Fast & Firm Vs. Distance Dilemma

[JSPayne]

It seems like these two arguements, which regularly come up in this forum, are at odds with each other.

Everyone thinks the increasing distance players are able to hit the ball is a problem, whether it be a result of the clubs, the ball, personal fitness or other factors.

Everyone also seems to think that moving more towards universal firm and fast conditions on all courses is the right move to make regarding golf course conditioning.

Yet I think a very strong arguement could be made that very tightly cut, super firm and super fast fairways are a large contributing factor to the driving yardages that everyone gets so caught up in. I've even heard arguements/suggestions in these discussions that it may not be unreasonable to actually grow fairways longer and/or water them down more (horribly bad idea IMO, but a suggestion nonetheless) to prevent getting so much roll/distance on these drives.

So if these two dilemmas within our game/industry are at odds with each other, how do we combat distance while still striving for firm and fast conditioning? Do rennovations need to focus more on changing the original design intentions of the hole as opposed to just pushing the tees back? Do additional hazards or architectual features need to be added to penalize tee shots that aren't perfect? How do you balance the fact that your average paying golfer may enjoy the reward the firm & fast gives them on a well-struck shot by providing extra yardage, yet rein back the young and professional sub-scratch golfers who can use firm & fast to pull off 350+ yard drives?

People seem astonished that professional and other major events display players who consistantly bomb the ball a mile off the tee, yet often fail to see that the fairways are cut about as tight as most public course greens and are as firm as a rock because they haven't been watered for 2 weeks prior to the event as well. Granted they're only 20 yards wide, but if an average player could stripe it down one of those fairways he'd probably roll out 300+ as well, just due to conditioning.

We could roll back the ball and/or the clubs, but even a balata hit with a persimmon will go 300+ on concrete.

[Joe Hancock]

JSP,

I think the terrain of individual courses plays a part of this discussion.

For example, let's look at Medinah. The terrain there isn't super dramatic, but there is enough side slope and other features on the fairways that could and should affect drives...if it wasn't so soft. If the landing areas have some sort of side kicking feature, and the conditions are firm(not even necessarily "fast") the likelyhood that the pros would throttle back and play more defensively would increase. They may even use something less than driver if the land features are less dramatic(or consequential) further back in the fairway.

On dead flat parcels, I'm afraid it always has been, and always will be, bombs away.

So put me in the camp of drying things out, firming them up(not just for two weeks before a tourney...do it all the time) instead of looking for more distance. The act of firming up won't just positively affect the long and straight, it will negatively affect the long and crooked....and I think this happens often enough that even the big boys might tighten up a bit under firm conditioning.

Joe

[Sean_A]

JSP

As an ancillary to Crazy Joe's proposition, a critical aspect of how top players today gain yardage is by carrying the ball.  Most of the top players can carry the ball at least 275 yards and on softer fairways they as soft as angels.  If a guy has to gain his yards by looking to run his drive 40 or 50 yards it isn't hard to create interest and challenge that is varied.  Regardless, I say firm things up and don't worry so much about flat bellies. 

Ciao

[Mark Bourgeois]

The ultimate test of a championship golfer is control of his ball, both through the green and on the green.  F+F, along with the elements (wind), is analogous to the role of a catalyst in a chemical reaction: it transforms the architecture without technically being part of the architecture. 

F+F on crappy architecture doesn't separate golfers but F+F on great architecture does.  F+F does not merely enable the full expression of a course's bunkering and angles.  It enables what David Eger notes is one of the two strongest defenses a course possesses against Tour-level golfers: gravity.

If F+F reduces the challenge, the architecture is suspect: res ipsa loquitur.

cf: Hoylake, 2006.

[Brent Hutto]

Don't conflate the holding of strong opinions about course maintenance with giving a damn about what happens on the PGA Tour or in the US Amateur. Firm greens, especially firm approaches and as a lesser matter firm fairways are more fun to play golf on. That's why so many of us go on and on about what a pity it is that firmness is not more widely valued among those calling the shots on golf-course maintenance practices.

But I for one wouldn't care if firm-and-fast forced the PGA tour to play on 20,000 yard courses. I don't play the courses they play, I don't watch them play and I certainly don't approve of the fact that the wishes of elite players tend to dominate discussion of everything to do with the game I go out and piddle around with for fun every weekend.

[Niall C]

The ultimate test of a championship golfer is control of his ball, both through the green and on the green.  F+F, along with the elements (wind), is analogous to the role of a catalyst in a chemical reaction: it transforms the architecture without technically being part of the architecture. 

F+F on crappy architecture doesn't separate golfers but F+F on great architecture does.  F+F does not merely enable the full expression of a course's bunkering and angles.  It enables what David Eger notes is one of the two strongest defenses a course possesses against Tour-level golfers: gravity.

If F+F reduces the challenge, the architecture is suspect: res ipsa loquitur.

cf: Hoylake, 2006.

If I could understand this statement I suspect that I would strongly agree with it. The phrase that suggests I would is "control of the golf ball". Just because f and f gives you more distance doesn't necessarily make the course easier.

Niall

[Sean Leary]

Whenever I watch golf on TV, it seems like the ball usually runs like crazy on drives. Much more than mine do. Yes there are bombers but a lot of the guys that hit it 300 yards do not carry it near 300...

FWIW. I play occasionally with someone who play on the Nationwide tour. He noted thatdriving averages are very much inflated on the top tours because of the firm fairways they play on.

[Mike Vegis @ Kiawah]

I've always said that they way to get The Ocean Course to play its most difficult is to totally eliminate rough and get the fairways super hard and stimping at around 8.  The bombers or any wayward drive couldn't help but find trouble, especially if the wind was up.

[Steve Salmen]

I think Open scores do a pretty good job of showing the difference between FF and soft conditions.  How many times has it happened?  03 and 09 US Opens are good examples of how many people went low in the beginning of the week when conditions were quite wet.  As the courses dried, scoring went up.

I think this shows that increased distance does not help if conditions are firm and fast.  In 2005 Cory Pavin and John Daly won the Opens.  Both events were played under FF conditions.  One champion was the shortest hitter in the field (of those that made the cut), the other was the longest.  FF conditions don't seem to discriminate regarding distance.

Let's use the 06 Open Championship as another example.  Tiger didn't use driver because under those FF conditions, a ball hit a little off line would eventually find some kind of trouble.  I think he won because he took more trouble out of play than anyone else. 

[Jud_T]

Steve,

I thought the only major JD won in 2005 was the Hooters Masters of Beer Chugging 

[Steve Salmen]

Correction:  Pavin and Daly won the 1995 Opens.  Sorry about that.

[TEPaul]

"People seem astonished that professional and other major events display players who consistantly bomb the ball a mile off the tee, yet often fail to see that the fairways are cut about as tight as most public course greens and are as firm as a rock because they haven't been watered for 2 weeks prior to the event as well. Granted they're only 20 yards wide, but if an average player could stripe it down one of those fairways he'd probably roll out 300+ as well, just due to conditioning."


JSPayne:

I'm not in the slightest bit astonished or surprised that a good deal of the total distance we see some of these tour pros bomb it off the tee is the result of a new found bounce and rollout because of the renewed interest in F&F conditions that didn't often exist on the tour stops even a few years ago. For any of these people who claim the sky is failing on existing architecture with increased distance and that it is all the fault of the USGA/R&A because they allowed I&B to get out of control really aren't using their eyes and commonsense, in my opinion!


Actually, the USGA ODS standard (302  yards at 120MPH) factors in a set certain amount of bounce and rollout but it certainly isn't always the same or even more or less than we might see in any particular week on TV or anywhere else!

[Chris Tritabaugh]

This came up at our course two seasons ago when our maintenance practices changed from soft & soggy to firm & fast. Initial complaints that first season where that everyone was hitting the ball too far and the course was going to be too easy. Two years later people wonder why the golf course is so difficult and why they cannot shoot the scores they used to shoot. Fast & firm biggest equalizer of golfing skills. It all but eliminates the advantage of the long hitters and forces them to control their games. If you cannot play the game with great control on a fast and firm course you are not going to score well.

[TEPaul]

ChrisT:

What you said and experienced with your course is of course the case across the board but those F&F conditions do have to be applied throughout to make the challenge work well. Firm and Fast "through the green" really doesn't cut it that well unless the firmness of the green surfaces is done correctly. I say a light dent from a really good 9 iron from a good player is a pretty accurate barometer of ideal green surface firmness to match F&F through the green. Of course those approaches certainly have to bounce and roll too.

[Tom_Doak]

To me there is no dilemma.  The average player (and especially the average woman player) gets way more benefit out of fast and firm fairways than the good player does, so it's a no-brainer that most clubs should move in that direction.  Whether it makes the course play shorter for the low-handicapper is irrelevant, as long as it doesn't help him MORE than it helps everyone else.

[Jud_T]

TDoak-but it won't be green and pretty like Augusta in HD

[Sean_A]

The bottom line is proper F&F conditions make angles matter; be it an angle created by rough, sand, wind, a bump, a hollow - whatever.  Even the best players should be looking for the best angles and therefore they are also thinking where not to miss it.  If a course is f&f and of good strategic merit it ain't hard to get the flat bellies thinking.  That isn't to say that there won't be good scores achieved, but it would also be easy for the careless/over-aggressive player to leak shots left and right. 

Ciao

[Shannon Wheeler]

Who would ever stimp a fairway? Really?

[Jud_T]

It's pretty simple: F&F is cheaper, fairer, more fun and better for the environment.

[Kenny Baer]

I would argue that most every course in the world plays more difficult when it is f&f, especially for the better players.  I guess a course with no doglegs and holes that were dead straight would play easier.  The pros say when Augusta plays hardest is when the course plays fastest. 

[JSPayne]

I agree on all points......fast and firm is the way to go because it provides the maximum benefits to the most aspects of golf, from architecture, turf health, playability, fun factor, increased distance for the average golfer, etc.

So is everyone on here saying that if all PGA tour stop courses make a move toward these consistant F&F conditions that demands for rollback of the ball/club will cease because the creation of F&F will negate the advantage that the pros have with their increased distance played into soft and soggy surfaces? Or does the distance problem still exist, regardless?

And if the distance problem is thought to still exist regardless of conditioning, I refer back to my original proposal: shouldn't architecture, new and rennovated, try to encourage F&F while making design adjustments that don't just involve moving tees back, but by creating more effective use of the F&F conditions (fairway tilt, better placed bunkers or high rough, more undulating and close cut surrounds, etc) in order to put more emphasis on control, as was mentioned above, to take away the option of just bombing the ball over all danger?

I think a previous poster hit the nail on the head: I don't think Tiger's win at The Open when he opted to throttle back and hardly hit driver off the tee was any less impressive than any win he had killing the driver off the tee on every hole. More set-ups on more courses that played like the Old Course at that event would do nothing but benefit the F&F cause and enlighten the golfing public to newfound joys of playing CREATIVE golf, which I think every member of this DG would love to see happen. And I think it could easily be said that is was more the architecture and placement of hazards on that course, than the lengthening, that caused Tiger to play it as he did.

[Jeff Goldman]

I think Open scores do a pretty good job of showing the difference between FF and soft conditions.  How many times has it happened?  03 and 09 US Opens are good examples of how many people went low in the beginning of the week when conditions were quite wet.  As the courses dried, scoring went up.

I think this shows that increased distance does not help if conditions are firm and fast.  In 2005 Cory Pavin and John Daly won the Opens.  Both events were played under FF conditions.  One champion was the shortest hitter in the field (of those that made the cut), the other was the longest.  FF conditions don't seem to discriminate regarding distance.

Let's use the 06 Open Championship as another example.  Tiger didn't use driver because under those FF conditions, a ball hit a little off line would eventually find some kind of trouble.  I think he won because he took more trouble out of play than anyone else. 

Exactly right.  In 2008, the Fighting Illini Invitational golf event we have every year was played after horrific rains the week before, and was soft, slow, with lots of rough.  Winning team score was +12.  This past September, the place was very firm, with very little rough, but nevertheless the winning score was +30.  Balls were rolling out into fairway bunkers, and shots had to be very precisely hit to stay on the greens.