[Sven Nilsen]

With the Masters just about a month away, and talk on this board already turning to the annual updates to the course, I wanted to start a thread that went through the changes to each hole from 1934 to today.  I'll start things off on a hole by describing the changes, and would like to hear others thoughts on how the strategy of the holes has changed (or not), if the changes have made it a better hole, etc.  If anyone has any pictures to add (whether old or new) this would be a great place to do so.  

All of the descriptions I am including are paraphrased from the Golf Digest write-up of the changes over time, which has a great set of images of how the holes have changed and can be found here:  http://www.golfdigest.com/golf-courses/georgia/augusta-changes.  Please add any additional changes that you are aware of that did not make it into the GD descriptions.

There a few general themes to think about during this process, including the intentions of changes requested by Clifford Roberts, changes made to accommodate spectator viewing, changes made to address increased length and certain changes that were made to recapture features of the course that had gone by the wayside (look for Byron Nelson as a GCA later in the thread).

Hole 1 - Tea Olive - Par 4




1934 - 400 yards - Originally the 10th, players hit drives over a low valley formed by a dry creek bed to an uphill slope guarded by a splashy bunker on the right.  Another fancy bunker existed left and far short of the perched green.

1955 - 400 yards - RTJ filled in the old short-left bunker and added one on the left edge of the green.  The ditch, wet only when it rained, was piped underground.  Poa annua in the Bermuda greens was burned away with a chemical spray.

1983 - 400 yards - Tee shifted to the right in 1972 to accommodate spectator flow.  Mature pines planted in the left-hand rough to tighten drives.  The green was rebuilt to grow bent grass and a front lobe was added.  For the 1983 Masters, the tee was moved back 15 yards, but players weren't told.  Instead the club officials said the bunker had been moved 15 yards.  The scorecard yardage wasn't changed to 410 yards until 1999.

2002 - 435 yards - Green rebuilt in 1996.  A second cut of rough was added for the 1999 Masters, tightening the hole.  in 2002, Fazio moved the tee back 25 yards and rebuilt the fairway bunker 15 yards closer to the green (requiring a 300 yard carry).  The fairway was regraded to give short hitters a level lie.

2006 - 455 yards - Fazio moved the tee back another 20 yards (327 drive required to clear the bunker).  Fairway bunker was deepened and a new thumb of turf was extended into it.

2011 - 445 yards - Back of tee shortened to ease gallery flow.  In 2008, the green was rebuilt to install a heating and cooling system.

Hole No. 1 - Tea Olive Par 4 1933: 400 yards 2009: 455 yards

Dan's take:

"Augusta’s famed opening par 4 – site of so many ceremonial tee shots by Jock Hutchison, Fred McLeod, Byron Nelson and Sam Snead – has undergone its fair share of alteration over the decades, though an argument can be made that at least in terms of playing angles, it still approximates Jones & MacKenzie’s strategic concept to a reasonable degree.  Initially featuring the first of an original eight bunkerless greens, the opener was designed to encourage a run-up approach, though the precise configuration of the elevated putting surface (which included a protruding front-left section) made such a play considerably easier from the right side of the fairway.  The most prominent single alteration was the replacement of this extended section of green with a bunker in 1951, which has limited the great majority of approaches (and certainly any played from the left two-thirds of the fairway) to the aerial route ever since.  Of course, this hazard also served – at least cosmetically – to enhance the right third of the fairway’s “optimum” status, which in turn placed a greater emphasis on the large right-side fairway bunker, an invasive hazard which has existed since 1933, but which has been moved and/or expanded multiple times since World War II.

An additional change has substantially altered the holes aesthetics but done little to affect the play of the competent ball-striker: the removal of a large, impressively shaped MacKenzie bunker that sat just off the fairways left edge, some 50 yards shy of the green. Were it still in existence, this hazard would surely draw parallels to the huge, wildly shaped bunker that sits in a similar no-mans land along the 10th fairway though as we shall soon see, that bunker initially served rather a different purpose. Number one’s deceased hazard, in contrast, could never have factored very much into play for all but the weakest of golfers.

That the hole has been lengthened some 55 yards (by extending the tee backwards, onto land originally occupied by the putting green) represents at best a push in the courses battle to defend itself against modern equipment, though the deeper tees have certainly helped maintain the fairway bunkers continuing relevance in this era of unchecked technology.

Better Then or Now?

A fairly strong argument can be made that for all classes of players, the exchange of the old no-mans-land fairway bunker for the greenside hazard was a good one. True, Jones and MacKenzie’s favored run-up approach shot largely disappeared, but the move injected number one with a new strategic component, truly making the right fairway bunker the focal point and the subsequent decision whether to attempt to carry it or bail out left a fine strategic proposition. In this light, the tinkering with the bunkers size and position though anathema to purists has certainly served to strengthen the hole as well."

Edit:  Dan has indicated he has no issues with using his descriptions in this thread.  I hope Ran doesn't mind the inclusion with the goal of promoting further discussion on the topic.

[Jeff_Mingay]

Sven,

Hate to break it to you, but - in case you don't know - Dan Wexler did an excellent piece on this subject, posted in the In My Opinion section of this web site:
http://www.golfclubatlas.com/in-my-opinion/wexler-daniel-augusta/

[Sven Nilsen]

Jeff:

Thanks for pointing this out.  I need to delve into the IMO section a bit more as I obviously missed out on this gem.

I've reached out to Dan to see if it would be okay with him to include his hole by hole discussions in this thread.  I hope he says yes but completely understand if he'd prefer to leave it where it is.

I'm sure Dan's piece was well-read, but as is the case with many IMO pieces the conversation on articles in that section can be limited.  The thread started by Ran when he reposted the article (http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,47666.0.html) only generated a smattering of responses.  It did include a wonderful comment from Kevin Drum discussing how his dad would take him for a haircut on the Monday of the Masters in Augusta and the barber would fill them in on the changes made that year.

With the GD write-up, Dan's thoughts and added commentary from the treehouse, I think we'd have a pretty good repository on a range of thoughts on the changes that have taken place.  Hopefully we can recreate a bit of Kevin's barbershop experience here.

[Sven Nilsen]

Self-bump.

Was sort of surprised that this topic did not generate a single response.  Here's a chance to examine the changes made to a course that we all know (albeit mainly from television), yet not a single voice chimes in.  Is everyone afraid of losing their "golden ticket" by commenting on the "sacred cow?"

I'm happy to carry on the conversation by myself.

For the First, I picked up the following:

-The removal of the bunker short and left for a green bunker side seems to represent a shift in how the course was going to be played.  It seems that MacKenzie and Jones focused on holes that could be attacked with the ground game.  As the years rolled by, the emphasis on designing for an aerial attack comes through.  Makes me wonder how much of this related to the maintenance meld, how much to the evolution of the player's game and how much to a preference to present one type of course over the other.

-Related to the first post, the use of trees to narrow the playing corridors is evident in the changes made to the 1st in 1983.  In my mind, this represents another change from MacKenzie's focus on presenting wider playing corridors and asking the player to decide the best strategic lines (although Dan points out that the first still represents the playing angles conceived by M&J, to a degree).

-It was interesting to learn that the first real change in the length of the hole occurred in 2002.  There was no reaction to the advent of the Big Bertha type drivers of the late 80's early 90's, but there was when Tiger starting bombing it over all of the trouble.

-There seem to have been many changes that were focused on the spectator experience, including changes made to improve patron flow and viewing lines. 

Would love to hear other's thoughts, but if no one else wants to participate I'm happy to make this the longest single-poster thread in GCA history.

[Tim_Cronin]

Maybe we're all talked out about it. Or at work.

[Patrice Boissonnas]

Hi everybody,

I have just joined Golf Club Atlas and I can't resist joining this conversation (or at least, Sven's monologue)
I have just finished my monthly architecture column for a French golf magazine and my subject of the month is, guess what? Augusta !!

There is not a single course among American stars which has been modified as much as Augusta.
In case you don't know, there are several books that already describe all the changes hole by hole. Problem : none of them are very new and changes happen every year, so they need an update.
David OWEN, The Making of the Masters (1999)
David SOWELL, The Master, a hole-by-hole history of America's Golf Classic (2007)
Stan BIRDY, Alister MacKenzie's masterpiece, the Augusta National Golf Club (2005)

Is Augusta better now or before? That's a really good question. The course has completely lost MacKenzie's aesthetic (funny shaped bunkers, wide open fairways with few trees and no rough) but the course we see on TV doesn't look bad either, just a little too artificial maybe. Grass is a bit to green, bunkers a bit to white etc. And of course we would love to see more of MacKenzie styled bunker, the only remaining one being the one on the 10th fairway which used to guard the left part of the old green.

But let's face it : do you ever get bored when watching the Masters? Very seldom indeed, and you can really feel the tension from Thursday morning onward, when most tournaments only wake you up on the back nine on Sunday afternoon. For that only, Augusta deserves praise.

A lot of people complain that the par 5's are too short, but that's the way they were intended to be, more like par 4,5. I agree though that hole 13 has a problem. It can no longer be increased as the back tee hits the limit of the property, and it now plays really to short for the long hitters. That's a truly great hole we've (partly) lost.

I can't really blame ANGC for making all the changes they make : they have the greatest golf tournament to run every year and they need to challenge the best players at their best. If the big guys drive it 400 yards, who is to blame? Certainly not ANGC.

Now I would really want to know what new changes will be made for the 2012 edition. Any guess??

[Sven Nilsen]

Patrice:

Welcome to the site.  Here's a link to the thread discussing the 2012 changes: http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,51373.0.html

If you're not all talked out on Augusta, and you're not hung up at work, I'd appreciate hearing any thoughts you might have on how the changes have affected the strategies inherent in the various holes.

[David Kelly]

A lot of people complain that the par 5's are too short, but that's the way they were intended to be, more like par 4,5. I agree though that hole 13 has a problem. It can no longer be increased as the back tee hits the limit of the property, and it now plays really to short for the long hitters. That's a truly great hole we've (partly) lost.

Nothing is really lost.  It is still a risk/reward hole and it still plays to a stroke average under par and is one of the easiest holes on the course as it almost always has been.  A 3 really helps you, and a 4 is a must if you don't want to lose ground to the field. If anything there is now more pressure on contenders to get a 3 or 4 on the hole because it plays easier. 

If they called the 13th a par 4 none of the excitement of the hole would go away.

[Sven Nilsen]

Thanks to Howard Riefs for pointing out a series of anecdotes from David Owen regarding the changes to Augusta.  Here are his comments on the changes made to the first:  http://03547c3.netsolhost.com/WordPress/2012/03/07/masters-countdown-first-hole/.

[Sven Nilsen]

Charging Onwards.

Hole 2 - Pink Dogwood - Par 5




1934 - 525 yards - The hole had a cross bunker that was a modest carry off of the tee and the left side was bordered by a maintenance road.  The road was quickly removed.  A dry creek ran in front of the green but was buried in pipe before the course opened.

1947 - 525 yards - A left hand bunker was added near the green to pinch the front of the putting surface and to protect against faded second shots.  All of the MacKenzie jagged edges on the bunkers were removed for ease of maintenance.

1954 - 555 yards - George Cobb rebuilt the green to extend it to the left, adding several hole locations.  He also added a gallery mound on the back left of the green and rebuilt the three bunkers on the hole.  A new back tee was added and the Bermuda on the greens was replaced with a hybrid that was less grainy.

1968 - 555 yards - At the suggestion of Sarazen, Cobb filled in the cross bunker and added a new fairway bunker on the outside turn of the dogleg.  Cliff Roberts had drives recorded during the 1967 Masters, and after learning that most players laid up, he directed Cobb to realign the bunker to give more room and temptation on its left (the fairway here eventually shrunk to only 12 yards wide).

1999 - 575 yards - Ben Hogan urged the club to move the fairway bunker to the inside corner of the dogleg.  The bunker remained.  Rough and a new back tee were introduced after 1998.  Fazio relocated the bunker well to the right just over 300 yards from the tee, opening up a 40 yard avenue left of the bunker.

Here is Dan Wexler's write-up:

"The par-5 second has grown 50 yards in 75 years, with the tee initially being moved back during the World War II era, then back and right in 1977, and ultimately even further back in 1999. However, the degree to which the hole has changed greatly exceeds simple size. Always a sharply downhill dogleg left that afforded the better player an opportunity to get home in two, it initially featured a near-L-shaped green bending left-to-right around a single deep bunker. This configuration naturally favored a second shot played from the far left side of the fairway an area made harder to access off the tee by Jones and MacKenzie’s placement of a vast, left-side carry bunker, and by the tree-lined turn of the dogleg.

Change initially came in 1946, when a bunker was added to the greens front-left edge, and in 1953 the putting surface itself was extended back and to the left, creating the near-triangular configuration still in play today. By 1966, the left-hand fairway bunker long since obsolete for better players was filled in, but not replaced by a new left-side bunker further downrange. Instead, at the suggestion of Gene Sarazen, a right-side hazard was added, theoretically narrowing the primary driving area but also leaving the shorter left-side route more open for attack. This newer right-side bunker has been altered/expanded since, most recently being enlarged in 1999.

It is also interesting to note that MacKenzie’s original 1931 routing map indicates plans for a creek to cross in front of the second green. This same small hazard which was an extension of the creek-turned-pond which fronts the fifteenth green was also slated to cross the first, third, seventh, eighth and seventeenth fairways, though generally in far less invasive ways. For the most part, however, this creek was piped underground during construction, though at the first and seventeenth, it remained in front of the tees until 1951, when it was finally buried in its entirety.

Better Then or Now?

The range of shotmaking skills originally required for the better player to reach the second green in two was enviable: a drawn tee ball (to carry/avoid the bunker, and follow the general turn of the fairway), then a long, controlled fade to the narrow, left-to-right bending green. Todays re-shaped putting surface, however, is a bit more neutral in which angle of approach it favors, varying daily with potential far-left and far-right pin placements. On the one hand, this can be viewed as more strategic that is, one might be inclined to flirt with the fairway bunker to open up a back-left pin one day, then skirt the treeline to get a better angle on a back-right target the next. But on a hole of this size, where distance off the tee is a primary consideration, the fact that the bunker guards the longer (and thus generally less-desirable) right side seems a bit out-of-balance. Advantage: 1933 but only just."

David Owen provides some additional thoughts on the migrating fairway bunker:  03547c3.netsolhost.com/WordPress/2012/03/09/masters-countdown-second-hole/

[Sven Nilsen]

Two features of the 2nd stand out:

1.  The fairway bunker - The placement on the outside of the dogleg v. Hogan's request to have it moved to the left side makes for an interesting study in "penal" vs. "heroic" design.  Placing the bunker on the outside of the dogleg asked the longer hitter to play a shot to the heart of the fairway.  I don't see much in the way of creating strategic options in its placement.  The key seems to be that you avoid the bunker and if you're long enough you have a shot at the green in two.  I think I prefer the Hogan placement, as I tend to like bunker placements on the corner of the dogleg better than on the outside. 

2.   The nature of this hole would have been drastically changed if the creek had remained as a hazard short of the green.  I don't think it would have had much of an effect on the weaker player, as they would most likely be laying up and playing their third from well short of the hazard.  It would present a challenge for those going for it in two, as the addition of a hazard short of the green creates another item in the thought process, and as Pete Dye said, when you get those guys thinking they are in trouble.

The changes to the second emphasize the theme that the changes made at Augusta tracked the evolution of the game being played by those competing in the tournament.  Cliff Roberts touches, including the idea of tracking where drives ended up, generally focus on making the course harder for the better player.  Looking at this hole, I doubt the mid-handicapper would focus on anything other than finding the fairway twice and hitting the green on the third, whereas the pros think about avoiding the fairway bunker and leaving themselves in a position to attack the green on their second shot.

[Wade Whitehead]

As with many conversations about Augusta, I'm interested that conversation nearly entirely revolves around how the course is played one week each year.  There is often very little discussion for how the place plays as a golf course for members and visitors.

The fact that fairway bunker on the first hole now requires a 327-yard carry is completely irrelevant 51 weeks (minus the number ANGC is closed) per year.

I know we see the course once per year and that other major sites rotate.  Still, it's interesting that we tend to talk about the place nearly entirely in terms of how elite players attack it.

WW

[Sven Nilsen]

As with many conversations about Augusta, I'm interested that conversation nearly entirely revolves around how the course is played one week each year.  There is often very little discussion for how the place plays as a golf course for members and visitors.

The fact that fairway bunker on the first hole now requires a 327-yard carry is completely irrelevant 51 weeks (minus the number ANGC is closed) per year.

I know we see the course once per year and that other major sites rotate.  Still, it's interesting that we tend to talk about the place nearly entirely in terms of how elite players attack it.

WW

Wade:

I agree with your point, but I think its the nature of the beast.  Looking at the changes, it seems like there has been a steady progression from a Members Course that hosted a tournament to a Tournament Course.  There's nothing necessarily off-putting about the transformation, as the Masters has become synonymous with the course.  You could say the same about TPC Sawgrass (as the recent commercials exemplify).  There are probably a few other tour stops that provoke the "this is what the pros do" feelings, but these are the two examples that stand out the most.

I'll try to highlight the effect the changes have had on member play while doing the commentary.  I've never been there, so I'm probably not the ideal candidate to take on the challenge.  One quick thought is that there are probably very few members that play from the tournament tees, so some of the fairway hazards may present similar challenges to those faced by the pros.  Hitting into those greens is probably another story, as the high, spinning approach is probably not in the repertoire of the more pedestrian golfer.

[Sven Nilsen]

Hole 3 - Flowering Peach - Par 4




1934 - 350 yards - The green was built on a natural plateau with a deep right side and a shallow left side with one left side bunker and several knobs. The tee for the next hole was just a few steps off of the putting surface.  A left-side fairway bunker in Mac's style needed to be challenged to reach the left side of the fairway.

1956 - 355 yards - In 1937, Maxwell removed the front tongue of the green and reshaped the bunkers.  The green was regarded in 1955 and a spectator vantage point was added on the right side.

1983 - 360 yards - In 1981 the green was completely rebuilt to address the new bent grass turf.  A year later, the club considered installing a lake on the left side, but Nicklaus suggested changing the single fairway bunker to a cluster of bunkers and mounds.  These changes were handled by Bob Cupp.  The trees close to the tee appear to have expanding in coverage, a trend that would continue into the new century.

2011 - 350 yards - The green was reconstructed again in 1994, but the existing contours were replicated.  Tree growth and the addition of rough created a premium on finding the fairway.  Interesting note about yardages at Augusta:  The club measures from the middle of the back tee to the farthest useable hole location, rounding the yardage to the nearest five yards.

Dan's take:

The third green was the first of the seven altered by Perry Maxwell, the sum of his work apparently being the shaving of some front-right putting surface and, perhaps, some reduction in overall contour.  Beyond this, the lone obvious alteration was Jack Nicklaus’s 1982 division/expansion of a large, left-side fairway bunker into four smaller ones (thus creating an aesthetic anomaly on a course otherwise devoid of such clusters) and adding some adjacent mounds.  It is also worth noting that the tee was moved slightly right in 1953 and has twice been modestly lengthened – a curious development given that the hole is listed at the same yardage today as it was in 1933.  This suggests that the third was one of several holes (including the fourth, the thirteenth and the original sixteenth) that did not measure up completely to their listed opening-day yardages – though with modern measuring techniques, its current 350-yards can be taken to the bank.

Better Then or Now?

Is there a major difference?  Today’s golfer can obviously place the tee ball much closer to the green, but smarter ones likely won’t, preferring to leave themselves a full wedge approach rather than a dicey three-quarter (or less) pitch.  Further, the golfing world has really only known the post-Maxwell green (his work was done in 1937), and Nicklaus’s bunker work is, for the better player anyway, more cosmetic than invasive.  The argument could perhaps be made that in today’s game, moving the tees forward might induce Masters participants to try and drive the green (as Tiger Woods did, leading to a memorable double-bogey six, in 2003) but that’s far more a function of evolving technology than any changes to the hole’s design."

Highly recommend checking out David Owen's take on the 3rd (http://03547c3.netsolhost.com/WordPress/2012/03/12/masters-countdown-third-hole/).  There are some great nuggets in there on the conversations held between Roberts and MacKenzie, and highlights a few of Mac's design philosophies.

[John Kirk]

Great golf holes.  I like #2 and #3.  A couple of quick comments.  All comments will be related strictly to tournament play.  I haven't seen it in person.

-- I like how the runup shot works on #2, and when it curls around to the back right pin, usually on Sunday, that is exciting TV golf.

-- #3's green is so severe.  How deep is its left side?  This photo gives a great feel for the contouring.  Thanks to http://www.watsonphotography.org.  I will be happy to remove it if you object.

[Sven Nilsen]

Not sure if the photo related question was directed to me, but I have no objections to any additions to this thread, photos or otherwise.

[John Kirk]

Hi Sven,

I thought this picture would do a nice job of showing how the game is played at Augusta.  Those greens are gently sloped but fast for the tournament.  I'd guess average Masters green speeds these days are about 14-15 feet.

It ended up being a rhetorical question.  It looks about 10-12 yards deep.  Thanks for letting me make the occasional comment.  The Masters is a cool tournament, and holes #2 and #3 are great.

[Sven Nilsen]

John:

I'm guessing that your photo is taken from short left of the green.  The section on the right looks incredibly difficult to hold.

Its interesting to me that the 3rd, the shortest par 4 on the course, is one of the holes that has seen the fewest changes.  As David Owen illuminated, it stands as a good argument that length is always the answer for creating a challenge.

Sven

[John Kirk]

Gee, Sven, it has to be short right of the green, looking at the back left, doesn't it?

I love the way #4 looks behind it, too.  The bunkering is so austere.

[Sven Nilsen]

For those of you that have been waiting on the edge of your seat for the 4th, I apologize for the delay.  Here we go:

Hole 4 - Flowering Crab Apple - Par 3




1934 - 190 yards - MacKenzie's take on the Eden, the hole originally had very severe slopes and a narrow tongue of green between the two bunkers.  In 1938, Maxwell flattened the green, widened the tongue and pushed both bunkers closer to the collar.

1955 - 220 yards - At Robert's direction, a gallery mound was built behind the green in 1953.  In '54, a new back tee was added lengthening the hole considerably.  

1964 - 220 yards - A new back tee (at the same length) was added by Cobb and graded from front to back for drainage.  Based on Nicklaus' complaints that his low shots were clipping the front of the tee, Robert's suggested reversing the grade.  Cobb countered by saying the regrade would created the feeling of falling downhill.

2011 - 240 yards - Scorecard yardage reduced to 205 yards in 1981.  Green was rebuilt in 1994 creating a new back right pin position.  Fazio extended the tee back 35 yards in 2005 requiring a long-iron or wood shot, as the hole had been played 30 years earlier.

Dan Wexler on the 4th:

"The long par-3 fourth is the first of two front nine one-shotters to have begun life bearing more than a passing resemblance to a famous Old Country standard, in this case the Eden eleventh (more properly known as High In) at St. Andrews.  During the club’s much-chronicled construction, Jones was careful to point out that Augusta’s holes would only demonstrate certain salient qualities of these great British holes and not include straight, Charles Blair Macdonald-like replicas.  But the fourth (of which MacKenzie observed “we may have constructed a hole that will compare favorably with the original”) was clearly an exception.  Like the hallowed original, MacKenzie’s replica featured a pair of fronting bunkers modeled after the legendary Hill and Strath, as well as a green with so much back-to-front slope that the Doctor’s own sketches indicate an eight-foot rise from front apron to back collar.  The original green was also more of the boomerang variety (a MacKenzie favorite), but rotated slightly counter-clockwise – unquestionably a significant difference from the original Eden.  Additionally, early photos indicate the finger of putting surface which extended forward, between the two bunkers, to be extraordinarily narrow, with several yards of grass separating it from the sand on either side.  Clearly unpinable, and not a feature of either the original Eden or any C.B. Macdonald/Seth Raynor replicas, the purpose of this idiosyncrasy will forever remain a mystery.

Perry Maxwell rebuilt the fourth green in 1938, diminishing its pitch and turning it more towards the 90-degree, L-shaped configuration of the present.  Further, the hole has twice been lengthened since World War II, though only in recent years did its back tee reach (and ultimately exceed) the 220-yard distance that has been listed since the early postwar years.  Today, the hole stands a stout 50 yards longer than in its youth.

Better Then or Now?

A great question.  Today’s hole is an entirely different beast from the Eden redux of yesteryear, playing far longer, to a green of different shape and contour.  But…  Since MacKenzie’s original, severely sloped putting surface would have been largely unplayable in the face of modern green speeds anyway, how much can we complain?"

Unfortunately, David Owen has not moved on with his updates as rapidly as I have.  In place of his thoughts on the 4th, here's his take on lawn care tips that can be learned from ANGC:  http://03547c3.netsolhost.com/WordPress/2012/03/16/lawn-care-tips-from-augusta-national/.

[Sven Nilsen]

Gee, Sven, it has to be short right of the green, looking at the back left, doesn't it?

I love the way #4 looks behind it, too.  The bunkering is so austere.

My self-diagnosed dyslexia kicking in again.  Exactly what I meant to say.

[Sven Nilsen]

A list of threads from the first page with more than a tangential relationship to the thoughts provoked by an examination of the 4th hole:

http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,31056.0.html

http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,51502.0.html

http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,51468.0.html

http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,51499.0.html

http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,51500.0.html

http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,51503.0.html

http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,51467.0.html

[John Kirk]

I'm enjoying this thread, Sven, and will continue to play along.  My two thoughts, based on watching the Masters:

1.  Seems this hole is usually a big 3-iron or 4-iron for the top players, maybe a hybrid for good senior players.  They must hit it very high, as the ball generally takes a long time to hit the ground.

2.  I can't remember anyone going long, and pitching back.  That's not to say it doesn't happen, but since I can't remember a single shot over the green, I'd suggest the Eden concept is working.  Long is dead.

[Sven Nilsen]

Probably a much more manageable shot for mere mortals from the member's tees.  Even at 190, it probably plays shorter than the yardage due to the drop. 

The tongue at the front left of the green immediately made me think of the 15th at CPC.  Wonder if MacKenzie had similar motives for creating these two features.

Reading Dan's take on the green speeds makes one wonder at what point the club realized they were going to be presenting the greens at the faster levels. 

[Sven Nilsen]

Hole 5 - Magnolia - Par 4




1934 - 440 yards - Roughly patterned off of the Road Hole at St. Andrew's, absent the deep fronting bunker.  There was an elaborate Mac bunker that is noted on three separate "as built" diagrams.  The bunker was disliked by Jones, and disappeared shortly after the course was built.

1957 - 450 yards - Maxwell reshaped the green in 1937 to create ocean-wave contours.  The change was noted as "a definite improvement" by Roberts, most likely referring to drainage concerns, not playability.  A 1949 plan shows the original MacKenzie fairway bunker was replaced with two small ones, which became a set of three in the early 1950's.  A bunker was added by Cobb after the 1956 Masters (see below re questions on this date) on the back left of the green.

1968 - 450 yards - The set of three fairway bunkers lying 230 yards from the tee was reduced to two by Cobb in 1964.  He also created several fairway mounds, replacing what had been large knobs.  In 1967, he expanded to the gallery mound to the left of the green.  In 1981, the scorecard yardage was reduced to 435 with no changes to the hole.

2011 - 455 - Fazio moved the tee back as far as he could and filled in the old fairway bunkers while adding two new bunkers 80 yards closer to the green, requiring a carry of 315 yards to clear.  The new bunkers shifted the fairway to the right and narrowed the landing area.  A heating and cooling system was added beneath the green in 2008.

Wexler's words:

"The demanding par-4 fifth was, by MacKenzie’s own explanation, “a similar type of hole to the famous seventeenth, the Road Hole at St. Andrews” – this despite the absence of a road, railroad sheds, an Old Course Hotel, or any sort of fronting bunker whatsoever.  But regardless of such glaring stylistic differences, the substance of the hole remains among the least-altered at Augusta, particularly the putting surface which, save for some adjacent mounding added during the 1950’s and ‘60s, has been little bothered.  Despite a left-side fairway bunker being plainly apparent in MacKenzie’s plans, the fifth began life absent any man-made hazards.  A single, rear bunker was added sometime after opening (its creation is sometimes dated to 1956, but it is clearly visible in prewar aerial photos) though it surely represented more of a charitable donation than an added danger, for it prevents overly aggressive shots from tumbling even further down a rear hillside.

A more visible change was the early addition of two left-side fairway bunkers, which, through frequent revision, fluctuated between being one large hazard or two smaller ones for many years.  However, despite Bobby Jones citing them in his 1959 book Golf Is My Game as central to the hole’s challenge (“The proper line here is, as closely as possible, past the bunker on the left side of the fairway…”), they served primarily as little more than directional aids, for better players had little trouble carrying drives comfortably past them.  They became far more significant in 2003, however, when, as a part of a Tom Fazio project to enhance the fairway’s dogleg, they were reconstructed far downrange (they are now a 310-yard carry) and placed at a more invasive angle.

Better Then or Now?

Not too terribly different, really. Adjusted for technology, the hole is certainly shorter (the back tee is flush against Berckmans Road, and thus offers no room for expansion) but the fairway bunkers are rather more in play. A demanding two-shotter then, a demanding two-shotter now."

Just like the 17th at St. Andrew's, one would assume that technology has changed the way this hole is played on the approach.  With the added distance off of the tee, today's player is probably looking to launch a mid-iron for their approach, as opposed to running a shot in.  Does it say something about the original architecture that the hole still offers a challenge to the modern player, despite any significant changes to green?  Or is this just a factor of the faster green speeds increasing the challenge around the green while the effective distance of the hole stayed the same?

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