Riviera, WOW!

[Chip Gaskins]

So much for HD video on TV.  Riviera is much better than TV shows.

Never have I played 4 hours in such bliss, anywhere!

Being 100 feet below the real world is special (even in LA) the river bed that Riviera is built on is one of the coolest places in golf.

I did not find the Kikuyu as hard as everyone had said it would be, but I did grow with Bermuda rough in the south.

The bunkers are DEEP, as deep as Augusta, if not deeper.  After talking with the folks there it sounds like the sand builds up around the traps over time and the Kikuyu sticks to it and just gets deeper and deeper.

I realize Fazio has been working on Riviera over the past few years....and that #8 may or may not be in the spirit of Thomas.  I personally thought it was a fabulous hole.



Several of the highlights:

#5 Par 4


#7 Par 4 with the coolest fairway movement and bunkering...


#15 is one of the best par 4s I have ever played.


#16


#18


Oh, and apologies to all of my friends on the west coast...the 10th is way overrated.  The green is WAAAAYYY to small for anything other than a little chip shot.  No one without a scratch handicap can actually hit that green from over 60 yards.  It makes Augusta #12 look huge.

tee shot #10


green from behind

[Ben Sims]

Chip,

I felt the same way about the Kikuyu.  I also felt like the ebb and flow of Riviera is pretty special.  Going to #5 from a hole like 3.  Then the cool, quirky #6 to the difficult uphill #9.

Maybe I'm taking your comments on #10 like a bass on a buzzbait, but...

WHAT!?!?  

Dude, that hole is pretty dang cool.  There are many folks here who know Riviera very intimately, and I have NEVER heard anyone say anything but great things about that hole.  

[Chip Gaskins]

Ben

I realize I am going very very much against the grain on #10, but to me I saw only one way to play it.  Hit is far as you can and just left of the green.  Then chip it on and putt.

If you hit a long iron off the tee and try to hit a full wedge in, I can't see many people hitting the putting surface...and that was with the "safe" play.  The green is something like 15-20 feet from front to back over the bunker (and most of the green).

Hey, I love Geoff, Tommy, and all of the Thomas West Coast guys, but I am willing to say the green is simply too small for anything over a chip shot...and I say that knowing I may not be invited back west of the Rocky Mts. :-)

Chip

[Ben Sims]

Ben

I realize I am going very very much against the grain on #10, but to me I saw only one way to play it.  Hit is far as you can and just left of the green.  Then chip it on and putt.

If you hit a long iron off the tee and try to hit a full wedge in, I can't see many people hitting the putting surface...and that was with the "safe" play.  The green is something like 15-20 feet from front to back over the bunker (and most of the green).

Hey, I love Geoff, Tommy, and all of the Thomas West Coast guys, but I am willing to say the green is simply too small for anything over a chip shot...and I say that knowing I may not be invited back west of the Rocky Mts. :-)

Chip

Chip,

I played it twice--okay fine, two tee balls in same round.  I hit a slice driver to the right of the green in between the bunker and extra green.  Then I hit a perfect 220 yard 4 iron left middle.  I hit the wedge shot from the iron to the collection area short and left of the green.  I hit my flop shot from my driver tee shot onto the green, but it slopes away, to the collection area on the left. 

Moral of story, it affords several options off the tee, but all of the second shots must be exacting.  Sometimes a golf hole just asks you to execute.  But at least there are options. 

[TEPaul]

Chip:

You know I got dropped off at Riviera one morning not long after dawn and I spent the morning slowly walking and studying it and chatting with the super about once every third hole or so. It was one of the most ethereal experiences I've ever had on a golf course for a number of reasons. It is so beautiful, unique and interesting for a number of reasons and it still sure looks that way in your beautiful photos of it but I just have to say it just doesn't look anywhere near as good for a whole lot of reasons as it once did and in black and white too.

[Alex Miller]

Chip:

I played Riviera twice before Fazio came in most recently. I agree with all your praise, especially #15 and #7, both underrated very cool holes that get little talk.

It is hard to take your criticism of 10 seriously though because you praised 8. Actually it's understandable, 8 is still a good hole, but you should've seen it before. I think 10's green is VERY small, but u said it yourself, u can play way left and approach the green. I think you might be overlooking the genius of it because you figured out the smarter play quicker than most. Those not as cerebral as yourself really get penalized, and that's what makes it a great hole. 

[Chip Gaskins]

Alex-

Fair enough.  You point out ONE option....just as I did. Long and left is the way to play the hole.  Pretty easy chip shot to the widest angle of the green.

I was just thinking there were multiple "good" options.  I just didn't see all those options.  Maybe I just need a lower handicap to see those options?

Chip

[Bob_Huntley]

Chip,

Back in the early seventies I was a member at Riviera and lived on the rim above the back of the 12th tee. In the early summer evenings  iI would  take my two English Bull Terriers and  play 12, 13, 9, 10 and 11 back to the house. I had the place to myself and thought if heaven wasn't like this I didn't want to go.

I was never long enough to go for ten off the tee , played it left, wedged in and hoped for a two putt. The only way to play the hole.

I haven't been back in 35 years..

Bob

[Chip Gaskins]

Bob-

You live a life I can only aspire to...something so good that you don't even worry yourself to go back to the riverbed in Pacific Palisades.

You are a lucky man to call Monterey home!

Riviera is still great today.  And those holes you mention are the ones that have the most seclusion on the course.  I can't imagine a daily diet of that to end my day.  Life couldn't get much better....until Monterey!

Cheers,
Chip

[TEPaul]

"If you hit a long iron off the tee and try to hit a full wedge in, I can't see many people hitting the putting surface...and that was with the "safe" play.  The green is something like 15-20 feet from front to back over the bunker (and most of the green).

Hey, I love Geoff, Tommy, and all of the Thomas West Coast guys, but I am willing to say the green is simply too small for anything over a chip shot...and I say that knowing I may not be invited back west of the Rocky Mts. :-)"


Oh come on. I have years of tapes of the LA Open and they show it's not all that hard to stop it on that green. One pro, I think in a play-off, even managed to stop it to a back pin from the right of the right bunker and make the putt. Do you have to hit a great shot to do it? Well yeah, but DUH, the hole is distance drivable by good players!


I'll tell you what---even if Iv'e never seen it as an intentional strategy some of these guys are so long today an interesting strategy may be to just try to put a tee shot in the back bunker and approach from there!

I'll tell you something else I think might be cool on that hole is to just take out the right greenside bunker because it isn't Thomas original and see how that would play. I'd start by putting it into short grass to see how they'd manage a shot up over that right greenside rise to a green that shallow from that angle.

All and all that hole is probably in a architectural class of its own for a short par 4 and particularly considering 97% of the hole is on pretty blah topography!

[Adam Clayman]

Chip, See that brown patina on some of the Kikuyu?

That's dormancy. KK is much more playable in the winter time.

[Chip Gaskins]

Tom

Maybe the pros....not many others.

Also, I think Phil even hit it left this year one day, and then laid the sod over a chip/pitch shot trying to get cute and hit a few feet in front of him.

Its a hard hole.

Chip

[Chip Gaskins]

Chip, See that brown patina on some of the Kikuyu?

That's dormancy. KK is much more playable in the winter time.

Fair enough,  I knew it wasn't playing as hard as it could.  But we did play it a week or so after the LA Open.

[Alex Miller]

Also, it's not like Riviera has Bent greens, they have Poa (if I recall   ) Poa has a softer stickier first bounce than many other grasses. So with a full wedge I don't think it's asking too much of a player to stop a shot quickly.

[TEPaul]

"Tom
Maybe the pros....not many others."


Chip:


Yeah, I know but that's what's so cool about it.

There's this great guy in my club who ran Sunoco who was out there for years and I asked him what he thought about it. He told me it was the most confounding, God-damnedest, Son-of-bitch, inscrutable beautful little golf hole of his acquaintence------and I love that great quote about it that I wish I had available for accuracy but it was something along the lines of the hole was like a hussey/hooker/whore at the end of the bar with a butt dangling from her lips and a drink in her hand giving you that irresistable meretricious-allure "come hither" look to come on down and try her out!

[TEPaul]

Or Chip, there is one other response to your analysis of Riv #10 and that is you're a God-dang-it f...in' whimp of a golfer who needs to have his golfer stripes ripped all the way off to a buck necked PriVAT!

Plus, do you really want to take on that maniacal ultra swat team of golf architectural commentators from the West Coast mentioned on this thread earlier?

[Michael Robin]

Chip -

When Coore & Crenshaw re-did the greens in the early '80s, they restored a little backstop on the back left of the green. That backstop made the big right side fairway make sense to me. If you play left, you are challenged in terms of accuracy with your short shot, but you have some leeway with distance control. If you go right, you are challenged with distance control and have leeway in left/right accuracy. Or you could just try and drive the green in the right wind. The removal of that backstop recently by the Fazio group makes the right fairway not make much sense again.

Little changes make a BIG difference.

[Michael Taylor]

Chip,

Thanks for the photos.

Can you sum up in 1 sentence, in your own opinion, what makes Riviera great?

I see you didn't include 6 in your highlight reel. Did you not like that hole?

As for 10, what index does the hole rate anyway? Also for the people that know Riviera well, is it actually possible to stop a ball from the RHS? What is the best way to play the hole? Does attempting to drive the green ever pay off, or reap a substantial reward?

What are your thoughts on 18 Chip?

Does 8 feel out of character with the rest of the course?

Thanks,

Pup

[Wade Whitehead]

Chip:

Thanks for posting.  I've got a free Sunday afternoon in L.A. in May and am hoping to visit Riviera.  I look forward to comparing our notes if I can work it out.

WW

[John Mayhugh]

Ben

I realize I am going very very much against the grain on #10, but to me I saw only one way to play it.  Hit is far as you can and just left of the green.  Then chip it on and putt.

If you hit a long iron off the tee and try to hit a full wedge in, I can't see many people hitting the putting surface...and that was with the "safe" play.  The green is something like 15-20 feet from front to back over the bunker (and most of the green).

Hey, I love Geoff, Tommy, and all of the Thomas West Coast guys, but I am willing to say the green is simply too small for anything over a chip shot...and I say that knowing I may not be invited back west of the Rocky Mts. :-)

Chip

You may be right that this is the best way to play the hole, but I don't think most people could commit so easily.  Part of the genius of the hole is that it tempts one to try all sorts of strategies, and I doubt any of them feel satisfying.

It seems that if I played Riviera regularly, I would keep trying different kinds of tee shots there.  And just when I thought I had figured it out, I would screw up an approach and start all over.

[jonathan_becker]

Chip,

Thanks for the photos. 

Now, I have to ask a stupid question....

How long do the trees on holes #5, #7, #15, stay with the leaves off of them?  I thought there were only 2 seasons out there....warm and less warm.  I've only been to California a couple times, but it's just strange to me that those trees don't have leaves year round and yet every other tree on the course does.

Any experts in dendrology out there?

[JESII]

It always seemed to me that you would have to decide which club you were more accurate with...your driver or your wedge...and if you didn't then follow up with a good shot you'd immediately second guess yourself because it really seems like a hole you should make a three on.

I haven't been there, but it looks like you can get in trouble with the driver, no? Is it feasible to hit it somewhere that you'd have to work hard to make a 5?

Seems like a hole that would always leave you second guessing as you walked off, or thought about later.

[Matthew Petersen]

What I like about the tenth is that it's a difficult short hole. So many short/driveable par 4s are really just holes with many different ways to make birdie. The risk/reward type of short hole almost always uses water as the penal risk factor.

Not so with the 10th at Riviera. There are lots of ways to play that hole but none of them make it "easy." Laying up on the hole doesn't guarantee a routine short iron or wedge. It requires a very precise shot. Your other option is to try to hit a very precise drive that leaves you either a putt or a relatively straightforward chip.

[Terry Lavin]

The "wow" factor is undeniably huge at Riviera, just as it is at LACC, the Olympic Club, San Francisco Golf Club, Pebble Beach, Spyglass and Cypress, just to mention six courses.  What a state for playing golf!

[Chip Gaskins]

Can you sum up in 1 sentence, in your own opinion, what makes Riviera great?

I see you didn't include 6 in your highlight reel. Did you not like that hole?

As for 10, what index does the hole rate anyway? Also for the people that know Riviera well, is it actually possible to stop a ball from the RHS? What is the best way to play the hole? Does attempting to drive the green ever pay off, or reap a substantial reward?

What are your thoughts on 18 Chip?

Does 8 feel out of character with the rest of the course?

The biggest thing that jumps out making Riviera great is the land form the course sits in.  I realize this is a architecture website, but the ability to play golf in the middle of a city with millions and millions of people and not see or hear a car, horn, anything is really cool. Plus the golf course is off the charts good too...

18 was much longer than I expected.  I saw Freddie hit a wedge (albeit into the tree) last year at the LA Open....However I had 218 in, ouch!

8 is a really cool hole.  we stood on the tee trying to figure out which way to play it.  the second shot looked a lot harder coming in from the right so we played over to the left.  unfortunately ended up dead in the middle of the sandy river basin (which is only a few yards wide?).