pinnable areas

[Tommy Williamsen]

The third hole at Ballyhack is a par three that has tees from 111 to 251 yards. Slope and undulation are difficult to see on pictures but this green has as much movement as any on the course. The green slopes toward the front on the right side and there is a bailout area short and right of the green. In the middle back is a shelf that is the flattest spot on the green. Over the bunker is a bowl. Any shot close will feed down to the pin. The pin that is shown in the picture is only used when the green speeds are on the slowish side. The super told me there are really only four pinnagle areas. The bowl, back left, middle back, and the one in the picture. We don't get a lot of play but it seems that with a green this size more usable pins should be in the offing.
When designing a green how do you create enough pinnable areas? How many should there normally be on a green?

[Jeff_Brauer]

Tommy,


Shameless plug but I finally sent the new ASGCA book, "Designs On a Better Golf Course - Practical Answers to Common Questions" off to the printer.  it tries to answer those kinds of questions for committees and others.  On the subject of pinnable areas, here is what I wrote (the book is a self edited compilation of my old columns in Golf Course Industry, which also focused on the practical aspects of design):


Superintendents need 14-21 separate pin locations (usually 8-10 feet in diameter) to move the flagstick around, allowing recently used locations to heal.  That’s only 1600 SF of cup space, but we should add another 2-5 feet for collar, 10-12 feet as the minimum distance to place a flagstick from the edge, and if thinking ahead, several feet to account for inevitable green shrinkage over time.  That equates to 3850-5025 S.F., but only if 100% of the area can be used for hole locations.  Most greens have some internal contouring that prevents cup placement, requiring 20-25% more space.  4,600-6,280 S.F. is a more practical minimum green size. 


The 14-21 days are influenced by both play levels and maintenance practices. 


Busy public courses usually have lesser maintenance $$$, and low play private clubs are typically pretty aggressive in their cultural practices, and the range can be broader on the low end.  A few privates may get away with as few as 5-6 pin positions. (Although if they are closed on Monday's, the same pin tends to show up for the once a week on Saturday player on a 6 pin rotation, so 5, or 7-9 is more practical.  Or actually, most supers have a pin rotation system looking like a tic tac toe board, so 9 may be the ideal minimum.  For public courses, each of the spaces on the board should have 2 or 3 cup locations within to get you to 18-27.


And, according to the USGA, these should be in the 2-3% range.  Jerry Lemons (ASGCA) did a chart showing it can be more depending on green speed, and the USGA itself uses a field measure system that, if you run the math, sets pins at slopes of as much as 3.88%.  Some architects contour greens as low as 1.5%, so a cuppable area is probably one that ranges from 1.5-3.75% (no need to absolutely push the limit, because a quarter inch grading mistake could put you over the edge.)  I can tell you that measuring green slopes using the USGA system at a private club with stimp 13 greens, that the 3.88% is right where golfers complain about a pin position being unfair.  And, that is why gca's spend a lot of time on greens, usually checking slope on 10 foot grids just to make sure.


Now, I know many will come back with a "That's too rigid a rule of thumb" and maybe even a few courses that make only a few pin positions work.  Sure, but you can't really fool Mother Nature, and in my 37 years experience, every green without a suitable number of pin positions elicits similar questions from golfers and complaints from supers.


As always, just MHO.

[Brad Steven]

Interesting question - what is amazing is how few pinnable spots there are now on many golden age private greens because the green speeds are so much faster now.  As Jeff points out, the exclusive, low play clubs actually need fewer- but that they have fewer now is reflective of the race for faster greens.  Anymore, it seems that 10.5 on the stimp is just average .... where I used to think that was pretty quick. 

[Tom_Doak]

As Jeff said, you don't really need x number of different areas, you need a total area that's usable for hole locations, after you exclude the perimeter of the green.


That's the first time I've heard the 3.88% number, but that is probably a reasonable limit for calculating the area that can be used.  Crystal Downs had some old hole locations that were 4% and 5%, but they are hard to use anymore in certain green speed or wind conditions, and you can never tell what's going to happen by the afternoon.


The PGA TOUR swears they won't cut a hole in a place with more than 2% slope, although they certainly have to bend that rule as some older courses don't have four such locations on some greens.  I mention this to point out that the pinnable area depends on the maximum % of slope he will use to cut holes.  If his tolerance is like the PGA TOUR's, the greens will have to be much flatter than if you use up to 4% slopes.

[Thomas Dai]

Height of cut, green speeds, seasonal/daily wind/weather conditions?
Atb

[Jeff_Brauer]

Tom,.


The PGA might use 2%.  The old Masters and US Open guidelines were to select a hole location, and then place a digital level two directions 90 degrees off.  If the sum total of those 2 percentages was 5.5 or less, it is a useable hole location.  They also used a max of 5% on the front half of the greens to minimize de-greenings......


Running some math, (i.e., X squared times Y squared = Z squared for the long leg.  The maximum slope would occur if both directions were 2.75%, making a 45 degree triangle, where the long leg (hypotenuse?) is 1.414X the equal length legs, which turns out to be 3.8885%. 


In reality, most slopes might be 3.5% one way and 2% the other, or 3% and 2.5% the other, in which case the max downhill slope is a bit less, 3.83%, but they all come out about the same, providing the steepest slope isn't over 4%, which is the max the USGA allows - 4% downhill with 0% cross slopes. 


At one club, with 13 stimp greens, it was amazing that every.....single.....pin spot golfers complained about measured out to 5.5 or above, with some being right at 5.5, 5.6, etc. and a few greater.


The philosophical question is, do you slope greens at the absolute max grade for normal green speeds, allowing big events or dry off season slopes to go over to the marginal category, or do you max out slope for the worst green speed times, i.e. assume that at some point in the year your greens will be at PGA Tour speeds?


Jerry Lemons chart shows good, marginal and avoid.  For a green speed of 10, the 3.75% or so is the max in the good, but for 13, 3% is the max recommended, etc. The maximum marginal grade at 10 and 13 is 5.6% and 4.4%.


The 3% at 13 stimp suggests to me where the USGA Green Section gets their 2-3% maximum slope recommendations.  And, really, depending on who you design for, like average golfers who putt 100% worse than tour pros, I would say 3% would be the max practical on most courses, but it is all in the eye of the beholder (or the putter) I guess.

[Tom_Doak]

Jeff:


I was with you til the last sentence.  Average club members shouldn't see greens that Stimp 13 more than one weekend a year, no matter how flat they are!  And a course like Crystal Downs or Merion should never go to 13, because they don't need to.


It's that work by numbers approach that's causing the problem.

[Alex Miller]

Having never played Ballyhack, I'm surprised the front middle / left-portion-of-the-right-side doesn't get pinned. Looks fairly flat.

[Tommy Williamsen]

Having never played Ballyhack, I'm surprised the front middle / left-portion-of-the-right-side doesn't get pinned. Looks fairly flat.

There is more slope there than one can see in the picture.

[jeffwarne]

Interesting thread and commentary.


The real problem with 13 and God forbid 14....is what do you do for an encore?
Which was the problem with 10,11 and 12.


I just don't get how putting is more fun at 13 to a 1.5% slope is more fun or challenging than a stimp of 10 with a 3-4% slope.
It certainly costs more.

[Jeff_Brauer]

Jeff:


I was with you til the last sentence.  Average club members shouldn't see greens that Stimp 13 more than one weekend a year, no matter how flat they are!  And a course like Crystal Downs or Merion should never go to 13, because they don't need to.


It's that work by numbers approach that's causing the problem.

Down south, winter greens, either painted or just lightly over seeded, can get to 14 for 2-3 months, and the numbers need to be considered more than just for a few days a year.  Also, public courses with pace of play issues probably get some relief without greens that treat golfers like babies treat diapers.


Jeff W,


Google Jerry Lemons charts.  As I mentioned even at 13, the green zone is up to 3.88%. They yellow zone goes up even higher, to 5.7%.  Its really not as black and white as all modern greens only have 1.5% slope.


I had a discussion with Pete and Alice once and their feeling was tour pros tout the 1.5% as being more difficult to read, but in reality, they like them flat because they are easier to read quickly once a year.  Average golfers who play every day prefer gently rolling greens where the random variety of contours and approach shot landing location provide a different to read putt every time out.


In reality, there have been periods (and specific courses) over my career where I contoured pretty flat and others where I got pretty wild.  I am actually trending back a bit more wild now for a variety of reasons.

[Tom_Doak]

I had a discussion with Pete and Alice once and their feeling was tour pros tout the 1.5% as being more difficult to read, but in reality, they like them flat because they are easier to read quickly once a year.  Average golfers who play every day prefer gently rolling greens where the random variety of contours and approach shot landing location provide a different to read putt every time out.

Jeff:


I think the main reason the pros like flatter greens is that they don't have to aim outside the lip on a putt of 3-4 feet, or worry about whether they need to aim outside the lip.  As soon as you cross that line, it's psychologically more challenging.

[Matt_Cohn]

I played a tournament today with greens running probably at 9 and hole locations up to 4% slope. Probably half of the pins couldn’t have been used at 11+. Probably the way it should be, but faster greens still feel more fun.

[Rob Marshall]

What courses keep their greens on average at 13? That’s just stupid imo.

[Jon Wiggett]

faster greens still feel more fun.

Why?

[Kalen Braley]

faster greens still feel more fun.

Why?

For me its because of how true they roll.  I can't ever recall playing a course where the greens were 9+ on the stimp and bumpy.  And visa versa greens that rolled 7 or less were always at least a bit bumpy...

[Jeff_Brauer]

I think the hard part is, after breeding bents for shorter cut for 30 years, I doubt many new varieties can even be maintained well at the HOC needed to slow greens down to 8 or whatever.


BTW, similar to the distance debates focusing on the 0.01% of golfers who hit it further than 300 yards, I am told by a few industry types that the average green speed in the US is still 9-9.5.  If, say, 5-10% of courses want them faster, who am I to argue with them?


Similar to TEPaul's big world theory on design, I suspect its also a big world when it comes to green speeds......

[Matt_Cohn]

I had a downhill, right to left 2 footer this morning on a 4.5% slope and 9 stimp. Scariest putt I’ve had in a while, probably more than any putt I’ve had on a fast green in some time. Pretty interesting experience overall.

[Tommy Williamsen]

I had a downhill, right to left 2 footer this morning on a 4.5% slope and 9 stimp. Scariest putt I’ve had in a while, probably more than any putt I’ve had on a fast green in some time. Pretty interesting experience overall.

How long was the comebacker?

[Erik J. Barzeski]

I had a downhill, right to left 2 footer this morning on a 4.5% slope and 9 stimp. Scariest putt I’ve had in a while, probably more than any putt I’ve had on a fast green in some time. Pretty interesting experience overall.

Let's say it's 45° down… the putt will break about four inches (and should be aimed about 2" outside the cup).

[Jon Wiggett]

faster greens still feel more fun.

Why?

For me its because of how true they roll.  I can't ever recall playing a course where the greens were 9+ on the stimp and bumpy.  And visa versa greens that rolled 7 or less were always at least a bit bumpy...

Kalen,


thanks for the answer. I will be honest that I am less bothered about how how bumpy or apparent trueness of the roll as I am about the consistency of the result. These are very different things.

[Kalen Braley]

Jon,

That's very true, consistency is key in these situations.  If I had to guess more of us would prefer to fight the consistency battle with things we can control vs those that we cannot.

If I play a course with fast greens that putt true, and I consistently go 5-6 feet past, that is in my control.
However if I putt on bumpy slower greens, and the ball is consistently being knocked offline due to being plinko'd on its way to the hole then that is out of my control.

P.S.  I have nothing against slower greens, I just don't recall ever playing a course with slow greens that weren't also bumpy.

[Matt_Cohn]

I had a downhill, right to left 2 footer this morning on a 4.5% slope and 9 stimp. Scariest putt I’ve had in a while, probably more than any putt I’ve had on a fast green in some time. Pretty interesting experience overall.

Let's say it's 45° down… the putt will break about four inches (and should be aimed about 2" outside the cup).

Yeah, a safe line would have been right about that. I took the line that would have been a problem had I missed—luckily I made it. Unluckily that was my last shot of the day, as the tournament was called off five minutes later due to smoke/air quality issues.

[Jeff_Brauer]

I had a downhill, right to left 2 footer this morning on a 4.5% slope and 9 stimp. Scariest putt I’ve had in a while, probably more than any putt I’ve had on a fast green in some time. Pretty interesting experience overall.

Let's say it's 45° down… the putt will break about four inches (and should be aimed about 2" outside the cup).

Erik,


Okay, OT for sure, but how do you know that?  I have seen the GreenLogix, Strakaline, etc. books which all purport to be able to use for green reading, but haven't studied it enough to figure it out.  Thanks in advance......


As to your aiming point, I was lucky enough to play with Dave Stockton in a pro am and he gave me the same tip. With a 4.25" width cup, the first 2" (leaving .125" for a shot that might not drop) break is really "on the house."  Nothing says you need to hit the front center of the cup, but most of us read it that way.  In fact, most breaking putts should hit the hole somewhat high of dead center.

[Erik J. Barzeski]

Okay, OT for sure, but how do you know that?  I have seen the GreenLogix, Strakaline, etc. books which all purport to be able to use for green reading, but haven't studied it enough to figure it out.  Thanks in advance......

I have the old AimPoint numbers for every 15° and stamps from 8 to 14 on 1-4% (maybe 5%?) slopes.

In fact, most breaking putts should hit the hole somewhat high of dead center.

Well that depends on where you call "center." The center of the hole relative to you is not where most breaking putts should go in - that's low. If a putt breaks heavily right to left, it might enter the hole at 4:00 (if 12:00 is away from you) but still go in the "center" of the hole.

I made a 40' putt the other day that had an aiming point (start line of the ball) at about 25' right. It went in at almost 80° from a straight line to the hole. It went in the dead center of the hole the way I talk about things, but obviously fell in the far right side from my actual physical perspective.