also, you can ask the broader question "whats wrong with pros shooting low scores?"


If they tear up a course, great, they're the best in the world, that's what they should be doing more often than not.


Sure that might negate some of the architectural merits of shorter, classic courses - but frankly, those will still be perfectly playable for me, so I'm not sure I care much.

[Matthew Rose]

Maybe they could start building courses with five par threes. There's an easy way to add an additional 200+ yard shot without needing a huge land grab.

[Doug Siebert]

Maybe they could start building courses with five par threes. There's an easy way to add an additional 200+ yard shot without needing a huge land grab.

That's easy, just play a par 4 from the front tees and call it a par 3 


Lengthening is not the solution, it has already made golf cost more and since distance is still increasing even 8000 yards isn't enough to stress the pros. At a guess I'd say a 9000 yard course today would play the same as a 7000 yard course did in Snead and Hogan's days...

[Mark Chaplin]

Golf at the professional level is entertainment, pure and simple. They are paid because people pay to watch them play. So what does the punter want to see 62s or 73s??

[Matt MacIver]

If golf (pro or otherwise) is broken, longer SECOND shots might be the answer.  So being pinching the width down into a bottleneck, so the bombers have something to think about, or a centerline hazard at 300-320Y, etc.  Make the bombers have a real risk - even if it occasionally doesn't have an obvious reward.  The bombers will have to think more and the precision player will have a chance, especially if there are some speed slopes etc. that can be reached by all. 

[archie_struthers]

 


The answer lies in the equipment and the ball specifically .


It seems to me that the ball and bat need to be regulated further.  How many dead pitchers would we have in  MLB  if they allowed aluminum bats . Baseball gets it !  They understand the danger of technology making ballparks and records obsolete.


Jason I'm surprised you would want al the old courses to be outmoded , at least relative to expert players. We really have to roll the ball back . It really benefits these with swing speeds over 110 mph to a much greater degree.

[Jason Topp]

Jason I'm surprised you would want al the old courses to be outmoded , at least relative to expert players. We really have to roll the ball back . It really benefits these with swing speeds over 110 mph to a much greater degree.

Archie - I would definitely prefer that equipment be rolled back.  I just do not see it ever happening.  Manufacturers would have a difficult time charging premium prices for equipment that does not go as far or is less forgiving than the equipment in place today.  Therefore they would fight any rollback idea to the death.  The general golf population finds the game difficult enough as it is and therefore is not going to like the idea of an equipment rollback.   

Thus, my post back in 2005 assumes there will never be an equipment rollback and then raises the question of how to provide the most interesting tournament venue.  At the time, I made what seemed like an outlandish suggestion that 8,000 yard courses might be needed and argued that they might provide for more interesting tournaments than 7,000 yard courses tricked up to provide a challenge to top professionals. 

I thought it would be interesting to revisit the old thread given that the US Open came pretty close to presenting an 8,000 yard course and the biggest complaint was that the course was too easy.   

Some of my thoughts in 2005 and my reaction based on actual experience:

"My proposed hole distance ranges would be

Par 5 - 550 and up
par 4 - 390-540 (sand wedge to utility wood approach shots for the average length tour pro (290 yards))
par 3's - same as they are now"
Not too far off although I did not see the widespread use of short par 4's
. . .

"Lengthening the courses requires pros to hit the same types of shots and have the same choices as 40 years ago.  Lengthening courses places more emphasis on accuracy and angles, because it is a lot harder to recover from an inaccurate tee shot if one has 200 yards into the green rather than 100 yards. Lengthening courses puts Donald Ross' ideal test of a long iron into a par four back into the game.  Lengthening courses and playing them in fast firm conditions may bring the ground game back into play. "
I don't know if you can make a course long enough to require top players to hit long irons
. . . . 

I also think that shorter, more accurate hitters might benefit from such an approach because accuracy would be necessary to succeed.

This thought might be accurate.  There were certainly some shorter hitters in contention at Erin Hills

[Sean_A]

"It is very certain that additional length provides no answer to the problem of the ball."

Tom Simpson knew this 85 years ago and it still rings true.

Ciao

[jeffwarne]

Good discussion -Good topic Jason.


While many on this board are aware of my Quixotic rants against hot balls against technology, the sheer impracticality and perceived bias against such an idea made me think of a rollback as a pipe dream.
Lately though I hear many more average players (nonGCAers) saying the same thing and/or at least listening and even agreeing to a discussion of such.
I truly feel like Erin Hills may have been a tipping point as many became aware how far the elite actually hit the ball when allowed to.


This board has always been ahead of the golf mainstream in architectural trends, and over time I've seen some good discussions regarding a rollback. Anecdotally, I was just on a two daygolf trip with a mix of high low and medium handicappers, some of whom kill it, and I was suprised to hear how many of them felt the ball and the lengthening courses was out of control, and that the solution was obvious to them-roll back the ball, or at least bifurcate.These were non GCA types, bt a few showed signs of an appreciation of strategy and a love of classic and modern architecture-albeit a bit trophy heavy.


This was the first time I had heard a majority of average-good players say that equipment was out of control and should be reigned in.......Unprompted....

[Tommy Williamsen]

I played Quail Hollow on Thursday with my pro and the assistant at QH. I played the three bird tees while they played the two bird tees. Not even they wanted to tackle the back tees. Both were good players in their twenties and both hit it so high and long that not even in my thirties could I get that kind of distance and height, but then again very few could. Erin Hills may indeed be a tipping point. Five hundred yard par fours are beginning to be the norm. When I was a kid the USGA recommended that 470 yards be the starting point for a par five. Today, even for mid handicap players 470 yards is reachable. I don't know the answer because I get shorter off the tee every year, but something needs to be done. I really didn't enjoy the Open this year but found that the shortest par four played the most difficult.

[Pat Burke]

Could Erin Hills be a setup??


Crazy long
Extremely wide by US Open standards
For the first time, players were given incredibly precise hole locations, which made the greens books even MORE effective


16 under wins
5 under to finish top 20


Basically an exhibition of all the modern game.  Could it be the test go for the upcoming rules updates to actually address the distance and technology  issues??


"we played a long course, with nasty penalty for missing targets, and got 16 under etc."  Time to react?
I doubt it, but only because my tin foil container is empty

[Tags:]

Tags:

[Tags:]

Tags:

Call to undefined function theme_linktree()