I’ve been enjoying reading posts by Armen Suny on his “Classic Minimalist Golf Course Architecture and Design” blog.
I like what he and his cohorts have done as psychological warfare.
Below are some excerpts.
What are your thoughts?
“In 1980, we rebuilt several championship tees on East Course. Richie Valentine manipulated the slope of these tees. He believed that the greatest golfers in the world should be able to figure out the slope of a tee and adjust their shot accordingly. An example of what we did was the 15th Championship tee, which we put a 1% grade on from the right side to the left side, creating a hook lie on a hole that you probably want to hit a fade on since there is OB very close to the landing areas on the left side. The member tee was sloped 1% from the left side to the right side creating a fade lie to help the member stay in bounds.”
(For the Open) “In 1981, Richie Valentine had me pick up 18 rollers from the Merion Cricket Club. The rollers were 4 feet wide and were not real heavy and were never used on the course. But they were placed at the players' exit at each green. Richie wanted to "get into the player's heads." So every time a player walked off a green they had to pass by or almost step over a green's roller.”
Wicker flags at Merion: “The old wickers were all different heights. The set … ranged in height from 6.5 feet tall to 8 feet tall. The wickers were picked up every evening to prevent theft and replaced each morning as we did course setup. And as the guy that did that course setup most days, I created optical illusions as to the hole position on the greens by using different length poles for different effects. A short pin in the front of the green looked to be much deeper.”
I love it!!
