A Fan's Photo Tribute to Pacific Dunes - 18th hole commentary now in progress

[Ted Kramer]

I really liked this hole and it would have been one of my favorites if there weren't so many other great holes on the course.  Both its playability and how it blends in were both high points for me.  To boot the ocean views are still really really good on this hole so no disappointment after leaving 4.

Kalen - you turn away from the ocean for the most part... and my disappointment after leaving 4 is more in terms of knowing what's to come, as I say.  The first time I played PD I thought 5 was a very cool golf hole (and I still do); there was zero disappointment.  Each subsequent playing I kinda like it less and less, just want to get it over with.. which causes me to short-shrift it and be sorta tricked into playing it poorly!  That is, I think about 6 as I play 5.. and 5 doesn't have enough going on to change this, at least not for me.  In the end this is a good thing I think, in the overall context of the course... 5 is a fine sorbet.  But taking it in a vacuum and just looking at it as a single golf hole, well... I don't see the greatness.  The good news is this only tends to matter when talking hole against hole outside the context of the course as a whole, which is an esoteric discussion at best, meaningless at worst.

5 works as it is.  I think perfectly so, the more I think about it.

TH

As is often the case, I find myself agreeing with Huck . . .

-Ted

[Tim Bert]

Kalen - I've played the hole ten times, so the multiple play perspective can go either way.  I've enjoyed it slightly more with each play; Tom slightly less.  It's all good - that's why we discuss them. 

The first thing that struck me on my return trip that I didn't notice the first time was how well it all blended.  Once I became more acquainted with the bunkers and the associated recovery shots I started to like the hole a little more.  I also love watching the ball feeding forward 40+ yards on the ground from the kick point and wondering if I got it right until it stops.

[Tom Huckaby]

Ted - that's a scary place to be, agreeing with me.

 

But this also illustrates to me part of the greatness of this forum.  It takes dicussions like these - at least for me, a lot of the time - to think a different way, see a different side, learn and hopefully come to some better enlightenment.  This thread got me to think about 5 more in the context of the course and not as a separate entity... and to realize that's more important in the end.  That might be fundamental for some, but I tend to take longer to grasp some things.

Kalen - oh I get ya, and others, who want to praise this hole as no slouch, etc.  It surely is a damn good hole in and of itself.  Just how good, well.... since it works so well in the context of the course, that ought to be enough... and maybe in the end makes it worthy of even more praise?

Hmmmmm.... I find myself backing off previously held comparisons with other golf holes....

But that's a discussion for another day.

Tim - I guess enjoying it less with each play is overstating how I feel.  I think the first time it wowed me, now like I say I am so stoked to get to 6 and reeling for so many reasons after 1-4, I overlook it.  The problem is mine.... but I think Doak trapped me a bit too, as this is certainly not a golf hole to overlook.  So score yet another one for him.

TH

[Mike Benham]

Missed the discussion of 4.  Oh well.

No problem, just go to the Hole 4 thread and make your comm ..., oh wait, never mind ...

[Tom Huckaby]

Missed the discussion of 4.  Oh well.

No problem, just go to the Hole 4 thread and make your comm ..., oh wait, never mind ...

You are a bad bad man.
You also make a very good point.

TH

[Tim Bert]

Missed the discussion of 4.  Oh well.

No problem, just go to the Hole 4 thread and make your comm ..., oh wait, never mind ...

You are a bad bad man.
You also make a very good point.

TH

Let it go, gentleman!  You had all day Monday to catch up from your weekend off.  There's also plenty of time to tell us what you think about #4 from now until tonight when I post #6.  There's no reason you can't share your thoughts now that the discussion on #5 is winding down if you have anything interesting to add.  It's no more confusing than trying to track down 18 individual threads. 

By the way, when all is said and done with this thread I plan to provide a consolidated photo only thread (sans discussion) for those that want to browse pictures start to finish.  Thanks to Mike Hendren for that idea.

[Tom Huckaby]

Tim -

I just figured it would be really weird, if not rude, to comment on 4 now that the title reads "5th hole commentary now in progress."   And note I was not at a computer for any of Sat and Sun and very little of Monday.  So while yes, there was time... I just missed it.  My loss.  Mike just does make a very good point, as this wouldn't be an issue if there were separate threads for each hole.  But no matter... on the whole I was just having fun with you.

In any case now that you've thrown discussion on 4 open again.....

My feeling is that if one was to put this in the great golf holes of the world, or even put it in the top par fours on this course, one would be over-rating it.  I do think it's a beautiful golf hole for sure - and oh yes scenic beauty does matter to me - and the tee shot from down below halfway down the cliff was thrilling... but now that that tee is closed, well... I will say that particularly in the winter wind it is a very difficult golf hole... and the massive change from winter to summer is very cool... and either way, one breathes a sigh of relief when finishing it because of its round-ruining potential.... but to me, it just seems odd - a very penal golf hole in a course otherwise full of vexing strategic choices.  By that I mean this:  early in this thread you saw how it took me forever to figure out how to play the tee shot on 2 - and that to me is what golf fun is all about!  It takes me two miliseconds to decide what to do on 4... just hit it straight!  Just don't go in ocean and don't go in bunker left - that it's for "thought"  - the hole is all about execution.  That's just not my cup of tea.  Oh for sure I have no clue how any of it could be differently - and again, it is a very very good golf hole for all the reasons previously stated - I just do find it odd and more of a ball-buster than anything that elicits joy or thrills or vexing thought.

But perhaps it works in context as well... I'm sure it does... and that makes it worthwhile for sure.

I just don't feel right about singling it out as a great golf hole - kinda like 5.  That's cool too though - there are many other holes on the course for which one can wildly cheer with no reservations.

TH

[Tim Bert]

Just wait until I declare #9 my least favorite hole on the course days after Tom Doak declared it his favorite driving hole he's ever built.  We've all got opinions and I like to hear everyone's - even when their wrong!  Oh wait, an opinion can't be wrong.

You and I agree that #2 and #3 are better holes than #4, even though #4 is all-world scenery.  I'm not sure where I stand on #1 vs. #4.  We both know that #6 is better than all of the ones before it (I think #2 is a close 2nd.) 

[Tom Huckaby]

Concur with that last part.

Re #4, I just also wonder if any others have comments one way or the other on the thought that this is a penal golf hole in a course otherwise full of strategic choices, and whether that's a bad thing or not.  I'm not sure myself.

How do I love the tee shot on 9?  Let me count the ways... but I shall wait for that.

TH

[Tom_Doak]

Tom:

I guess from most people's perspective, #4 would be a penal or shot-testing golf hole, especially in comparison with others on the course.  But I think there is a place for those in any course.  12 and 15 at Augusta are pretty penal, no?  10 at Pebble Beach is actually pretty similar to #4 at Pacific Dunes ... so is #7 at Ballybunion.  Couldn't help but think of both of those holes a little bit when we were building it.

More on topic, though, as I pointed out earlier in this thread, how would you make a hole hard against the cliff into a "strategic" hole?  If you gave players way more room to drive the ball, they'd just get themselves into impossible position for the second shot.  For that matter, you can drive it into #12 fairway if you really want to ...

On #13, we made a wider fairway and gave you more options of left vs. right, but I didn't think it made sense to do that twice in the same round. 

I actually think #4 is a greater hole than #13, BECAUSE it's more testing and it uses the cliff to its ultimate effect.

[Tom Huckaby]

Tom:

Well, as I said, I have no clue how anyone could have done it differently - my question more remains the effect of one standout penal hole in a course filled with holes requiring strategic choices; and you answered that!  In the end it works.  The Pebble and Augusta and Ballybunion examples are telling, but I also think that one ball-buster to keep one on one's toes is not a bad thing at all either.  I guess in the end this is more about my personal preferences; #4 is indeed more testing than 13, but testing is sure not what it's all about, at least not for me!  In my weird personal world I like to have vexing choices AND be tested - you know, like you do on #6?  And on 13, well... there is distance choice on the tee shot there as well as left or right (obviously depending on wind)... so for that combined with one of the world's most striking features (HUGE sand dune on right), I tend to prefer 13 to 4.  But you're right, twice in one round may well have been too much for a cliff-side tee shot with a wide fairway.

SO... I won't argue too much with those who praise #4.  Hell in the end it is a great golf hole.  I just don't find it to be my personal cup of tea, not compared to 2, 6, 13, 16 in particular, others that offer vexing choices in general.

[Tom_Doak]

Great!  Back to #5 ...

The main thing about this hole is that it's a par-3 designed for a strong tailwind.  You don't see that too often in modern design, and most golfers tend to like their par-3 targets small and well defined by bunkers ... but on this hole if we'd done that it would have been unplayable most of the summer.  As it is, you can land the ball on the front edge and there are still days when it might not stop before running all the way over the back.

The approach is awkward and takes a few rounds to get a feel for.  I tend to leave it short left as often as not, and it's hard to make 3 from there if the greens are fast.

This was indeed the first hole we built.  It only took 2-3 days to get it shaped, bunkers and all.

[Tom Huckaby]

Tom D. - damn right it's tough to make a 3 from the left if the greens are fast (which they always have been when I've played there) - that's part of the fun of this hole also.  To me, it looks like a breather, and I treat it like a breather after the bitch-ness of 4, and with the glory of 6 pending.... and it inevitably bites me.  You know the more we discuss this the cooler and cooler 5 is getting in my mind.  Love this thread!

TH

[Kalen Braley]

Tom,

If we keep discussing it until your trip up there in 2010, maybe by then the hole will be even cooler and make you an espresso with a back rub after your done with the hole.   

Good to see your coming around though.  Aestically one of the nicest things I found about the hole is all the grasses that surround it.  When the wind is up and it usually is, these wave and titter so back and forth almost teasing saying "make sure you don't hit it here".

Additionally you hit the "looking for a break" part right on the head.  After playing a par 5 that plays long into the wind, and then the par 4 4th which is just plain tough, it seems like a welcome respite until you realize you need to hit a tee good shot just to get it to stay on the green.

[Tom Huckaby]

Kalen - just understand though that again, if this hole is compared in a vacuum to other number fives, or other great par threes, it's not going to fare well, not as I see it.  I do think it works very well in the context of the course, and does get cooler and cooler to me in that respect.  But taken alone?  Not so much.

Which really just says that consideration of holes out of context is pretty stupid.

TH

[Kalen Braley]

Kalen - just understand though that again, if this hole is compared in a vacuum to other number fives, or other great par threes, it's not going to fare well, not as I see it.  I do think it works very well in the context of the course, and does get cooler and cooler to me in that respect.  But taken alone?  Not so much.

Which really just says that consideration of holes out of context is pretty stupid.

TH

Tom,

I'd agree 100% with that last statement.  Its tough to judge any hole on its own merits without getting the entire context that its in.

For me, one of the finer par 3's I've played, but then again I'm not Americas Guest who has played what 500 courses?    

[Tom Huckaby]

Well, I have been playing this game for 35 years.  If I've only played 500 courses in that time, that's not all that much.  Others here dwarf me.

But if we want to make the statement, well... I can't put #5 PD in the short list of greatest par threes I've ever played.  But the hole works very well... so in the end, who cares?

TH

[Tim Bert]

Kalen - just understand though that again, if this hole is compared in a vacuum to other number fives, or other great par threes, it's not going to fare well, not as I see it.  I do think it works very well in the context of the course, and does get cooler and cooler to me in that respect.  But taken alone?  Not so much.

Which really just says that consideration of holes out of context is pretty stupid.

TH

It does, however, fare pretty darn well against an average par 3 #5 hole at another great (but not quite Pacific Dunes) oceanside course on the west coast.

Give me a little credit, Tom H.  Six pages in on this thread and I haven't brought up that comparison yet.  I'm letting this course stand on its own in this thread.  I promise I'll continue to not go there if you and Mike relent on the multiple thread jabs.  Of course, Mike I believe may fall on oppostie sides of the fence on that battle which may give him little or no incentive to stop the jabbing.

I just can't wait to post the #6 photos, but fair warning there's a chance that won't occur until tomorrow evening.  I'm doing my best to track toward tonight.
 

[Kalen Braley]

Well, I have been playing this game for 35 years.  If I've only played 500 courses in that time, that's not all that much.  Others here dwarf me.

But if we want to make the statement, well... I can't put #5 PD in the short list of greatest par threes I've ever played.  But the hole works very well... so in the end, who cares?

TH

Agreed...who cares.

Tim,

We're ready for #6.  Huck is ready to go and has a 2 page essay with discussion and analysis on how to play #6, stay out of the sand, and get one of those rare 3s.

I'm also curious to see Tom D's comments on this hole in terms of its genesis and just how bad of a day he was having when he decided to put that massive bunker front left, the fallaway slope behind, death left, and a teeny green that normally plays with a nasty crosswind.   

[Tim Bert]

But if we want to make the statement, well... I can't put #5 PD in the short list of greatest par threes I've ever played. 
TH

I agree 100% with this.  For me, however, it does make the slightly more expanded list of some very great par 3s out there.  And #11 makes the short list you reference above.

[Tom Huckaby]

Tim:

And I'd say it fares poorly against the hole you allude to.  To each his own.  My point anyway isn't to jab at you, but rather to share the enlightenment I only gained today... and that is that considering a hole in context - that is how it fits in with the course as a whole - seems to me to me more important that how it stands on its own outside of that context.   I never really thought of things this way until today.

I can wait for #6.  I just hope I get to a computer in time to catch the discussion.

 

[Tim Bert]

Tim:

And I'd say it fares poorly against the hole you allude to.  To each his own.  My point anyway isn't to jab at you, but rather to share the enlightenment I only gained today... and that is that considering a hole in context - that is how it fits in with the course as a whole - seems to me to me more important that how it stands on its own outside of that context.   I never really thought of things this way until today.

I can wait for #6.  I just hope I get to a computer in time to catch the discussion.

 

By jabs, I wasn't referring to your comments on the hole.  I was referring to the grief over the consolidated thread concept.  I'm pleased with it despite protests.

You have my word that I won't post #7 until you have sufficient time to weigh in on #6 and the conversation dies down.

[Doug Wright]

I played #5 into a fierce wind and hit DRIVER!

Charlie,

I've only played #5 into the wind as well and it's a tough hole with a driver or 3 wood in your hand...

I think the #5 greensite and contouring is another example of the fine work at Pacific Dunes. I like #5 a lot more than #14. One beef I have re PD is that 14 seems like a shorter version of 5 playing in the same direction, and I find #5 much more interesting. It falls at a nice time in the round for a par 3 and as the only par 3 on the front nine flows nicely with what precedes and follows it.  

[Jon Nolan]

I love #5.  I think it's one of the best par-3s I've ever played.  There are so many options and every time I go there I learn of others.  Two years ago a guy who joined us for the round skulled his tee shot left and around the back of the front left mound and (I thought) right into the bunker.  I figured it was dead until it inched its way up to ten feet.  I've played off the mound intentionally but never around it.  I doubt he could pull that off again in 200 balls but maybe it's a good play... I'm too chicken to give it a try!

[Tom_Doak]

I'm going to be in Montana the next three days with my wife (yay!) and I'm not likely to look in here during that time, so I thought this would be a good place to include a VERY little-known fact about Pacific Dunes.

In the routing that Mike Keiser approved in November 1999, the fourth, fifth and sixth holes were all different than they are today.  I decided to make the change between November and January.

Number four would originally have been a short par-3 from today's back tee to a green just across the chasm, by the ladies' tee.

Number five would have been a short par 4 with the tee set back and to the left of the green just described, and its green in the same place as today.

Number six would have taken off from near #5 tee, to its current green site, playing about 390 yards on the dogleg.  The ground of the current fifth would not have been used.

All of this looked pretty good out in the walk-through, but when I came back home to draw it on the map [I hadn't drawn this version before we walked it, because I only came up with it the night before], it just didn't fit well.  With the tailwind, the fourth would just have been an exercise in hitting a short iron and watching it bounce to the back of the green, and the fifth would have been almost driveable.  Most of all, though, I hated the thought of not using the ground where #5 sits today ... it was a beautiful little valley of dune grass with no gorse in sight, which made it a rare oasis before the gorse fire.

The other reason that we had avoided that area was that Mr. Keiser was uncomfortable with hole #6 as a very short par-4 of around 290 yards.  He just didn't see what was going to make it an exciting hole -- to his defense, it was buried in gorse and you couldn't see much of it other than the green site.  I had drawn that hole on my original plan before walking the site -- it's one of four which wound up making the final cut, along with #11 and #16 and the green site for #10, which I'll explain next week.  But it almost didn't make it, until I realized that the routing as approved had some flaws.

I did send Mike the two versions of the routing and told him I liked the current version better, but he was uncertain, since he had walked it the other way.  So, when Jim Urbina and I got out there in early January to start construction, we discussed the situation, and we agreed that Mike would never see the merits of #5 in the dunegrass, unless we went ahead and showed him what it could be.  So ... the first hole we built at Pacific Dunes was the one Mike hadn't approved.    We figured we could always erase our work if Mike didn't like it.  When he came out two weeks into construction, he liked it, and we were off to the races.

We solved Mike's concerns on #6 by building the tee a little farther back than I had originally drawn, in a crowded triangle between 5 and 9.

That's the kind of stuff you'll find in my book if it ever gets to print.