Medinah - my report

[Paul Richards]

Not having spent any time on GCA reading what has been written by others about this PGA Championship at Medinah, this is my report from Medinah.

I attended yesterday's Saturday round.  My first reaction is that Medinah and the PGA deserve kudos for running an absolutely first-class event.  From the time I pulled into the lot in a forest preserve, a classy Greyhound bus took us, without delay, to the Welcome Center - the paved over fairway of a hole on course #1.  

Upon arrival, security was evident, and cell phones/pagers/ipods etc had to be checked.  We even got ours back without any hassle on the way out.  And we had no delay on our way out either.  Just first-class treatment all the way.

The merchandise tent was massive and impressive in its products for sale.

On the course, there were plenty of restrooms and food/beverage areas.  While $19 is a bit steep for two hot dogs, chips, and two pops, the food was good and the pop was cold.

Over the years, I have played Medinah some dozen times, the last time being about 3 weeks ago.  I hold the course in higher regard than many of those who post here, apparently, but what always made Medinah memorable was just the sheer difficulty of this monster.  It is right up there with Winged Foot West, Oakmont, and Carnoustie as some of the biggest and hardest courses I have ever played.  It's a long, hard course, with many greens perched up on ridges and plays, for me, very tough.  To me, 'par' for a scratch-player is probably 78 or so.  Under tournament conditions, I would expect a scratch amateur to shoot an 85.

That being said, I am absolutely blown away by what I am seeing at the PGA.  These guys are destroying a very hard golf course.

I've heard plenty of theories about why - length doesn't scare them, the greens are too flat, no trouble around the greens, the PGA missed on the weather and overwatered, the PGA wanted green and lush and went overboard, etc etc.

Regardless of the why, it is hard for me to still fathom these scores!

When one looks only at how many under the pro's are, keep in mind this is par 72.  At Winged Foot, they made two par 5's into 4's, lessening the 'under-par' effect.  Medinah's #5 is a four par, for all intents and purposes.  There were more birdies and eagles than pars there on Friday, I believe is the stat I saw.  Either way, that is a four par and probably #10 is as well.  Move both of these tees up to a forward tee 30 yards ahead, it's still probably the longest-ever Major Championship course, and now it's a par 70.  That makes Tiger and Luke 8-under instead of 14.

Medinah members have to be pulling their hair out to think they spent all this money on renovation with the 'Open Doctor' and these guys are destroying the place!   I really think they thought they'd get a 7 or 8-under winner.

When we played, I stepped off the fairway landing area on #10 and 15.  10 was 22 yards wide, beyond the bunkers (not many players were getting there yesterday as a strong breeze was in their faces when I was there - but they had been hitting it in this area on Thursday and Friday) and #15 was about 24 yards wide.  Even the first fairway was only about 25 yards wide.  There's not a lot of margin for error here, folks.

But the flip side to how 'easy' it has played is that Medinah has brought us an AMAZING leaderboard.   Everyone whos anyone is still in the hunt.  Tiger going for 12 and Luke going for his first (hopefully, of many!).  

We walked all 18 yesterday and saw every player hit at least one shot except for the first two groups out.  It was exciting and electric to see that the leaders hadn't even teed off and yet the entire leaderboard on the course was filled with ties at 8-under!  Phil just tied!  Micheel did too! etc etc.  The crowds were really into the great play by all of these guys.  It was exciting stuff.

The rough is long and lush.  It's just that these guys aren't hitting into it!  And when they do, they are soooooo good, it doesn't seem to matter much.  Ernie Els hit one on #9 into the left trees.  He had about 90 yards, to a pin tucked left behind a bunker by only a few yards, so no green to work with left.  He couldn't run it up as there was a decent-sized oak between him and the green.  My play would have been a sideways pitch back to the fairway and then hit the green with my next shot.  Ernie just powered his lob wedge up and over the tree to a couple feet!  We stood there in awe.  He had to hit it practically straight up in the air from a nasty lie and knocked it to gimme-range.

In summary, these guys are good.  The PGA and Medinaha put on a helluva show.  The leaderboard is top-notch.  And after I go out and play one of Chicago's finest early this morning, I'm going to plop myself in front of the boob tube and watch the conclusion to this exciting tournament with a few cold ones.

And root like heck for my fellow Northwestern grad to bring home the Wannamaker!!!   How about a double-Wildcat victory weekend?  Jess Daley is leading the Nationwide event too!


Go Luke!!!

[Joe Hancock]

Excellent report, Paul. My wife and I were there yesterday as well, and had a wonderful time. We spent our first several hours walking the course in order before meeting up with Shivas and a friend of his.

Dave kept making smilar comments to yours, and he has plenty of experience here. He was astounded at the mockery these guys were making of the place. The only real answer we could come up with had to do with the soft conditions removing fear from their swing. We sat on 12 to watch several groups play through, and I think 3 players out of 20 missed the fairway. None of them missed bad enough to make the trees come into play....the only way to do that is to fly it into the trees, and these guys just don't do that very often. Get rid of the long grass, dry the place up, yada yada yada....then they might find some bad places to be, but they really do fly the ball whereever they want it to be.

The place is huge. The room between holes is astounding, yet tees and greens remain close. Plenty of elevation and roll to the land.

I was looking through pretty picky eyes early in the day. I wasn't at all impressed with the quality of the reconstruction work. The tie ins to existing grade seemed almost ignored, and many of the new bunker positions moved them right into natural swales and drain areas.....imagine dropping loads of dirt into a pile right in the valley of a fairway, then shaping a bunker into it so it would be the "right" distance for the pro's...that's what I saw a lot. I also saw many tees the had to be built up "like big piles of dirt with the top knocked off" because they were behind the ridge they were originally intended to be on. So be it, that's what has to happen to add length. It wouldn't make sense in the old days when moving dirt was difficult, but now it just requires money and heavy equipment.

I would love to play it some day in an effort to understand how good those guys really are. I kept watching and saying "I know I could hit that shot", but I bet the reality is I couldn't. I'm sure we judge the courses set up for tournament play without truly understanding the purpose of the changes or setup. At least, for me, that's what I'm trying to convince myself as I look at things with a critical eye....

Joe

[Paul Richards]

Redanman

You are absolutely correct.

The USGA needs to go to a competition ball and this week at Medinah is proof in the pudding that the Tour players and every day golfers are no longer playing the same game.

Bifurcation has already occurred.  Time to bring in one ball for all competitors in these Major Championships.

[Mark_Fine]

Joe,
What you saw with the bunkers is not that uncommon.  If you look for that kind of thing, you we see it quite offen.  I was just at a university course (which shall remain nameless) down south done by a high profile firm and you see the same issues with many of the hazards that had been added and/or moved.  

[Adam Clayman]

Get rid of the long grass, dry the place up, yada yada yada....then they might find some bad places to be, but they really do fly the ball whereever they want it to be.

The place is huge. The room between holes is astounding, yet tees and greens remain close. Plenty of elevation and roll to the land.

Joe,
 I felt the same way, but seeing you almost poo poo the idea I have to ask, are you poo pooing?

It's funny how those Jones/MacKensie principles work practically everywhere.

Screw the comp ball issue, the harping is getting old, very old. Stop these ridiculous, ill-conceived maintenance set-ups. Then maybe we will see some non-somnambular inducing Sundays.

Don't tell the elite player where to hit, by defining it with a narrow fairway. Ask them to figure it out by not defining it.

 With Medinah's wonderful ground contours, surely a few drives would've gone on to an unpredictable conclusion, somewhere other than two feet from where they landed.

Of course this is too counter-intuitive to convince the uninitiated, unsophisticated decision makers, who would rather sleep than push an envelope.

God Bless Mark Michaud

[Craig Sweet]

A tournament ball?  The out come would have been no different.

[Joe Hancock]

Adam,

No, I wasn't poo poo-ing the idea. I added the yada yada stuff because it's all been said before....ad nauseum.

I shared with Shivas that it was a bit like watching bumper pad bowling with all that deep rough. In bumper pad bowling you can play a whole game without a gutter ball. Sure, if you hit the bumpers a lot you aren't going to have a great game, but you won't have gutter balls.Same thing at Medinah. If you hit the roughs often, you won't have a great round. But, you won't have many punch outs or worse, either.

I'm all for drying it out, at Medinah, at anywhere. It is becoming my soapbox and I preach it everywhere, even at the risk of upseting some of my superintendent brethren.

Joe

[T_MacWood]

It sounds like we might be advocating another redesign of Medinah, maybe this time we will finally get it right.

What are the chances the USGA or PGA come back to the course any time soon?

Save your money.

[John Kavanaugh]

There is nothing wrong with the architecture..it is all with the setup..The super has been scared for two years running and had been protecting his job with slow fairways and slow and soft greens.  He balked and didn't turn the water off weeks ago...Too bad for him and good luck in his next job...hopefully out of the midwest.  This tournament was an embarrassment to his profession.