[JESII]

Padraig,


That 10 to 12 feet you are adding by putting a 4 iron in their hands instead of an 8 iron will all too often result in a missed green as opposed to just a 12 foot longer putt...calculate the scrambling percentages and you'll be close to the full effect of added yardage, I think.

[jg7236]

I have played this course many, many times and I can attest that this course is not easy by any means.  The greens are always lighting, the turf is always in superb shape that gives very little roll in the fairways, and the rough is thick.  These are pros, not amateurs and they always seem to make great routed, and challenging golf courses look easy.

[redanman]

Oh yeah, one more thing ......... as with most of Nicklaus courses "lots" of holes play downhill* for visibility (remember Jack can't see all that well - quoted as a young man as not being able to see his tee shots land, etc.
..............So like hole #1 at 470, most hit 3 wood, so it plays 300+ yards shorter. #2 is also downhill, ... ... ...


TEP, you  know I love ya man, but those greens are almost never going to be firm as long as they insist on forcing bent grass to grow there in amongst all those goddamn trees and near all that water.  It's a given that they will be receptive, receptive-ish at best.  IMM does not work when you have that climate, all those trees, no air circulation, all those water features unless someone changes the laws of the physical world.  You'd have to sub-air the whole damn course.

(*TD, did you teach JWN how to build an uphill hole?  )

[TEPaul]

BillV:

Good points there about those factors of Muirfield Village. But you know my IMM is not supposed to be standardized. It's supposed to be designed to be course specific or type specific and the ideal green surface firmness I'd recommend for an older style course that has far more run-in design capacity I wouldn't recommend for a design like MV that looks to be pretty aerial approach designed. The way those greens were last weekend firmness-wise or receptivity-wise is probably the IMM for that particular type of course.

[Doug Siebert]

Bob

If 150 yards is taken as an 8i distance and 200 yards as a 4i distance, a tour pro will have a 7 or 8 percent error on average. He will hit an 8i between 31.5 and 36 feet, and a 4i between 42 and 48 feet, a difference of between 10.5 and 12 feet.

This difference won't have much bearing on his score.

It'll sure as heck show up in his score if he drives it in the rough.  I have plenty of lies in the rough where I'd be quite comfortable hitting an 8 iron but wouldn't think of trying a 4.

[Matthew Rose]

Par 5s are also the key to scoring, if you added 30 yards to every par 3 and 4 on a given course, an extra 420 yards, but let the par 5s alone, I think you would find overall scoring to be very similar.

It occurred to me while reading this, that why don't they do the opposite? Why not add 50 yards to all the par-fives and leave the other holes alone?

I bet if suddenly every par-five became unreachable, that scoring would go up dramatically. Anything under 600 yards now is pretty much easy meat.

Whenever Tiger wins a tournament, for example, how many times do we see "Tiger this week: +2 on Par 3s, -1 on Par 4s, -11 on Par 5s"

Maybe too many of them are reachable now.

[JESII]

Matt,


They're going to play a 650+ yard par five at Oakmont that will be reached in two by a number of guys, how scary is that?

My opinion is that you defend par at the green against them...mostly through firmness, but with speed and tough hole locations as well...

I believe Pete Dye is credited with the quote along the lines  of 'as soon as you get them bitching you know you've got'em'. This was in referrence to creating golf courses to challenge the pros...make them think something is unfair.

[Phil Benedict]

Matt,


They're going to play a 650+ yard par five at Oakmont that will be reached in two by a number of guys, how scary is that?

Does this hole play downhill or downwind?  Good Lord!

[JESII]

Downhill, and will typicall provide tons of roll out on both shots, but still...667 is the measured number I believe...

[Jeff_Brauer]

I recall another Ohio course - Firestone - went from Monster to lower scoring after years of repeated play. I think the pros figure out any subtlety there may be, allowing them to lower scores.  If I recall, I read an article about this "problem" a while back.  

Colonial, Butler (No longer applicable) and a few other tough, but repeating on Tour courses, faced similar challenges.  Heck, even the British Open scores seem to be dropping with a seven year rotation, but not quite as fast.

I think at MV the biggest contributor was the wet weather, but familiarity also breeds low scores.

[JESII]

I was thinking of familiarity also Jeff, it has merit...

[Phil Benedict]

I don't think I could hit two shots that far on the moon.

It used to be that a long par 4 would be 465 yards or so.  The typical pro would need a long iron or in some cases even a wood to reach in two.  Now you have to go to like 515 to create a hole with the same playing characteristics.

[Padraig Dooley]

It can't be that easy Davis Love did shoot 81 in the second round.

About half the field finished overpar as well.

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