Rolling Green Golf Club Completes Restoration Project (now w/ before/after pics)

[Joe Bausch]

Here is a 'before' shot of the FW bunkers on 18:



And 'after':

[Joe Hancock]

Mayday,

Was there much discussion about whether to leave or take out trees on the corner of the dogleg on #18?

It all looks very good. I hope the membership appreciates the diligence and hard work it took to balance the return of the original work with the desire to upgrade for modern equipment.

Nice Job to the Forse/ Nagle team!

Joe

[mike_malone]

 The drive to make #18 a par 4 increases the pressure for more tree removal on the right. But, I believe it was better to remove trees on the left which enhances the 3 shot nature of the hole and recovers Flynn's ideas. You can't see in this photo the significant tree removal just off of the tee on the left. This is wonderful because it allows you to hit the ball away from the line of play without penalty. What the proponents of par 4 for this hole are missing is the narrowness as you approach the green. This cannot be changed because of the essential nature of the trees on both sides. This narrowness comes into play on one's layup. Unfortunately, we have placed a new bunker directly where the average golfer is supposed to hit the ball.

    As for responding to technology, Flynn wrote about that in the 20's!!!. Where possible he allowed for moving the tees back.

   I think fairway expansion on undulating property is a great response to technology. With the ability to maintain firm and fast conditions compared with 75 years ago , allowing balls to move through the fairway to more challenging positions is great.


       Adding bunkers is not my idea of "responding to technology". The new bunkers play completely differently for different skill levels. In fact, they hardly affect the most skilled golfers and totally change the intended strategies for the average golfer.

[Bill Shotzbarger]

I played Rolling Green today for the third time. It was the first since the recent renovations.

The course is amazing and a joy to walk. In one sentence, the changes make it a little easier than before but a lot more fun to play.

[Sean_A]

Thanks for the pix Joe. 

Maybe its me, but I think the bunker scheme needs a total re-think.  I am probably wrong, but RG seems to have a different type of bunker scheme to other Flynns shown on this site, but I don't know if this was intentional on Flynn's part or even if the membership wants an exact Flynn as he designed assuming these bunkers are true to Flynn.  Rolling Green is a very hilly property with some wonderful green sites that imo is let down big time by the bunkering and trees.  I also prefer the roll over grass look of the old bunkers. 

Ciao

[Jay Flemma]

Congratulations, guys.  I had a great time there and thought it was marvelous.  It was a great bookend to our GCA Beechtree weekend last year.  Great stuff Mayday, Joe.

[Rory Connaughton]

Sean

  Curious about your comment re the bunker scheme. I see loads of similarities between the scheme employed at RG and other Flynn's especially my home course.  What differences are you seeing?

[tlavin]

This is yet another example of thoughtful and relatively minor (in scale) restoration work that leaves the golf course in a condition that is at once more visually pleasing, more playable and more challenging in many respects.

[Matt Dupre]

Sean,

The bunkering is now very close to what we have on the overhead photos (with the exception of the new ones, obviously), and the flashed faces are a restoration.  I also think they are consistent with other Flynn's in Philadelphia - especially Philadelphia CC and Huntingdon Valley.  Even the "white faces of Merion."  The beauty of Flynn's bunkering at Rolling Green is directly attributable, IMO, to their fit with the ground.  There isn't a greenside bunker that looks out of place, and the rolled grass we had previously almost completely erased the visual nature of some of those hazards.

The membership, and most people who have played it "before" and "after", are thrilled with the way the course looks - and those who have a clue are thrilled with the way the "look" makes you think your way around.

[John Gosselin]

Mayday,

I am curious if  you think the top sand lines are at the same elevation as they were originally and the depths of the bunker floors are the same as originally?

[mike_malone]

I think that the fairway bunkers may not reflect the original scale but the restored greenside bunkers at #1,3,5, and 10 are completely based on original intent.

   Certainly the bunkers added on #7, 17, and 18 are not Flynn ideas for this course.

[Scott Warren]

Mayday,

I gotta say, you way undersold this place when you were telling me about it last week! It looks awesome. Good to see a course getting wider and losing trees. Some of those green sites look unreal.

Hope you enjoyed the rest of your UK odyssey.

cheers,
Scott

[mike_malone]

John,

     I doubt it. Forse Design presented to the club that they overlayed the original photos onto the original designs to replicate shape and perimeter size. They did not speak to depth as far as I can recall.



   Scott,

    That's the first time I have been accused of that.

 

[John Gosselin]

I think that the fairway bunkers may not reflect the original scale but the restored green side bunkers at #1,3,5, and 10 are completely based on original intent.

  Not sure what you mean by this.

The bunkers on #1 and #3 were split within the first few years of the courses existence. Do you think they split them because they had nothing better to do or do you think there may have been an agronomic or playability issue? Do you think Flynn was involved? Do you think the new bunkers play the same in terms of height of sand faces and floor depths as original?

Believe it or not a great deal of research went into the last bunker redo by myself, Gill Hanse and several members of RG. We just took a different approach based more on evolution of the bunkers and their surrounds rather than aesthetics. We went back and forth on the sand lines and where they should be is why I asked my earlier question. We chose to keep them where they Flynn had them and keep grass on the evolutionary build up. Similar to the approach Merion took a few years later.

It is disheartening to run into members of RG now and hear how we butchered the bunkers and now they look just like the old photographs. We certainly could have done that as well we just did not think at the time it was the right thing to do. We wanted to preserve them and treat them as antiques.

We considered and debated lots of other factors before we chose the course of action that we did. I guess we are all a lot smarter 12 years later.


http://turf.lib.msu.edu/2000s/2000/000530.pdf




Anyway the latest version looks great and the added legth is fantastic. 

[Scott Warren]

John, I have to ask: are you that John Gosselin?

[mike_malone]

Scott,

   He is not.


    John,


       I always loved the bunker work you did. I don't have the information about original depths.

[John Gosselin]

Scott, yes, now that I dumped Kate and don't have to put up with all those kids I can take the time to post on GCA.

[John Gosselin]

Mayday, I just get defensive when it comes to RG since it is one of my favorite places in golf. The membership was fantastic and we worked hard to protect Flynn's work back when most did not know who Flynn was.

[mike_malone]

 As for the splitting of the bunkers early on, I can only guess as to the reason.My feeling is that the original was wilder and gives us some disctinctiveness. I tried to find old minutes in the past but had no luck. So, I don't know about Flynn's involvement.Of the several articles that Joe Bausch has found about early RG work none has mentioned Flynn.

[JNagle]

Regarding bunker depth and/or outline.  In many instances we chased the outline of old sand found below the bottoms of the previous bunker construction (that could have been completed anytime over the 80+ years).  This was not entirely intentional, nor was it a short-coming of the previous bunker work.  We were digging many of the bunkers looking for the old sand and found it on holes such as 4, 5, 10 and 16.  This is what created deeper bunkers on many of the holes.  You can overlay old photos with new photos, but there is still some field changes that have to be made to adjust for current conditions.

[Jim_Coleman]

I find it surprising that some believe that the renovation has made the course "easier and more playable."  I think most members would disagree, especially those with handicaps over 10.  Yes, the tree removal has made a couple of holes easier - especially #'s 5, 11 and 12 for those that have the length to hit it where the trees used to be.  But the bunkers are probably 30-50% larger than before, not to mention deeper, and are catching more shots.  I would say that, overall, it's about a wash from the tees that did not change.  And, of course, the course got much harder from the new, longer tees.  Apparently however, the raters think it got harder, as RG's new rating from the unchanged white and blue tees will cause everyone's handicap to drop almost a stroke next year, when they go into effect.

[Dan Herrmann]

Jim,
Unless, of course, their average scores go up

[mike_malone]

Jim,

   I'm not much for the "harder" versus "easier" game but #12 is a much better hole now, imo. Now one can be in middle of #9 fairway with a 150+ shot off a downhill lie and as one moves away from the green the approach directly into the green brings into play two problems---right or left. When the evergreens were there the hole , from the left side, was like every other hole in the area---pitch out into the fairway and then hit a wedge to the green.

    From the right side one would avoid the trees if they couldn't carry them. This eliminated the design at the green.


      Now we just need to remove the left fairway bunker, expand that fairway toward the creek and let good players go for that area. That hole was always intended to have bunkers on only one side of the fairway.

     I believe the bunkers are playing easier. The bottoms are flatter which leads to a more consistent and predictable shot. Once we solve the plugging problem in the faces I think you will see most balls hitting into the sides of the bunkers and rolling onto the flat bottoms. I wish we had more variable slopes on the bunker floors.


  As for #5 there is now a shot that again is one of the best on the course. If you go too far left you need to hook the ball around the trees and go over the right greenside bunker to reach the green. Before you had one of those typical tree shots---punch out or try to hit a low runner---snooze!


    Do you mean handicaps wil rise?

 

[Mark_Fine]

Cool before and after photos.  John Gosselin, I was wondering the same thing.  Also, who did the bunkers in the before photos?  If my memory serves me correctly, weren't they re-done not too long ago (in the last eight or ten years)?  Who was the architect?

[mike_malone]

Mark,

     John did #13 through #16 in house. McDonald did all of the rest ------without an architect!