Any one tired of looking at Augusta's bunkering?

[paul cowley]

I am....they remind me more and more of big old moonpies.

High maintenance moonpies.

Can't think of any that that are similar.

The white contrasting sand combined with hard edges makes them look a little weird in my opinion.

I'm not really sure how they got to where they are from their inception, but they really need a new look.

[JESII]

I actually like them, Paul.

Nothing else, just that I like them...

[paul cowley]

well, lets tally one for and one against!

[PThomas]

i dislike their look more than i like them, so i'm with you Paul

[jeffwarne]

I'm from Augusta,
love the golf course, (sans a few trees and rough)
love The Masters,
don't mind the white sand,

have always (1973 for me) disliked the bunker shapes and a lot of their  placements (outside the doglegs)

[Patrick_Mucci_Jr]

Paul,

Judging the bunkers at ANGC, or any other club, from blimps or camera platforms, doesn't provide the critic or his audience with an evaluation from the golfers "eyes", which, I believe is the only valid angle by which to make a judgement.

Time and time again we've seen aerials that make bunkers look unusual/odd.

The golfer's perspective should be the only one that counts.

[paul cowley]

I'm with you Patrick about a players perception from the ground plane.

But I have been to ANGC many a time and the bunkers seem to me to be more and more anachronistic.....similar to high rise construction during the 60's and 70's.

[Patrick_Mucci_Jr]

Paul,

One of the things that shocked me on a recent play of the golf course was the depth of the left side fairway bunkers on # 5.

They are massive and they are DEEP.

And then it dawned on me.

They were constructed that way to thwart the greatest players in the world.

We all remember Sandy Lyle's incredible 7 iron from the left side fairway bunker on # 18.

He made it look easy.

I'm in favor of deeper bunkers in the face of modern hi-tech equipment.

I like them at Merion, I like them at Oakmont and I like them at ANGC.

If you want to blame someone for the configuration of these bunkers, blame those that developed and permitted hi-tech equipment to overrun and obsolete the underlying architecture.

[Mark Bourgeois]

Paul

Sorry to see you've blown your "post less" new year's resolution -- hey, you beat the pants off Doak!

Mark

PS You should definitely take Patrick up on his offer to play O-gusta. The blimp, too, if he can swing that.

[paul cowley]

Patrick.....I'm not knocking bunker placement or strategy....just 'look'.

[paul cowley]

Mark....I'm not sure where I've been but I guess I'm back.

[Patrick_Mucci_Jr]

Paul,

I understand what you're saying and what you object to, but, perhaps that's a 
product of function dictating form.

The bunkers are massive.
That makes them look closer.
They are deep.
That thwarts recovery.
The fairways remain wide, therefor I believe the bunkers must be large to maintain scale.

With such a large scale, aren't minor changes in the perimeter lines lost to the observer from a distance ?

How would you change them

[paul cowley]

....good point to think on.

[Eric_Terhorst]

Paul

I'll chime in that I am tired of correspondents here complaining about Augusta.

To me it appears to be an unmitigated treasure, even with the infernal new trees.  But then, I haven't had the privilege of seeing it or playing it.  Given all the complaints around here and reports of the course's demise, I guess the state I'm in is "the impending doom of the virgin spirit" (title of a guitar song by William Ackerman).

[Brian Cenci]

I'm not a big fan, other than that they are unique.  The one that actually looks out of place is the finger looking bunker in front of #10 as compared to the others.  Can't they throw in a little lateral depth in those things with some contours and shapes?  To me, that would look nicer, but who am I to say.  It's Augusta and their course and they can do whatever they want.

[Ray Richard]

After a final round a few years ago I bypassed security and stood in the two bunkers on #18 fairway. They are both deep- you can barely see the green and I think they fit in well with the extreme conditioning done at AN. A sharp faced and shaggy retro bunker wouldn't look right at AN.

[Jeff_Brauer]

I'm with you Patrick about a players perception from the ground plane.

But I have been to ANGC many a time and the bunkers seem to me to be more and more anachronistic.....similar to high rise construction during the 60's and 70's.

Paul,

Here in DFW, there is a move on to preserve 50's and 60' building architecture.  While I agree that architecturally, we are and probably should be moving away from the Augusta look, I favor it keeping itself as we know it as much as possible.  The wide fw's are gone. Lets at least keep the greens and bunkers.

[Mark Bourgeois]

If they added a few capes here and there, probably not as many as on the Mac bunker, how might that look? Would it ruin the ovoid nature of the place, and would that be a bad thing?

It would be weird to see bunkers there without sharp edges and imported sand.  But it might be weird to see capes, too. (Mac bunker notwithstanding.)

Are clean lines and / or ovoid bunkers and greens Roberts's lasting legacy?

I always figured the course came to reflect his neat freakiness, which at heart explained why the Mac "natural" look couldn't endure.

[paul cowley]

Patrick.....I agree about the sense of scale....but obviously they were not always that way.

I think if the sides were grassed faced and closely mown they would still produce a gathering effect to the floor of the bunker, similar to what they have now.

I expect that the closely mown look that has evolved throughout the course was probably most responsible for the evolutionary creep of the bunker faces up the slopes.

From a maintenance standpoint it would be more difficult to closely mow inside the bunker faces, combined with problems relating to cleanup and clippings.

If one looks at most of the bunkers at Augusta, the grass edge has crept up to the very top of the elevations surrounding each of them and many of the tongues and fingers have been swallowed and incorporated as sand.

Mowing around the bunkers is much easier and allows them to maintain that very distinctive low cut throughout the course.....but overall they still look a little jarring to my eye....God bless em!

[Greg Krueger]

Brian Cenci, would you believe that bunker on #10 you mentioned is the only McKenzie bunker left on the course. Hard to imagine!

[BCrosby]

Brian Cenci, would you believe that bunker on #10 you mentioned is the only McKenzie bunker left on the course. Hard to imagine!

That is not strictly true. There are any number of bunkers at ANGC in the same basic locations intended by MacK. What's unique about the fw bunker on 10 is that it is one of the few that retains (sort of) the look of a MacK bunker.

I agree with Paul. Bunkers at ANGC have evolved to a hybrid Maxwell - RTJ look. Which is not surprising given their active hand at ANGC. Symmetrical, oval and not much like the shapes that MacK designed or that were typical of his style.

Question for the group. Had Pasa's bunker look become similarly symmetrical before the Doak restoration?

Bob

[Garland Bayley]

I can't understand why people might not like the appearance of the bathtubs at ANGC. After all, it is such a welcome relief from all the naturalistic looking bunker attempts from C&C, TD, GH, etc. that we see on this website. Also, it is a departure from the silly pots we see at the home of golf, and other places across the pond.

Now put some bathing beauties in those bath tubs and my enthusiasm will overflow.

[BVince]

I love the bunkers.  All of them.  It is their style and I like their style.

That doesn't mean I don't enjoy the "naturalistic" bunker but its nice to have contrasting styles. 

[Phil McDade]

Brian Cenci, would you believe that bunker on #10 you mentioned is the only McKenzie bunker left on the course. Hard to imagine!

That is not strictly true. There are any number of bunkers at ANGC in the same basic locations intended by MacK. What's unique about the fw bunker on 10 is that it is one of the few that retains (sort of) the look of a MacK bunker.

I agree with Paul. Bunkers at ANGC have evolved to a hybrid Maxwell - RTJ look. Which is not surprising given their active hand at ANGC. Symmetrical, oval and not much like the shapes that MacK designed or that were typical of his style.

Question for the group. Had Pasa's bunker look become similarly symmetrical before the Doak restoration?

Bob

Bob:

Interesting you mention Maxwell. I was struck, watching the Masters this year, how much they resembeled (form, sharp edges, general roundness) the ones at Southern Hills last year.

[BCrosby]

Phil -

If you won't tell anyone, I'd guess that the current look of ANGC's bunkers owes more to Maxwell than anyone else. I don't have any documentary evidence for that. Maxwell did make a lot of changes there, though the extent of his changes is not completely known.

But the main evidence for my claim is that many, many of them just look like Maxwell bunkers.

Bob