Are the changes to the Old Course an unnecessary expense

[Gib_Papazian]

One other unintended consequence of stretching otherwise healthy golf courses on the rack is that once the circus has left town, these newly constructed tees are a carrot on a stick for the delusional donkeys that infest the American golf ethos in particular.

At least the Brits have enough brains to close off those tees and insist that everybody but REAL gunners play from the appropriate markers. Here across the pond, we let the gorillas run wild and then plaintively wonder why our pace of play moves at the brisk clip of an Arab Caravan.

In the aftermath of the USGA's pillage of Olympic, we not only have a brand new ribbon of cement adorning a disconnected par-3, but a brace of shiny new "U.S. Open tees" to tempt the cigar smoking, Budweiser guzzling, lower vibratory orders.

Last week, thoroughly exhausted after we finally wrapped production on our movie, I told the Redhead I was off to clear my foggy cranium with a round of golf. The Ocean Course seems to be perennially stacked, not due to the novelty of Bill Love's remodel (don't get me started), but because the new rough lines on the Lake Course make it too damned hard for seniors and women.

The combo tees on the Lake looked like a rational enough option and I shouldered my bag and set out for the first tee with an old friend. BUT NO!!!! Waiting in front of us was a clown car of burly 12 handicappers flexing their egos from the Black Tees. One of them had a particularly graceful reverse-pivot - and the inevitable banana ball that fell out of the sky like a seagull dropping.

In as polite a tone as I could muster over the bile rising from my ulcer, I inquired whether they had ever played the U.S. Open tees before. Note, we were a twosome; they were waiting until the group in front was 350 yards down the fairway before teeing off.

The alpha simian was pleased to tell me how excited they were to "play the whole golf course" - he evidently spends most of his time notching CCFAD's on his cigar holder.

I've only got a four hour attention span and after putting out on the aforementioned disjointed amputation on #8, the big hand on my watch had circled well past two rotations. Tapping my foot on the tee in a plume of their cheap cigar smoke waiting for four stooges to waddle back to the tips was more than we could bear and the vote was 2-0 to retire to the 19th hole for a triple shot of tequila.

How does this situation arise? First, because just as it takes many months to "prepare" (read: make progressively impossible) a golf course for the U.S. Open - narrowing fairways and fertilizing the newly grown cabbage - it also takes months to theoretically return the course to its previous incarnation, except it never truly gets restored.

Worse, the new tees are permanent and guarantee that at least one group of machismo infected nitwits are going to hold up the golf course pissing into a hurricane while everyone else pitches tents waiting . . . . and waiting.                    

[Doug Siebert]

Again, the essence of golf is the balance between player skill, the equipment used and the playing field. The necessary balance should be achieved at the lowest cost possible. In the long run, that is best for the game.

If we are spending money to modify courses simply because we have introduced golf ball technology that requires modifying golf courses just to accommodate a very small minority of golfers, that simply isn't progress.

THIS ^^

I believe that technological improvement made that lowers cost of equipment or makes equipment more consistent is a good thing.  That which makes it more expensive and is targeted only at making the game easier (how well it does so can be a separate discussion) is a bad thing.  The below isn't an exhaustive list (things like long putters and U grooves can't really be put in either category by this measure) but I've tried to categorize some major changes of the past 110 or so years:

Positive improvements:
machine made rubber balls replacing handmade gutta
machine made steel shafts replacing handmade hickory
cast replacing forging
durable artificial materials replacing natural rubber in balls
steel headed woods replacing wooden woods
solid balls replacing balls with rubber windings inside

Negative improvements:
graphite shafts replacing steel shafts
titanium heads replacing steel heads
multilayer balls engineered to respond differently to different swing speeds



That list of negative improvements has occurred in the past 25 years or so and increased rather than decreased cost of equipment, but more importantly by greatly increasing driving distance have resulted in increased costs of participation by making new courses longer with more land and maintenance costs.

It's far too late to turn back the clock, but if we'd decided to put in the rules 50 years ago that wood and steel were the only acceptable materials from which to make golf clubs, IMHO the game would be better off today.  I've said before where I believe shaft technology will be in a couple decades, and assuming there's any real benefit to adjusting the location of the weight in the head, heads will be made from carbon nanofibers as well, with bits of metal glued or screwed in at various locations to get the desired characteristics.  And the USGA and R&A will again sit on their hands while driving distances for top players with consistent swings increase by another 30-50 yards, and TOC gets Open tees in ever stranger locations.

[Mark Chaplin]

Doug - does the public who pay for pro golf want to see players using a tournament ball and hitting it 275 yards when if they smash one they maybe able to hit it as far? If we reign back the pros will the professional game lose it's lustre and therefore it's audience?

Could the salvation of GCA ruin the game?

[Tim_Weiman]

Mark,

Keep in mind, if we finally go to a tournament ball and the manufacturers do a proper job advertising, the type of person who pays to go see professional golf tournaments will also want to use a proper tournament ball. So, unless they had the ability to hit drives the length pros hit them, there would not be anything like the problem you suggest. If they do, who cares. There was a time I could hit drives as long as pros, but I was never crazy enough to think that made me as good a golfer as pros.

Besides that, I not sure we need to worry about people who go see professional golf tournaments. Not many people really do that.

Beware. People will come up with all sorts of seductive and confusing arguments to sell the golf technology arms race.

[Gib_Papazian]

Mark,

All these nifty technologies have done is grossly widen the gap between a good amateur and the Tour Professionals. I will admit that "chicks dig the long ball" - which is a significant gallery draw for the rank and file. Thus, since money rules all things professional, there is no way to roll back technology that I can see - neither is it feasible to conjure up a "tournament ball" specifically for the various tours. Obtaining consensus agreement between all the various organizations (USGA, PGA Tour, PGA of America, Masters Committee, R&A, European Tour) is a fool's errand at best.

The answer is to simply confine professional tournaments at the highest level to courses specifically modified (or constructed) to accommodate the idiotic length these super-humans can hit the ball. In response to the prodigious carry length at the very end of the bell curve, certain architects erected a series of monstrous green complexes, demanding a ball flight beyond the abilities of the vast majority of the players.

So, even the 6400 yard tees play closer to 6800 yards because the opportunity to run the ball is deliberately frustrated with idiotically elevated greens, surrounded by deep bunkers and slender putting surfaces oriented perpendicular to the line of play. It is not all about length, but playability for Uncle Joe and his regular foursome.

I HATE this sort of arrogant, self-indulgent architecture and the strength of my venom escalates as I get older. Unlike Mucci, Shivas and Brains Goodale, the golfing gods have dictated that my back trouble demonstrate what the aged and the infirm must endure. I'll spare everyone another colorless rant on Nicklaus courses . . . . . C&C, Doak, DeVries and brother Neal Meagher has shown the tide is turning - with or without my toxic spew.     

Let's just agree: The big boys can have their own ballparks - or ones that currently can appropriately meet the objective of tournament organizers or governing bodies.  Again, is Ballybunnion diminished because the R&A does not hold The Open Championship there? Uh, no.

Is Pine Valley diminished because it has never held a modern major? My two favorite golf courses on earth are NGLA and County Down. My head would spin like a scene from the Exorcist if the governing bodies opted to force-feed a series of execrable disfigurements on their pristine anatomies.

[Mark Bourgeois]

Doug - does the public who pay for pro golf want to see players using a tournament ball and hitting it 275 yards when if they smash one they maybe able to hit it as far? If we reign back the pros will the professional game lose it's lustre and therefore it's audience?

Could the salvation of GCA ruin the game?

Mark: I'm a little unclear on your meaning. Are you asking whether the salvation of GCA could ruin the game of flog? I guess that's possible but I see it as nothing but good for golf.

[Mark Chaplin]

What I'm saying is if the game stands still are there other more exciting sports waiting in the wings to take the advertising and sponsorship dollars?

We may protect our courses but if golf became less exciting and youngsters were turned off, would it damage the overall game?

Personally I think the competition ball will be driven by The Masters. They can impose a ball for their event and the manufacturers cannot have their players miss the event and lose the exposure.

[Jon Wiggett]

John any club is welcome to apply to the R&A for an interest free loan to assist with such work.

Mark,

in theory you are correct, in reality way off the mark. My experience is that the R&A is more interested in spending (investing) money abroad than helping clubs at home. There are many courses in the UK that would love an interest free loan but unless it belongs to the chosen few there is no chance. IMHO, the R&A have no real interest in growing the game in the UK which is a sad state of affairs as it is where they get the vast majority of their income

Jon

[John Chilver-Stainer]

Ian Andrew came up with this on another thread, which I'm adding here as it's pertinent.

From earlier this year at Lytham, a press release:

"Royal and Ancient chief executive Peter Dawson says the St. Andrews-based organization has invested $16 million in toughening and tightening all courses used to host the Open Championship, including lengthening the courses for the 2012 and 2013 editions. Dawson said a fund was created to bring the nine courses used for the Open "into the modern era." He said an average of about $800,000 had been spent on each course, "but I would say its money well spent."

Does that mean the R&A are financing the new changes to the Old Course at a cost of approximately $800'000 over 2012 and 2013 ?

[Jon Wiggett]

£800K x 9 courses gives £7.2M not £16M claimed I am sure there is a reason for this difference but it doesn't fill one with confidence.

Jon

[Rick Shefchik]

Mark,

All these nifty technologies have done is grossly widen the gap between a good amateur and the Tour Professionals. I will admit that "chicks dig the long ball" - which is a significant gallery draw for the rank and file. Thus, since money rules all things professional, there is no way to roll back technology that I can see - neither is it feasible to conjure up a "tournament ball" specifically for the various tours. Obtaining consensus agreement between all the various organizations (USGA, PGA Tour, PGA of America, Masters Committee, R&A, European Tour) is a fool's errand at best.

The answer is to simply confine professional tournaments at the highest level to courses specifically modified (or constructed) to accommodate the idiotic length these super-humans can hit the ball. In response to the prodigious carry length at the very end of the bell curve, certain architects erected a series of monstrous green complexes, demanding a ball flight beyond the abilities of the vast majority of the players.

Let's just agree: The big boys can have their own ballparks - or ones that currently can appropriately meet the objective of tournament organizers or governing bodies.  Again, is Ballybunnion diminished because the R&A does not hold The Open Championship there? Uh, no.

Gib, I believe you're right: there will be no tournament ball. It makes too much sense, and it would take too many befuddled "leaders" to reach agreement. But I think your solution is only half right. By all means, let the PGA Tour build more 8,000-yard monsters to test the world's elite ball-smashers. But why not let the pros play TOC, Merion and Olympic too? Just tell the USGA and the R&A that we're done stretching our greatest courses to try to protect some arbitrary number that these Luddites consider sacred.

Mark Chaplin, if Bubba Watson shoots a 61 at Merion, isn't that progress? If Rory McIlroy wins the next Open Championship at St. Andrews with a final-found 57, won't that stimulate a lot of excitement among young kids? You cited Usain Bolt as an example of a sport progressing. I agree. But we're not lengthening the track for Bolt to see if he can keep breaking the tape in the same amount of time. We're sending him out on the same 100 meters, every time, to see how low he can go. Why can't golf do the same?

[Bradley Anderson]

Jon,

I haven't been following all these threads on TOC changes to see what you think. How do you as a Scotsman feel about it? I know I am disturbed every time I see the picture of that huge mound of soil that was shaved off the 11th green contours.

[jeffwarne]

Doug - does the public who pay for pro golf want to see players using a tournament ball and hitting it 275 yards when if they smash one they maybe able to hit it as far? If we reign back the pros will the professional game lose it's lustre and therefore it's audience?

Could the salvation of GCA ruin the game?

99.9999/99% of spectators would not be able tell the difference in a 275 yard drive to a 310.They already think their son hits it 300 when it's closer to 230.
Chicks do dig the long ball, but don't worry, they can't see them land.

[Jon Wiggett]

Bradley,

for the referendum you may be right according to the SNP but really I am a Yorkshire man. I understand that TOC needs to be altered and evolve but I question what they are doing in this case and even more the reason why. What none of the bodies organising big tournaments fail to grasp is on a good weather day some of the worlds top players will shoot low no matter how tight or long a course plays there fore lengthening a course and/or tightening it up will not make any difference.

A good example of this is most people would say that Olympic was set up much harder than Castle Stuart this year yet it only played half a stroke harder than CS. With a 25 mile wind playing TOC is no easy task even for the best.

It seems to me that many of the major decision the R&A have made recently show how little they understand the problems facing most golf courses today. The alteration to TOC are just sending out the wrong signals.


Mark C, I think golf was just as exciting to watch in the 60's as it is now
 
Jon

[Bradley Anderson]

Jon, The thought occured to me that they might move the event back from mid July to mid June and have a much better chance of dry weather. As I understand they scheduled the event during the wettest time of year.

[Jon Wiggett]

Bradley,

I am not sure why the 3rd weekend in July is the chosen date but moving it back to mid June would bring it too close to the US Open for many. It is true, that May-June as well as September are often drier months but the climate in the UK is very local and very difficult to forecast. Besides, golf is an all weather sport.

Jon

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