Length of Par threes

[Greg Tallman]

Thanks Jim.

Greg its interesting how we differ on #7....for me its the hole I most look forward to playing of all the par 3's...and I think you would just as soon skip it! I like that...the diverse opinions that a good course can arouse in different players.

Paul, my issue with 7 is ALL about the 15 yards short of the green. If I have that kind of club in my hand a sheer face a few feet short of the putting surface does not seem correct. I actullay think it is a REALLY cool hole from the low left tees and would love to see a 160-190 yard tee thrown down there... love it.

To respond to your point on the course in general... was talking with Erik and then a panelist about favorite holes, weak holes... etc. and with the obvious exception of 11 and also 15 there were three different groupings of holes that included probably 14 of the 18 in the favorite category.  

My favorites were 2,4,8,11,and 15
Think Erik lobbied hard for 3,10,14,16
The panelist too exception with 8... did not like it at all - I told him he should consider resigning from the panel   Just kidding but I stated the case for 8 which I simply love... and there is no eye candy to influence me there. The rise to the approach is the prefect yardage to make it maddening for me from the tee.... I refuse to it it there, I would rather not play that way... Going for it is my only choice!!! Rarely does it work out. Had one clear the ridge, take a really weird hop and fall to the right down adn around the center bunker and diown to the flat about 115 out!!! A confused WTF was uttered as I was expecting to be the greens edge!

Oh yeah the panel guy really liked 7. also 5, 9, 10, 15 adn 16.

[Niall C]

I recall playing Craigielaw, a very good Tom MacKenzie design in East Lothian, which has some interesting greens. If I remember rightly it might have 5 par 3's, anyway on this particular day I remember hitting the same club to all of them. If I recollect there is a fairly decent spread between them and good size tees to chop and change the length but somehow the greenkeeper managed to give the same distance at each.

Niall

[paul cowley]

Thanks Jim.

Greg its interesting how we differ on #7....for me its the hole I most look forward to playing of all the par 3's...and I think you would just as soon skip it! I like that...the diverse opinions that a good course can arouse in different players.

Paul, my issue with 7 is ALL about the 15 yards short of the green. If I have that kind of club in my hand a sheer face a few feet short of the putting surface does not seem correct. I actullay think it is a REALLY cool hole from the low left tees and would love to see a 160-190 yard tee thrown down there... love it.

To respond to your point on the course in general... was talking with Erik and then a panelist about favorite holes, weak holes... etc. and with the obvious exception of 11 and also 15 there were three different groupings of holes that included probably 14 of the 18 in the favorite category.  

My favorites were 2,4,8,11,and 15
Think Erik lobbied hard for 3,10,14,16
The panelist too exception with 8... did not like it at all - I told him he should consider resigning from the panel   Just kidding but I stated the case for 8 which I simply love... and there is no eye candy to influence me there. The rise to the approach is the prefect yardage to make it maddening for me from the tee.... I refuse to it it there, I would rather not play that way... Going for it is my only choice!!! Rarely does it work out. Had one clear the ridge, take a really weird hop and fall to the right down adn around the center bunker and diown to the flat about 115 out!!! A confused WTF was uttered as I was expecting to be the greens edge!

Oh yeah the panel guy really liked 7. also 5, 9, 10, 15 adn 16.

That's interesting Greg, and I love to see how all over the place everyone's favorites are...the mark of a course with depth of good holes.

It's hard to do but using your your formula I would pick 2, 4, 6, 7, 8, 11, 12, 14, 16 and 17.

#9 always seems to pop up as someones favorite and I never saw that coming...not that it's not a good hole.

[mike_beene]

with the newer equipment par 3s have become much more important as one of the few places to test longer approaches.So many holes that used to require a mid to long iron just don't any more.If that ends up being the same four iron a few times,so be it.

[Paul Jones]

I have always found it ironic that all the new courses have all the Par 3 very long - guessing so they can have 7000+ on the score card.  However, a lot of the most famous Par 3 are short:

7 at Pebble Beach
17 at Sawgrass
12 at Augusta
Postage Stamp at Troon
15 at Cypress
10 at Pine Valley

[Jeff_Brauer]

Paul,

The real long ones are to get the card to read 7200+...........

[Doug Siebert]

Tom Doak,

I have the same impression. Some of the RB Harris proteges used the "perfect par rotation" pretty often (4-5-4-3-4-5-4-3-4), even tending towards the long par 3 at 4, and shorter one at 8, etc.  If you took the par 5 sixth, and the (usually) short par 4 7th in the rotation, followed by the short 3 at the eigth, the net result was a stretch of holes from 6-8 where the approach was a wedge, despite all being different pars. 

Perhaps the Stanley Thompson distance chart is a better diagnostic tool than perfect par rotation.

And I agree that two 175 yard par threes can be completely different distance wise. Not only that, but even if they play the same length effectively, it might be a nice parallel to have them similar, but reversed, with one favoring a fade and the other a draw.

Well my RBH home course has that perfect par rotation on both nines, though the 4th is more of the shorter/easier, or at least was until they lengthened it.  In fact, over the years it has done exactly what Tom Doak alluded to, length was added on the 4th and 17th from the back tees to where they are all four pretty much about 200 yards.  The wind is different (prevailing right to left on 4 & 17, against on 8 and helping/right on 13) so that mitigates it somewhat.  Additionally, 13 is a special case as it has two island greens and with the recent addition of a teebox at 235 yards, can range anywhere from 135 to 245 from the back tees depending on tee/pin locations.

And yes, the new tee at 235, along with two other tees that added another 100 yards or so, were all in pursuit of getting the card over 7200...

[Matthew Rose]

Perfect par rotation. Four 200+ yard par threes.

Few things annoy me more when I look at the scorecard for the first time of a course I've never seen before.

[James Boon]

As long as the holes themselves offer good variety, I wouldn't be too bothered if I'd used the same club for all of the par 3s, and as others have said, the variety would probably stop me from noticing.

Having said that, I sometimes watch tour events on TV and it seems to me that they are all par 3s between about 190 and 220 yards (very broad brush). Every so often you see a shorter hole around 150 or 160 yards but never much less apart from the obvious famous examples. But we see plenty of 490 to 520 yard par 4s, and yet the only par 3 I can think of for the pro's that is over 250 is the 8th at Oakmont?

Can anyone think of other examples or give a reason why there aren't more? I think a 520 yard par 4 is a bit daft so I'm not exactly wanting more, just surprised it doesn't seem to happen more?

Cheers,

James