St. Andrews' Par Threes

[Wade Whitehead]

At what other major championship layout(s) do par threes play as little a role as they do at The Old Course?

WW

[Wade Whitehead]

PS Before I'm asked, I haven't played TOC.

[Bill_McBride]

No other major course only has two!

[Mark Chaplin]

Do they play so little part? 175 and 174 yards respectively yet they were the 8th and 5th hardest holes.

[Jeff Taylor]

11 is one of the best par 3's I hvae ever played. The eighth just never set up to be more than a transition hole to #9. The weather diluted it's potential.

[Bob_Huntley]

Having played the 11th close to a hundred times, I can think of few par threes of similar length on any Major venue anywhere in the world, that can cause havoc to one's score.


Bob

[Tom_Doak]

I was surprised watching the play at 11 this week.  It seemed like they cut the hole further right than I've seen before, and certainly, the right side of the green going over to #7 seemed like it was more in play than ever before.  I wonder if anyone went in the Hill bunker to the left the whole week?

[Kevin Pallier]

At what other major championship layout(s) do par threes play as little a role as they do at The Old Course?

WW

WW

Could you expand what you mean by "as little a role" ?

[Bill_McBride]

I was surprised watching the play at 11 this week.  It seemed like they cut the hole further right than I've seen before, and certainly, the right side of the green going over to #7 seemed like it was more in play than ever before.  I wonder if anyone went in the Hill bunker to the left the whole week?

I think they were far right a lot because the strong wind was left to right off Hill bunker, and they were afraid to play much left of Strath because of Hill bunker!  The only option was 30' right of the pin.  I can't imagine one of those players actually hitting into Hill.

The time I played the reverse Old Course, the wind was dead in the opposite direction and fierce!  The 7th in Reverse is 13 tee to 11 pin.  Brutal carrying Hill Bunker onto the green.

[Wade Whitehead]

Could you expand what you mean by "as little a role" ?

As far as I can tell, they hosted no real momentum shifts, produced no unusually low or high scores, and presented very little relative challenge to the field (outside their brief response conditions that lead to suspension of play).

The field seemed to stride through them, no better or worse than they were before.

My perception may be influenced by limited television coverage or this week's pin positions or having just two Par Threes on the card; under any explanation, they seem to have less influence on the outcome of the Open than do par threes at other major venues.

WW

[Kevin Pallier]

WW

Thanks for that - I appreciate that given that there are only two P3's at TOC they need to be viewed in that context.

For mine - #8 is a pretty nonchalant hole though #11 I am a huge fan of and I was interested to see they were both ranked within the hardest eight holes in the Championship - with the wind of course - playing a huge role in that result. Birdies were only yielded 7% and 5% of the time respectively.

I had 5mins to spare so I quickly looked up Augusta's 6th and 16th holes as a point of comparison given that they are of similar lengths (180 and 170 yds respectively) to gauge their relative results. Obviously completely different tournaments and fields but I was interested to see that TOC holes averaged harder than those above at Augusta for this years event (3.14 & 3.08). Birdies+ were much more forthcomming at the Augusta holes = 11% and 17% of the time respectively. 

I'd hazard a guess that the pro's under the conditions presented at TOC would have been more than happy to walk off with their par.

[Tony_Chapman]

We shouldn't forget about the other two par-3's on the Old Course, the 9th and the 18th. Would the course be "better" if those both played about 260-295 and the par around St. Andrews was 70? I loved what Watson said when Casey and Louis got to "the Loop" in that he thought Casey needed to play all those holes in "3" to have a chance. Couldn't have agreed more.

[Jim Nugent]

Do they play so little part? 175 and 174 yards respectively yet they were the 8th and 5th hardest holes.

Par 3s usually are among the hardest holes.  So this is not unusual.  Now add the fact that TOC only has two par 3s.  Backs up ww's point/question in the first post. 

We often ask how to make courses hard for scratch, but playable for bogey.  Add more par 3s.  They typically play toughest for the pros, but easiest for the average guy.  Also build fewer par 5s. 

[Wade Whitehead]

Good points, all.

Both par threes ranking in the eight hardest holes doesn't really say much in my view.  The "eighth-hardest hole" is, after all, average in a group of eighteen.  Besides, there just didn't seem to be the possibility that any particularly low or high score would be made on either of the holes; players seemed to arrive at the tee, hit a shot on or next to the green, proceed with par or so.

By "role," though, I mean more than score relative to par.  I'm including intangibles like those presented by 12 at Augusta.  17 and 18 at TOC present this; on those holes, anything can happen when things are on the line.

As to the suggestion that 9 and 18 be changed to Par 3s, I disagree.  They're par fours.  They may be obsolete now, but they're par fours.

WW

[Tom_Doak]

I was surprised watching the play at 11 this week.  It seemed like they cut the hole further right than I've seen before, and certainly, the right side of the green going over to #7 seemed like it was more in play than ever before.  I wonder if anyone went in the Hill bunker to the left the whole week?

I think they were far right a lot because the strong wind was left to right off Hill bunker, and they were afraid to play much left of Strath because of Hill bunker!  The only option was 30' right of the pin.  I can't imagine one of those players actually hitting into Hill.

Bill:

The wind they were playing in has been the prevailing wind at St. Andrews since time immemorial.  Same exact wind they saw in 1995, and I don't remember so much play to the right on #11 back then ... or so many hole locations over that way.

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