Part II of our Feature Interview with Samuel Ingwersen, AIA, is now posted

[Ran Morrissett]

As a reminder, Sam's thesis is that the pursuit of golf course landscape effects to create unique and beautiful course scenes negatively affects the qualities of the game that make it attractive. In my eyes, look no further than the updated Westward Ho! profile to glean a genuine understanding as to his very point.

In Part II, in addition to paintings that illustrate his thesis, Sam cites the work of two psychologists and a sociologist to expand his premise of landscape effect and its impact upon qualities of the game of golf. In 1958, the French sociogist Roger Caillois wrote Man, Play and Games, in which he analyzes game-playing and three major categories of games; competition, chance and simulation that have application to the game of golf. These major categories or qualities are reviewed.  I really like Sam's explanation of chance and Robert Browning's quote from A History of Golf, "...we have been so anxious in the name of fair play, to take all the elements of luck out of the game ... and destroyed its value as a test of each man's ability to stand up to bad luck. Modern golf is a stiffer test of skill, but has robbed the game of its charm as an "adventure" of the spirit."

'State of Flow', a sense of heightened reality and a division of simulation, is a central underpinning to Sam's thesis. Without it, joy and the varying experiences of State of Flow may be replaced by experiences varying in degrees from anxiety and frustration to boredom. With Optimal Flow, as Sam quotes from the psychologist's work; 'Once attained from engagement in an activity, it is a defining moment of joy and forever afterwards becomes a desire to return to by those who have experienced its pleasures.' Every golf architect and owner should consider that. When an architect's design becomes conducive to great flow, play will become robust and addictive (think Rustic Canyon).

Sam states that there are four components of the State of Flow that have affinity to his experiences of golf:  Challenge/skill (C/S) balance, Acton-awareness merging, Clear goals and sense of progress, and Unambiguous feedback of agency and recovery. This is new terminology for me as it relates to golf course architecture. We present it as a potentially new metric for understanding successful architecture. I am confident that after you read all three parts of Sam's Feature Interview, you will gain a new/additional/different perspective on how to look at a course. To me, that’s super exciting because the traditional ways of ‘judging’ a course had gapping flaws.

Sam provides a hint of what is to come in the final installment: 'To that end, Interview Part Three goes into a great bit of historical background about the cultural forces that have driven the mindset of golf's design ideology in pursuit of beautiful, unique and individualistic creations of landscape effect. Also, Interview Three suggests a strategy to turn the decline of the game around. That approach involves the implementation of outcome-orientated evaluation processes that include course design measures that would improve costs, delays in play, challenge/skill (C/S) balances for low and high levels of handicap players and more fun.'

Stay tuned - we will post Interview Part III later in the month!

Here is the link for Part II:

http://golfclubatlas.com/feature-interview/feature-interview-with-samuel-ingwersen-part-two-page-one/

Best,

[Tom_Doak]

The number one breaker of state of flow on a golf course is not any of the things Mr. Ingwersen cites.  It is simply the golf cart.  Building easily walkable courses with short green to tee walks is the best way to help golfers maintain a state of flow when they are lucky enough to find one.

[John Kirk]

Before this thread starts to fall down the list, I thought I'd take a few swipes at the flow concept.

The three sports I've played most in my life are probably basketball, golf and table tennis (ping pong).  Golf is by far the least flowing of the these three sports, as I understand it.  Since flow is so important to me as a sportsman, golf has been a less suitable sport.  I can't play basketball anymore, but find me someone who plays ping pong at about the same level as I do, and I can find that sweet spot of competition where I lose myself in the moment: moving, reacting and rejoicing.

You can try to break flow down into a number of specific categories, but I know what it is; that special feeling where one is reacting to the environment without conscious thought.  I was a pretty good basketball player as a kid, and by the time I was 24 or 25 years old, I knew the game well enough that no conscious effort was required to play.  I had transcended the whole thinking about how to play, as did most of the good players I played with.  As a guard who had the ball in my hands a fair amount, there were times to run, and times to slow the ball down.  When to assert yourself, and when to stay out of the way.  Everything about the game became spontaneous and unscripted.  After thousands of hours of practice and coaching, you just knew instinctively what needed to be done to win games.  You didn't win them all, because there are lots of good basketball players, but we won our fair share.

Don't think, play the game.

The primary difference between basketball and golf is the speed in which decisions are made.  In fact, professional golfers have proven that slow decision making and execution works best for optimal performance.  Also, golfers initiate every action, and never react to an outside agency, such as a competitor.  I found that elated state in sports by extreme physical challenge, coupled with unconscious reaction to a changing game environment, provided by a outside agency.  Basketball has it, ping pong has it, and golf does not.

The only way golf could elicit a state of flow, as I understand it, is to be played quickly.  The other day I played a quick nine with three other friends, in about 80 minutes.  When you're playing fast, where no one takes more than 5-10 seconds to play his shot, you are fully engaged, watching the action carefully while also preparing for your next shot.  It's your turn, go!  That's a flow game, that's a rhythm game, and that's probably how we should always play golf.

Perhaps one can separate the flow of the actual playing of golf shots from the downtime between shots, where we shut the mind off by whatever method we choose.  I like looking around, watching birds and animals, chatting during friendly rounds, less so during competition.  I've had glimpses of a flow state during golf rounds when I was swinging it well, but once again, it doesn't match that endorphin high of working your ass off to keep up and making decisions on the fly.

I hope this makes some sense.

[John Kirk]

One more thought.

There's a great song about flow in sports, one of my favorites.  "Ponta De Lanca Africano" is the story of Umbabarauma, the Brazilian goal man, by Jorge Ben in 1976.  The key lyrics of the song describe the play of a ball game beautifully:

The key lyrics in the English translation (sung in Portugese) look like this:

Umbabarauma, goal man
Umbabarauma, goal man

Play ball, play ball, ball player
Play ball, I want to play ball, ball player
Jump, jump, fall, get up, go up and get down
Run, kick, find a hole, thrill and give thanks
See how the whole city empties out
On this beautiful afternoon to watch you play

Umbabarauma, goal man
Umbabarauma, goal man

Play ball, ball player
Play ball, ball player

This is the story of Umbabarauma
An African point man
A point man whose mind is made up
Umbabarauma

I don't expect anybody to like or understand the song with only one or two listens, but it is the greatest song I've ever heard about playing sports.  I first heard the song at a "midnight movie" at the Varsity Theater in downtown Palo Alto in the late 1970s.  That was back when they rolled up the sidewalks at 6 PM on weekend nights.  This little 5 minute film captured my imagination then, and I was "reunited" with the song when David Byrne featured it as the first song on the first volume of his Brazil Classics series.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sAh4Vb1ghCo
                                       

[Niall C]

John


Let me respond to your first post. The second post unfortunately is way over my head but let me just point out that David Byrne was born in the fine golfing county of Ayrshire in Scotland (or was he brought up there and born in Dumbarton, or vice versa, I can never remember).


Anyway, I agree with you first post about flow and as a keen footballer and rugby player in my youth that was how the game was played. Not just the basic pass/tackle skills but also positioning round the pitch. You played intuitively. I also think you can get that in golf as you suggest when the game is played as it originally was, hit ball find it and hit it again. Back in the day before yardage books, sprinkler heads and the electronic gizmos the game was played by feel. Not only in club selection but how you hit it.


Now it seems to be much more of an arithmetic exercise. Even more so when you get caddies involved. Does that produce better scores as you suggest ? Well given two of the best golfers on the planet happen to be two of the slowest golfers on the planet then that would suggest the answer is yes, but I still recall Tom Watson saying the faster most players played the better they played. Could it be that Jordan and Jason are beating the opposition not just by their good play but by reducing the pace of play making the other players play not as well as they can ? 


Niall

[Ally Mcintosh]

John & Niall,


Now yer talking.

[Thomas Dai]

Not sure about Johns comment that golfers don’t react to outside agencies.
What about variables in the likes of wind, rain, temperature, altitude, slope, lie etc. Surely there’s a multitude, some of which, like the first two mentioned, can vary continuously, thus requiring a reaction?
And then there’s matchplay against an opponent(s)....getting into the opponent(s) heads etc. Reaction?
Ref Nialls last sentence, which made me chuckle, surely no one would ever dream of adopting such a tactic (sic! )
Atb

[John Kirk]

Niall and Ally,

Thanks for the responses.  Ran posted this a couple weeks ago, and it just took me a while to get around to saying something.

The nature of golf demands an arithmetic and deliberate approach to optimal performance.  What I do best in golf is hit the ball the right distance.  I've got three or four ways of covering distances, and the method I use depends on what the shot looks like, where the trouble is, and the number.  I have to take time to make this non-trivial decision, before beginning the pre-shot routine.

At my home course Pumpkin Ridge, I know all the distances within a few yards without looking at the sprinkler heads (I know the numbers already), and shot decisions are made instantly.  I could play the home course making instantaneous decisions and average only a stroke or two higher on average.

Putting may be a different story.  Like many older players, my dominant hand can get active at impact, opening and closing anxiously.  Playing fast by instinct, reading putts only for a moment, might help me stroke the putts more naturally.  I don't think so, but maybe.

Still, playing golf, even if one's scores are 2-4 strokes per round higher on average, may be a more rewarding if played as a speed game, where players are expected to play within a few seconds when it is their turn.  Perhaps a higher state of enjoyment can be found.  Surely, it would require greater attention to the game at hand.

To return to Mr. Ingwersen's analysis, I agree that an unnatural landscape is disruptive.

"Qualities by which a golf hole for players should be judged are structure, playability and delight."

--  Samuel Ingwersen

As I said before, I like a primarily natural environment for golf.  Humans can build an artistic garden for play, but it's not as good as the real thing, where plants and animals organize themselves over a longer period of time.  I love the walk in the park, but the parks are best when a minimum of disruption is made to the natural landscape.

I'll add this, as Thomas Dai's comment came just before I finished.  I assume all outside influences are accounted for before the player initiates the ball action.  The golfer does not react in mid-swing (while playing golf) to outside agencies.  That's my assumption, and I believe it to be largely true.