If Modern Tech has made some types of shots more difficult, then ...
... What's an architect to do about it ?
It has been suggested that there are some types of shots that are actually harder to play nowadays than they were with older balls and clubs.
Which shots ? Hooks and slices ? Gentler fades and draws ?
I know that in ancient times ( when Pat was young 
), a higher handicap golfer could often hit a shot that scratch players would not even try. Indeed, they might react to the very notion like it was Kryptonite. I mean of course a shot such as a 60 yard slice.
Do you remember how, back in the day, you would find yourself blocked behind a tree or dune, with a strong quartering headwind, and all prudence demanded a tacking approach, and you would say, "I've got this shot". Aim way left, try to hit it straight, and, just like a future Bubba, your ball would turn sharp and ride the wind to glory ? Nowadays, it seems, the more I try to turn it, the straighter it goes. I must aim at the fairway now.
Is there a way for architecture to actually reward a strongly curved shot, given that it is so easy these days to drop a ball with backspin on a small target immediately beyond a hazard ?
If so, wouldn't it restore a skill to the game, the ability to turn the ball ?
I think the answer is yes, but it requires a ball to bounce and roll a significant distance, coming from the proper angle.
A very old concept, I know. But the precision of modern golf needs a different scale for such features than in the old days.
What examples, old or new, can you give, where a highly accurate straight shot is not as good as a decent curving shot ?
Neil,
You cite and excellent example.
Golf courses/organizations, especially those that want to host championships,
want to be perceived as "tests" and it trickles down to the rank and file member.
Sadly. the word "fair" has resulted in so much charm and imagination being removed from design.
On an inland treed site, leaving a few "strategic" trees seems a perfect solution to introduce interest and "test" relative skill; certainly more than importing white Ohio fake sand to an inland site.While trees can compete with fairways for water and nutrients, certainly a select very few are cheaper to keep than maintaining a nest of fake bunkers.
Holes that require curving shots for optimal position are often done away due to unpopularity as a prior thread on GCA will attest. It's a wonderful way to test skill, but increasingly better players only see numbers and yardages, and see little need for shotmaking-other than controlling distance.
Greens with tilt and slope, the simplest way to interject strategy and thought into play, are systematically eliminated due to ever increasing green speeds, combined with softer greens typically associated with such fast greens (to keep them alive) I truly hate the words "firm and fast" because the fast generally ruins the firm resulting in just fast roll on putts, but slow bounce-negating the effect of tilt (which is usually absent anyway other than level tiers
The fastest playing COURSES I've seen have been in the UK/ireland and the actual stimp meter reading was probably around 9. Firm greens coupled with firm fairways can be accessed by curving the ball around bunkers-especially on holes where the slope of the green is away from the player.
That's something ALL course operators and players should consider when they lean on their super for faster stimp readings.
Additionally, with ever decreasing heights of cut on fairways, canted fairways won't work as the ball simply won't stop until it hits friction-the rough.
A fantastic way to test skill and angles that can be retained/restored by maintaining an appropriate height of cut which will accept a properly shaped shot into the cant yet not be eventually ruined by the inevitable forces of gravity on a nearly frictionless fairway.
Modern courses have of course responded by shaping the tilt and slope out of a fairway to accomodate this which results in less shotmaking skill being required to play off severe sidehill lies as the ball simply doesn't stop on one in a fairway.
Did I mention all of the above are cheaper ways to produce strategy?
Modern tech in many phases of the game has definitely made courses land the game less thought provoking. Frankly I don't think it's any easier-just less interesting