Where does Pacific Dunes trump Kiawah Ocean..

[Mike Vegis @ Kiawah]

I have not played the Ocean Course so really unfair for me to comment, but can you really have a CLOSESTTO THE DEAD SEA LION CONTEST at the Ocean Course?

No, but you can have a HIT THE PASSING DOLPHIN CONTEST there.  The toughest part is to time it so you catch them at the top of their leap...

[Matt MacIver]

On the routing: I found PD more interesting, with the holes zig-zagging across the property, versus TOC which runs one direction for 4 holes, #5 points towards the ocean, then you have something like 9 holes in a row heading south, before the 4-5 hole home stretch into the wind (and really hard!).  

But this out-and-back style has been successfully replicated at other courses (see TOC, St. Andrews version), so maybe because The Old Course has more options (wide fairways, green complexes, etc.) it makes the routing work?  

After losing countless balls in the fescue at Kiawah I wanted to substantially widen all the fairways, maybe even create some double fairways as the course crosses back on itself...much like The Old Course.  Is this a good idea?  

Also, and this is a small nit, but even if you're walking you must be shuttled from #9 to #10 - they're easily a couple thousand yards apart.  

[Mike Vegis @ Kiawah]

If you were losing countless balls on The Ocean Course, its because you were going for miracle shots and trying to cut corners.  The fairways are upwards of 40-45 yards wide.  If you can't hit a fairway that's half a football field wide, blame the archer, not the target.  As for elevation change, stand on the fairway of No. 12 and you're standing about 25 feet above the green level.  Same goes with No. 18 and a few others.

As for the out and back, they don't run in a perfectly straight line.  They zig-zag back and forth at up to a 45 degree angle.  Y'all need to play the course again and this time, pay attention...

[Greg Tallman]

Mike,

But if people accurately depicted your course as it is then it would be more difficult to bow down to Pacific Dunes...

Perhaps PD is preferrable to Kiawah Ocean... I'd be quite happy to play either on any given day and without having had the pleasure of playing PD cannot accurately compare the two... only marvel at the nitpicking aimed at The Ocean Course at Kiawah.

[Doug Wright]

I have not played the Ocean Course so really unfair for me to comment, but can you really have a CLOSESTTO THE DEAD SEA LION CONTEST at the Ocean Course?

No, but you can have a HIT THE PASSING DOLPHIN CONTEST there.  The toughest part is to time it so you catch them at the top of their leap...

Mike,

You can also certainly have the HIT THE PASSING ALLIGATOR CONTEST! These photos are from the second fairway. My caddie got an extra tip for moving this alligator along after we found him about 10 yards from my tee shot...

[Mike Vegis @ Kiawah]

One time I had to wait for a bobcat to cross the first fairway and I had to move to the far side of the bunker in front of No. 2 green because a baby 1 foot gator was sunning himself in it.  

I was playing with a well-known golf writer and renowned curmudgeon who, declaired as an egret squawked in the middle of his backswing, "G** damn nature!"

[Doug Wright]

I enjoyed my first visit to the Ocean Course last month. I expected it to be much more demanding than it turned out--more like TPC Sawgrass/PGA West, where there seems to be big-time trouble lurking on every shot. At Kiawah Ocean, there is a lot of width off the tee except for a couple of holes, allowing for the constant wind. I thought three of the par 3s were excellent (5, 14 (pictured below) and of course Calc's Folly #17).

Pacific Dunes allows one to play the ground game; Kiawah really doesn't though there are areas around the greens (eg the volcano 3rd green) that allow options. I think in general the greensites at Pacific Dunes are more interesting but Tom Doak had a lot more room and topography to work with in his routing. There is some sameness to the par 4s at Kiawah Ocean (#6, #9 and #10 seemed to me like the similar holes both in length and in the way they played). However, the challenge posed by the tee shot on #17 at the Ocean Course is unparalleled by anything at Pacific Dunes.

Two really fine courses, no question about that.

PS I walked the Ocean Course with a caddy. It is a pretty easy course to walk, easier than Pacific Dunes since there isn't much up and down. MUCH better than the cart path only my playing partners endured...

#14:



#17

[Mike Vegis @ Kiawah]

Generally, around here any hole that Dye figured most players would be attacking with a short iron does not have much of a chance to run-up (No. 3 for example).  Longer holes (especially from the back tees) allow for run-up shots (No. 4, 6, 9, 10, 12, 13, 18).  This makes it a bit more challenging par 5s where, if you go for the green in two, you better be extremely good (or extremely lucky...)..

[Jay Cox]

I disagree with Tom Doak re: variety.  The Ocean Course has plenty of variety, both in terms of look and in terms of the problems presented for shotmaking.  Regarding look, compare, for example, the tee-to-green low profile holes (2, 4, 8, 18), the low profile holes with built-up greens (3, 14), the ground-level holes with flashy features (16, 17), and the run of steeply elevated fairways to begin the back nine (10, 11, first half of 12).  Regarding variety of shots, consider two runs of approachs: the second (relatively short approach if played as a three shot hole, no one clear best shot to play in), third (tiny push-up green, mandatory aerial approach, roughly equal penalty for any miss), and fourth (open to the ground game, especially with certain pins / wind conditions); and the thirteenth (relatively short approach most of the time, water hard right by the green, key to the approach is angle based on tee shot placement), fourteenth (sort of redan-like, with the wind often helping the draw), and fifteenth (relatively low profile on the approach again).  

Instead, I think the reason Pacific Dunes outshines the Ocean Course is that fully half of the holes on the Ocean Course do not blend into the land (1, 3, 5, 6, 10, 11, 12, 16 17).  That's the Pete Dye style, and it might have been the best solution to the very flat site, but it doesn't create the same burning desire to play until after it's dark that I get at Pac Dunes.  Of course, that doesn't make the Ocean Course bad; having not played many top private courses but most of the best publics, it makes my top 10, though closer to tenth than first.  That doesn't mean I would change anything about it, but it does put it one or two notches below Pac Dunes for me.

I would like to see what would have happened if the 10th through 12th at the Ocean Course weren't so damn unnaturally high.  The resulting course might be worse, since they're all fantastic golf holes, and it certainly would reduce the variety of visual perspectives one gets during a round.  But steep drops on flat land (as opposed to at, say, Yale) rub me the wrong way a bit.