Is this a good hole, great hole, or bad hole?

[Tommy Williamsen]

The hole looks like fun and depending on the tee requires different strategies. Not sure why random bunkers are bad. They usually are in play for someone.

[Carl Nichols]

http://www.golfpelicanhill.com/courses/north-course

This is a copy of the 17th hole of the North Course at Pelican Hill in Newport Beach, CA.

Given the fact I have fully embraced my template-worshiping Raynorosity, there is no way I can pitch feces from my cage on the sidelines . . . . . . but #17 at Pelican North is the same hoie.

Fazio is like a great painter who has decided to ply his trade by feeding the public repetitious eye-candy. Seth brought new and unique interpretations of classical arrangements . . . . . Fazio just repeats his formulaic holes because it give the peeps what they want.

I'll quote a long-departed (and hopelessly controversial) Trrehouse trust fund baby: "There is plenty of room in the tent for all perspectives."

Never played a Fazio course I did not like . . . . . . . never played one I found as interesting as the worst C&C either.

So, do you want dependable, consistent and well presented pop music? Abba probably sold 200,000,000 records . . . . . . but I'm still a Deadhead who listens to old Pink Floyd, Peter Gabriel-era Genesis and Yes. Therefore, I am in the minority. If popularity is the measuring stick, we are on the fringes.     

Gib--
I've only played Pelican Hill twice, but isn't that a par 5?

[Jason Thurman]

http://www.golfpelicanhill.com/courses/north-course

This is a copy of the 17th hole of the North Course at Pelican Hill in Newport Beach, CA.

Given the fact I have fully embraced my template-worshiping Raynorosity, there is no way I can pitch feces from my cage on the sidelines . . . . . . but #17 at Pelican North is the same hoie.

Fazio is like a great painter who has decided to ply his trade by feeding the public repetitious eye-candy. Seth brought new and unique interpretations of classical arrangements . . . . . Fazio just repeats his formulaic holes because it give the peeps what they want.

I'll quote a long-departed (and hopelessly controversial) Trrehouse trust fund baby: "There is plenty of room in the tent for all perspectives."

Never played a Fazio course I did not like . . . . . . . never played one I found as interesting as the worst C&C either.

So, do you want dependable, consistent and well presented pop music? Abba probably sold 200,000,000 records . . . . . . but I'm still a Deadhead who listens to old Pink Floyd, Peter Gabriel-era Genesis and Yes. Therefore, I am in the minority. If popularity is the measuring stick, we are on the fringes.     

Gib--
I've only played Pelican Hill twice, but isn't that a par 5?

The dogleg doesn't look to be nearly as severe either. On the bright side, I just went to the Pelican Hill website, which declares that "Every hole is a signature!" So a copy of a hole from that course has to be awesome. Perhaps even the Mother of all Golf Holes!

[Tom_Doak]

How can the Mother of all golf holes only be ten years old?  And be a copy of a hole that's twenty years old?

[Jason Thurman]

Best Teen Mom season ever! The curvature of the bay does resemble the stomach of a pregnant woman.


My guess is the original quote contained a crucial word between "mother" and "of" that the yardage book omits for decency's sake. If you're not sure what word I'm talking about, shoot a message to Ben Cowan and ask him what he thinks of me and he'll probably fill you in. The hole is definitely one of those, and I probably agree with the developer that the location practically demanded a similar hole. But this hole felt a little off to me when I played it a week ago, and it feels more off to me the more that I think about it.


For one, the bunkers detract from the aesthetic and the playing experience. They're so pedestrian and typical looking and they just don't fit this incredible rugged setting at all.


The other problem with the bunkers is that they move the action further from the coast. The green and fairway would be so much cooler if they were right on the cliff's edge instead of buffered by huge bunkers.


Finally, I think the tees are poorly placed. 10 sets, and yet only two of them are on the cliff's edge? I'd much rather they all be on the cliff's edge and placed such that the carry to the fairway is always fairly short and the carry to the green is in range for a wider class of players. Based on some of the greensites and tees I saw on other courses last week, I can't imagine the Dominican has any restrictions preventing the placement of tees and greens right on the shoreline. I think that would work much better here than what's actually on the ground.

[Kalen Braley]

I think we should have an armchair contest with this hole.

The premise would be straight-forward. In the future, the current owner has sold to a different one. A major storm comes thru, wipes out the hole, green, bunkers, etc and you come in and start over.  What would you do with more or less the same amount of available land?

[Jim_Coleman]

   I don't know.  I'm not that enamored by a hole where my back is to the green when I'm teeing off.  Seems weird and maybe gimmicky.

[Greg Tallman]

I think we should have an armchair contest with this hole.

The premise would be straight-forward. In the future, the current owner has sold to a different one. A major storm comes thru, wipes out the hole, green, bunkers, etc and you come in and start over.  What would you do with more or less the same amount of available land?

Very crude mock up...


1. Shift 16 Green complex hard against the sea creating a very long par 4 with perhaps more spectaculr Green complex.

2. Move 17th hole to basicall recreate the curent hole, alternate tees could remain if desired.

3. 18 becomes a truly drivable (AND SHORT) par 4 for most skill sets.

Having not been there I have not idea of the topography but in lookung at the holes is seems rather flat and thus able to be maipulated if necessary.

Finish would remain 4-3-4 with 16 and 17 becoming a bit more difficult (more beautiful??) and 18 simply becoming a better golf hole all around while maintaining it's "heroic" characteristic.

[Matthew Petersen]

The 17th at Manele (Lanai, HI) is doing a pretty similar thing and executing it much better, it seems to me. Tees pushed close to the cliffs (200 foot cliffs in that case), no fairway bunkers to distract from the star, which is the setting, and a classic line of charm/line of instinct conflict because you can see the green out there across the waves, but you have to play away from it (and yet the closer you play to the cliff edge, the shorter your approach).

I think to carry straight at the green is roughly similar on both holes ... like 310+ at least, which is maybe in theory possible for some in the modern age, or with a really howling wind at your back. But in both cases, I think any ball that made the carry would have no hope of stopping.

[Mark Saltzman]

I think the hole is more interesting and more attractive than most are giving it credit for.  There seems to be a ton of focus on the tee shot from the back tees, which are part of a 7,600 yard golf course.  From the middle and forward sets of tees, the green is not at the golfer's back -- the hole bends around the ocean and the golfer is given the opportunity to take a brave line over ocean, less brave line over bunkers, or cautious line with no forced carry.

[Buck Wolter]

I saw this on a plane the other day --good drone shot of the hole in question--the pdf is better.



http://executivegolfermagazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/PuntaCana-WEB.pdf


found this one elsewhere on the site --doesn't look particularly intimidating from there