Why are tees flat?

[Scott Stambaugh]

The tees at Chambers Bay are quite uneven.  The problem (at least the only time I have played there) is that the person responsible for set-up of the course had the tee markers only 5 or 6 paces apart.  In this short of a distance, it's impossible to have a variety of lies to choose from, if that was RTJ's intention.

 

[Jordan Wall]

Andrew,

Chambers Bay has some sloped tees.
Most notably, the second, sixth, and sixteenth.

Small slopes, but slopes nonetheless.

[Bob Jenkins]

I agree with Jordan regarding Chambers Bay. The tees were fascinating and as Jay Blasi mentioned, were intended to be a ribbon from the fairway, long and narrow with all kinds of possible teeing areas. I had never seen that before. The website shows the par 3 third hole with a very long ribbon tee. Several were sloped throughout.

It seemed very natural and I would have expected the greenskeeper would have a great time each day determining where the tees would be set up.

[Jesse Jones]

Jordan makes a good point.
The second is a long par 4 with a pretty wide fairway.
The sixth is one of the best holes on the course where an iron could be used off the tee.
The 16th is the most photographed hole. It's the one near the railroad tracks.
2 tee is not bothersome.
6 tee isn't that bad because most folks are hitting 3 wood or long iron.
16 tee is difficult because there is trouble right.

I'm not sold on the uneven tees for all courses, but it seems to fit at CB.
 

[Jordan Wall]

The interesting about the tees at Chambers Bay were that the only sloping tees were those which were big ribbons which extended out to the fairway.

Along with 2, 6, and 16, there were also other holes with slightly sloped teeing grounds.  1, 3, 7, 10, 13, and 18 all had some type of slope on the tees.

However, the holes which had several tee boxes, that were not really ribbons of fairway, were the holes without sloped teeing grounds.  5, 9, 14, and 17 had almost no slope on their tee boxes.  

Its quite intruiging.

[Joel_Stewart]

Interesting article today about the ribbon tees at Chambers Bay.  Mike Davis issued an unusual warning to players saying to not show up for only 2 practice rounds.
 

http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/golf-devil-ball-golf/usga-will-offer-sidehill--downhill-tee-boxes-at-u-s--open-160539482-golf.html


And it doesn't get any easier from there. Davis said that he will set up the course with tee boxes that aren't flat. That's right.

"One of the things that's unique to this is the architects put in what they refer to it as ribbon tees, these tees that just kind of meander, and it allows us to put tee markers where we want," he said. "And in some cases we may end up putting tee markers on slight slopes as opposed to you think, well, you're always going to have teeing markers on very flat areas. But there may be some where we give the players a little downhill slope, a little uphill slope, a side slope. So that's interesting."

Or infuriating. Add in a litany of blind shots and unclear bounces, and the person that's going to win this Open is going to be the one that studies hard and embraces the unpredictable.

"This is a one-of-a-kind site for us at a U.S. Open," Davis said. "There is going to be some players that just love this ground game and love the imagination and embrace it. And then there are other players who just want predictability. They want something right in front of them. They don't want to have to guess what is going to happen after the ball lands. It's just a different mindset."

[JLahrman]

Davis said that he will set up the course with tee boxes that aren't flat. That's right.

Actually (and I realize you've just pasted text from the article) what Davis said is that the USGA "may" set up sloped tee boxes, not that it will. The author of the article got that wrong both in the title and the text. We'll see if it happens.

[Will MacEwen]

.

[Joel_Stewart]

Davis said that he will set up the course with tee boxes that aren't flat. That's right.

Actually (and I realize you've just pasted text from the article) what Davis said is that the USGA "may" set up sloped tee boxes, not that it will. The author of the article got that wrong both in the title and the text. We'll see if it happens.

He's going to do it.  He advised players before the Open at Olympic that he may move the tees up on 16.  They forgot and on Sunday he moved them way up.  It cost Jim Furyk the tournament.

[Kevin_D]

I don't know about you guys, but when I think about some of the great, classic US Opens - Tiger at Torrey Pines, Pavin at Shinnecock, Trevino and Hogan at Merion - I always think, man, that would have been so much better if they only had sloped tees.

[JLahrman]

He's going to do it.  He advised players before the Open at Olympic that he may move the tees up on 16.  They forgot and on Sunday he moved them way up.  It cost Jim Furyk the tournament.

So "may" means "will" because it happened once before? We'll see. It would be interesting but everyone is talking like it's automatically going to happen. And come on Joel, Furyk lost because he didn't make any birdies on Sunday. He hit a bad shot on 16, but if he's blaming the tees he's just making excuses.

[Jon Wiggett]

Why not have tees that are not absolutely flat? Players seem to cope elsewhere on the course with uneven lies and on the tee they have the advantage of pegging it up.

Jon

[Tom Yost]

It would seem to me that the uneven tees at Chambers Bay would be something that would be generally embraced by the GCA crowd.

But we know the GCA mindset represents a very small percentage of the overall golfing population.  For a view of the thoughts of the "regular" golfing public on the subject, check out this thread on GolfWRX.  The bleating is deafening.

http://www.golfwrx.com/forums/topic/1171991-usga-to-use-sloped-teeing-grounds-at-chambers/

[Zack Molnar]

I have no problem with a sloped teeing ground, as long as it is not severe. I think it provides a great test of shotmaking, especially if there are advantages of being on one side of the fairway. For example, having a tee with the ball above the feet for a right hander, but being on the right side of the fairway is advantageous, you really force the good player to shape a shot left to right off that lie. Or, if you wanted to encourage players to bounce a ball into a redan-type green, you might have the slope on the tee box encourage that play.

In my mind, this is a similar principle to having a sloped fairway that forces a good player to shape a shot to which the green is receptive.

[Richard Choi]

My o my... if this has gotten the heathens at WRX in such a tizzy, I really want to see it now.

If I was Mike Davis, and I wanted to use a sloped ground for teeing, this is what I would do...

#17. Place the pin in the peninsula to the right where you must hit a very high shot to have even of hope of holding the green. Move up the tee to about 140 yards where there is a significant downslope between two teeing grounds. They have wedges in their hands, must hit high, and have a severe downhill lie.

You can do something like this on almost every par 3.

On most other holes, you can set it up to help your drive. On #6, you can setup to promote a draw to get the players away from the right. #8, the same. #13, set it up to promote a fade that you need. #18, just to mess with you.

[Michael Moore]

But we know the GCA mindset represents a very small percentage of the overall golfing population.  For a view of the thoughts of the "regular" golfing public on the subject, check out this thread on GolfWRX.  The bleating is deafening.

The "GCA mindset" is that of frank commentary on golf course architecture, which seems to be very much on display on that thread.

[Joe Zucker]

When I think of sloped tees, I imagine it could be a subtle way for the architect to help the player hit the desired shot, rather than an added wrinkle of difficulty.  If the hole moves right to left, an upslope tee for a righty and a downslope tee for a lefty will promote a ball flight that makes the desired shot more easily hit.  Lord knows there are few golfers who can hit a slight draw or fade on command regularly.  By gently sloping the tee, maybe a handful more players will hit the  tee shot called for on that hole over the course of a day.

Sloped tees can be an aid to a player, rather than a difficulty since this game is already pretty tough.

[Richard Choi]

In all seriousness, this is a non-issue.

You have to remember that the tee grounds is between the markers and two club length behind it. There is almost no internal movements at Chambers Bay large or prominent enough to take up that entire space.

Even if they do set up tees among slopes, there will be enough flat ground to tee off, if that is what you desired. I would guess any slope used will be there to aid the players, not to hinder them.

[Will MacEwen]

From my recollection, the slopes are pretty modest.  By giving them so much attention, Davis has people thinking they will be much more severe than they are.  I can see how they make that assumption.

When Davis speaks I am reminded of Lt. Bookman on Seinfeld, who said he liked it when he didn't know anything about the previous librarian's life.  Set the course up and let it speak for itself.