News:

Welcome to the Golf Club Atlas Discussion Group!

Each user is approved by the Golf Club Atlas editorial staff. For any new inquiries, please contact us.


Jeff_Brauer

  • Karma: +0/-0
Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« on: November 13, 2014, 12:43:05 PM »
Don Mahaffey's Obstacle thread got me thinking as I am working today.

For all we lament design ideas/concepts that have fallen out of favor, which one has endured the longest in recognizable form?

My immediate thought is the Cape Hole, by CBM.  Still used, and still works perfectly despite new clubs and balls, etc.

Some other CBM (or CBM copied ideas) that haven't fared as well -

Biarritz (who does those....did they ever play right?  It has been debated here)

Redan - Still kicking, sometimes done well, sometimes modified for reduced run but more side kick in action.

Fortress Green/Short Hole - Reduced use to accommodate average players.

Of course, other famous ideas also from other architects, such as:

Mac's Sitwell Park multi-level green (some built, was it the severity that caused critique or the concept?)

For modern, how about Jim Engh'd double deck green, with levels separated by 10+ feet.  (Ken Dye also has one in New Mexico)

Perhaps not credited, but how about the dogleg itself as an enduring idea?

What holes/ideas have held up the best, despite game changes, since introduced?
Jeff Brauer, ASGCA Director of Outreach

Peter Pallotta

Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #1 on: November 13, 2014, 02:02:03 PM »
Jeff - I don't see them all that often, but the very short Par 3 of 110-130 yards or so works really well, and works as well (and essentially in the same way) as it always has.  Ian Andrew designed one I like very much.

Peter

Mac Plumart

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #2 on: November 13, 2014, 02:37:45 PM »
Unfortunately, hard=good lingers.
Sportsman/Adventure loving golfer.

Mark_Rowlinson

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #3 on: November 13, 2014, 02:41:11 PM »
Unfortunately, few designers would now risk it, but I still enjoy the blind tee shot hit out over a marker post or stone cairn. Royal County Down comes to mind, but there are many others in the British Isles and there is the trust in the golfer that the marker post or cairn has been placed in exactly the right place. You know that you are not being asked to confront a lake or forest of impenetrable gorse on the other side, and very often you are given an option of aiming out to the side with a less favourable line to the green or whatever. Think also of those vast bunkers at Sandwich and St Enodoc: can you make it over them, or do you have to go round? There is something thrilling in taking on the unknown, even if it's only the first time you play the hole. And who hasn't thrilled on the 9th at RCD when crossing the summit and seeing your ball safely at rest in the fairway below.

I don't suppose many designers now imitate this feature, but where they have allowed them to remain from more 'sporting' times, they continue to excite.

Mark Bourgeois

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #4 on: November 13, 2014, 02:56:03 PM »
C'mon...EDEN
Charlotte. Daniel. Olivia. Josephine. Ana. Dylan. Madeleine. Catherine. Chase. Jesse. James. Grace. Emilie. Jack. Noah. Caroline. Jessica. Benjamin. Avielle. Allison.

Matthew Lloyd

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #5 on: November 13, 2014, 03:15:13 PM »
Unfortunately, few designers would now risk it, but I still enjoy the blind tee shot hit out over a marker post or stone cairn. Royal County Down comes to mind, but there are many others in the British Isles and there is the trust in the golfer that the marker post or cairn has been placed in exactly the right place. You know that you are not being asked to confront a lake or forest of impenetrable gorse on the other side, and very often you are given an option of aiming out to the side with a less favourable line to the green or whatever. Think also of those vast bunkers at Sandwich and St Enodoc: can you make it over them, or do you have to go round? There is something thrilling in taking on the unknown, even if it's only the first time you play the hole. And who hasn't thrilled on the 9th at RCD when crossing the summit and seeing your ball safely at rest in the fairway below.

I don't suppose many designers now imitate this feature, but where they have allowed them to remain from more 'sporting' times, they continue to excite.

I haven't played any of the UK courses you mention here, but this is exactly why I loved the tee shot on Old Mac #3 --- it was so much fun to hit that shot.  Would love to see more tee shots like that.

jeffwarne

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #6 on: November 13, 2014, 06:12:41 PM »
Elevated tee, Bunker left, bunker right surrounded by deep rough--followed by a shot to an elvated green with bunker left, bunker right..
Must be an enduring concept because I see so darned many of them. ::) ::) ::)


In the not enduring but a great concept/idea
What Mark R. said!!!  especially when it's to a deceptively wide target (#11 Muirfield)
« Last Edit: November 13, 2014, 07:17:35 PM by jeffwarne »
"Let's slow the damned greens down a bit, not take the character out of them." Tom Doak
"Take their focus off the grass and put it squarely on interesting golf." Don Mahaffey

Nigel Islam

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #7 on: November 13, 2014, 07:13:20 PM »
C'mon...EDEN

That was certainly my initial thought with the cape of course. I often see holes that meet eden characteristics.

Paul Gray

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #8 on: November 13, 2014, 07:21:58 PM »
The drop shot par 3.
In the places where golf cuts through pretension and elitism, it thrives and will continue to thrive because the simple virtues of the game and its attendant culture are allowed to be most apparent. - Tim Gavrich

Mark Pavy

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #9 on: November 13, 2014, 07:34:33 PM »
The push up green wins by a mile.

mike_beene

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #10 on: November 13, 2014, 08:39:55 PM »
I have always heard the concept of the dogleg came from Prestwick maybe 3rd hole but no idea if that is correct.

Tim Martin

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #11 on: November 13, 2014, 08:55:17 PM »
The drop shot par 3.

Paul-Although there are some great ones I wonder if this concept isn't strictly a result of making due with the land at one's disposal and the fact that they often serve as connector holes.

Mike_Young

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #12 on: November 13, 2014, 09:53:05 PM »
Nice ponds with rockwalls in front of greens...
"just standing on a corner in Winslow Arizona"

David_Elvins

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #13 on: November 13, 2014, 09:58:21 PM »
Diagonal lines.
Ask not what GolfClubAtlas can do for you; ask what you can do for GolfClubAtlas.

DMoriarty

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #14 on: November 14, 2014, 12:49:52 AM »
Golf history can be quite interesting if you just let your favorite legends go and allow the truth to take you where it will.
--Tom MacWood (1958-2012)

Jeff_Brauer

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #15 on: November 14, 2014, 09:16:35 AM »
David(s)

Agree diagonal lines is a concept that will always challenge and perhaps the best example of what I was going for.

As to blind shots, not sure.  Surely out of favor for the most part.  But even more, while a blind shot always plays blind, in any era, some say its only blind once.....and others say the advance of information technology renders the blind shot less effective at whatever it was supposed to be effective at.

As to short par 3 holes, I like them.  I think I like the underlying design concept more - the half shot that requires judgment and a made up, rather than mechanical swing.  In that sense, even with Pelz, et al, it may be even more challenging to golfers now than in the past, where they probably had to invent and improvise their swing more than now.  Of course, on any longer hole, the smart golfer has the chance to lay up to avoid the half shot, making the short par 3 one of the best examples of the genre.  It's not impossible, but its hard to get the approach shot to a limited area of 80-110 yards as the only place to play from.

As to Eden holes, I guess it's a classic, but as alluded to, I think the complimentary deep bunkers front and moderate bunker left of the Eden hole somehow morphed into "equal bunkers both side of each green" which I don't really understand and don't think is a great concept either.  Guess we can't fault the original for mediocre copies, though.

Surprised, BTW, no one has said "wind."
Jeff Brauer, ASGCA Director of Outreach

Mike_Young

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #16 on: November 14, 2014, 10:05:23 PM »
Uphill 18th holes....
"just standing on a corner in Winslow Arizona"

V. Kmetz

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #17 on: November 14, 2014, 10:31:41 PM »
I don't know if it is enduring as to the weight of public attention or enduring kudos, but...

The Drivable (so-called) "Par 4"...a hole of 280 - 320 yards.

Seems like many courses--both fine an anonymous--have one of them, and TOC has, what...four of them?

cheers

vk
"The tee shot must first be hit straight and long between a vast bunker on the left which whispers 'slice' in the player's ear, and a wilderness on the right which induces a hurried hook." -

K Rafkin

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #18 on: November 14, 2014, 11:26:03 PM »
How about shared greens....

Sean_A

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #19 on: November 15, 2014, 03:13:59 AM »
I don't know if it is enduring as to the weight of public attention or enduring kudos, but...

The Drivable (so-called) "Par 4"...a hole of 280 - 320 yards.

Seems like many courses--both fine an anonymous--have one of them, and TOC has, what...four of them?

cheers

vk

VK

Were there ever that many drivable 4s 100 years ago?  I think this is much more of modern ideal and one of the best consequences of club/ball technology.

Ciao
New plays planned for 2024: Nothing

David_Elvins

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #20 on: November 15, 2014, 03:36:15 AM »

Surprised, BTW, no one has said "wind."


I think there are lots of places where wind is not a factor.  But what about the sand bunker?  Surely that is the most amazingly enduring architectural feature.  On links land they make perfect sense but the way that this hazard has spread out ubiquitously onto courses on all manners of soil types and terrains, often at ridiculous expense, really is amazing.
Ask not what GolfClubAtlas can do for you; ask what you can do for GolfClubAtlas.

Thomas Dai

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #21 on: November 15, 2014, 05:11:02 AM »
Use of railway sleepers.
atb

Mike_Trenham

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #22 on: November 15, 2014, 07:09:23 AM »
Protecting par at the green.  One of the hallmarks of the modern golden age is this as despite the sea change in  driver improvements architects have not reacted with tighter landing areas but with more challenging greens and green sites.
Proud member of a Doak 3.

archie_struthers

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #23 on: November 15, 2014, 07:18:38 AM »
 ??? ;D


Love false fronts !

Defends par for all levels of player , unequally !

Mike_Trenham

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: Most Enduring Golf Architecture Ideas/Concepts?
« Reply #24 on: November 15, 2014, 07:19:40 AM »
And for the cliche ... Saving the "best holes or views for the end of the round"
Proud member of a Doak 3.