Modern Tee Systems and The Lido

[Mark_Fine]

What makes a ski resort great ? Is it the top half of the slope or the bottom half ?


Niall,
I think it depends who you ask 😊

[Tim Martin]

It's interesting that we are many years beyond the notion of removing so called top shot bunkers because weaker players can't cope. Rarely are they or any feature built at these distances today. Yet, now we have the concept of mega tees which is hailed as golf's savior. Nevermind the course walk is completely spoiled or that maybe it might be smart to actually create interest  for weaker players. No worries, we can build features for strong players and put people in carts to experience the "same course" at their personal level. I find the entire concept of mega tees as misguided, build it bigger paint by numbers architecture.

Ciao

The penalty for weaker players with top shot bunkers is still in force while modern irrigation practices have muted the run out achieved if said bunkers are skirted on the drive. In New England on parkland style courses I rarely see a “topped” tee shot run out significantly.

[Charlie Goerges]

It's interesting that we are many years beyond the notion of removing so called top shot bunkers because weaker players can't cope. Rarely are they or any feature built at these distances today. Yet, now we have the concept of mega tees which is hailed as golf's savior. Nevermind the course walk is completely spoiled or that maybe it might be smart to actually create interest  for weaker players. No worries, we can build features for strong players and put people in carts to experience the "same course" at their personal level. I find the entire concept of mega tees as misguided, build it bigger paint by numbers architecture.

Ciao

The penalty for weaker players with top shot bunkers is still in force while modern irrigation practices have muted the run out achieved if said bunkers are skirted on the drive. In New England on parkland style courses I rarely see a “topped” tee shot run out significantly.

Modern maintenance practices strike again!

[Michael Chadwick]

The original course had pretty much one tee per hole, 40-50 yards long, with three yardages posted from the back, middle, and front of the tee.  There were only a couple of holes that had an alternate tee.  I thought for sure that whatever else we added, the middle or back tees on the card would be exactly the same as the card for the course in the 1920's -- but no, between the client and my associates, they thought some holes needed to be played differently for today's "white tee" player.  I had to insist on putting stakes or plaques out or doing a separate scorecard so that people could play the historic setup, but I don't know how many are doing so.

Does this mean that WI's Lido has back tees longer than the yardage played one hundred years ago? If so, are the tees set back enough to recreate, so to speak, similar bunker carry requirements or approach lengths for a player using modern clubs? 

[Kalen Braley]

What makes a ski resort great ? Is it the top half of the slope or the bottom half ?

Niall

Niall,

I have wondered the same as a non-skier.

In Utah, the big draw seems to be the persistent "dry" snow conditions where its nearly always powdery unless you go in spring when it starts melting.

[Thomas Dai]

The comparison with skiing is an interesting one ……. apres skiing and apres golf.
And it seems like apres golf has become ever more widespread as the decades have progressed.
Golfs a simple stick, ball, hole game really. The rest is in many respects essentially expensive, money making malarkey.
Bells and whistles galore vrs hit ball, find ball, hit ball again.
Atb

[Tommy Williamsen]

What makes a ski resort great ? Is it the top half of the slope or the bottom half ?


Niall

Generally, the top half of a black diamond is the more challenging. Some are challenging all the way down. Fewer are challenging on the bottom half.

[Colin Sheehan]

Original Lido card listed Championship, Regular and Short courses as 6,693, 6,371 and 5,947.
https://photos.app.goo.gl/GHNYjpT68eoSvZxS9

Anyone who has read Scotland's Gift knows that Macdonald believed, as in life, there isn't any eternal justice to this game. Take the bitter with the sweet! Just deal with the challenge in front of you...remember the other player has to face the same injustice. Seven sets of tees, which is a lame pandering to constituents, would be an affront to Macdonald's sense of the game's arbitrary nature.

[Lawson Klotz]

Once upon a time the player measured his game against the course (and the conditions) and was given a handicap accordingly while now it seems that players want to fix the course to suit their game. A far cry from Donald Ross's idea of there's the hole, play it as you find it.


Niall

I hit my fair share of drivers on par threes as a junior (and the occasional layup short of a creek, etc. in front of the fairway on par fours). I always wished courses would accommodate my lack of distance, but that was not the course's problem...

[Brett Hochstein]

I thought for sure that whatever else we added, the middle or back tees on the card would be exactly the same as the card for the course in the 1920's -- but no, between the client and my associates, they thought some holes needed to be played differently for today's "white tee" player. 

"Needing to play differently," as in needing to be easier/shorter? Wouldn't the equipment evolution of 100 years (even the last 20) have more than compensated for that alone?  Or is my interpretation of the above wrong?

[Brett Hochstein]

What makes a ski resort great ? Is it the top half of the slope or the bottom half ?


Niall

Well if you are at Searchmont up in north Ontario, I would say the bottom half.  The top of a few runs are sort of flattish and then drop off for a steep run to finish.  Was awesome as you could build up momentum at the beginning and then catch a long run of air at the drop-off.  Still my favorite place I've ridden, even after moving out West.


Sorry to answer your rhetorical question 

[Kyle Casella]

Original Lido card listed Championship, Regular and Short courses as 6,693, 6,371 and 5,947.
https://photos.app.goo.gl/GHNYjpT68eoSvZxS9

Anyone who has read Scotland's Gift should know that Macdonald didn't believe there was any eternal justice in this game. Take the bitter with the sweet! Scorecards of his courses never had more than three sets of tees. Just deal with it...remember the other player has to face the same injustice. Seven sets of tees, which is a lame pandering to constituents, would be an affront to Macdonald's sense of the game.

It's sadly happening at a lot of clubs with recent member growth and pandering to preferences. My club originally had four sets of tees: championship (7100), back (6750), middle (6200), forward (5000). The club never put out the championship tees so functionally there were three. A group of folks decided they wanted to be able to play from ~6500, so a combo was born but it was understated and didn't have a separate tee box aside from a notation on the scorecard and a small stake next to the tee. That became the de facto member tee but the shorter hitters didn't like playing those tees in club events, even if they got more strokes than from the tees they normally played. There was also a call for a tee that was longer that the shorter tee but shorter than the middle tee. So this year, I was aghast to show up at the club to a scorecard with seven sets of tees. It looks like a train timetable. The one that really gets me is the combo of the original combo tee and the middle tee. The markers are usually five yards apart. Note- this is a top 100 club!!


That being said, I don't mind the concept of mixing it up at all and think it can be a fun way for a player to experience how a different player might play the golf course (especially in the case of the shorter player playing forward). I just don't think the concept of tee boxes needs to be so rigid but I guess the handicapping system gets in the way!

[Mark_Fine]

Kyle,
You might have missed my post, but the technology exists and will become widespread in the near future where you could start each hole from wherever you want and your GPS app will record the course and slope rating from those locations (for handicap purposes).  I just played in a GAP (Golf Association of Philadelphia) tournament and the course and slope rating for the set up we played that day was calculated using that method.  It took into account the tee and hole locations and generated the ratings.  This will be common practice in the not too distant future so golfers could literally start each hole wherever they want.

Sometimes I think we all (myself included) get too hung up on the starting points to play a golf hole.  Other than maybe the superintendent, who really cares where someone starts to play a golf hole (outside of safety reasons)?  If golfers have more fun or enjoyment or challenge or all of the above from playing farther back and closer in, have at it.  Multiple tees (even if less formal), give them that opportunity.  Has anyone ever played cross country golf?  It is a ton of fun if you ever get the opportunity to experience it.  Starting locations are purely random.

[Niall C]

I wonder what my handicap would be if I chose to "tee-off" 3 inches from the hole I'm playing, being sure to make the resulting putt uphill ?


Niall

[jeffwarne]

John:


It's a nice topic, but your post didn't say what I thought it was going to say!


Placing the tees at The Lido was a difficult exercise because many modern players [including, apparently, you] don't really like the way C.B. Macdonald intended golf to be played. 


Macdonald deliberately put in several carries that a shorter hitter like yourself couldn't make, and then provided alternate routes that you could play, which combined with getting a stroke on those holes, ought to even out the competition with your friends.  Instead, you want to be able to make the carries and take the short-cut on the Channel hole!  I don't blame you, exactly, but Macdonald will probably be haunting you from his grave now.


The original course had pretty much one tee per hole, 40-50 yards long, with three yardages posted from the back, middle, and front of the tee.  There were only a couple of holes that had an alternate tee.  I thought for sure that whatever else we added, the middle or back tees on the card would be exactly the same as the card for the course in the 1920's -- but no, between the client and my associates, they thought some holes needed to be played differently for today's "white tee" player.  I had to insist on putting stakes or plaques out or doing a separate scorecard so that people could play the historic setup, but I don't know how many are doing so.


If there is any course which you can play from the "wrong" tee markers and still find it interesting, I think The Lido is the one, because of all of the alternate routes of play it provides.  I find it somewhat sad that people still don't want to do that.

I'm so glad Tom posted and kept me from posting something uneducated and stupid.
Nonetheless, here I go.


Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems the best golden age courses were designed to be played from mostly one place with alternate routes, and it was up to the player to either
 1.figure out and navigate these routes
2.adjust via handicaps
2.get better


Now we often simply want to choose the course yardage that suits our game and (supposedly) allows us all to face the same challenges.


To each his own and great to hear both options exist at The Lido

[John Challenger]

Niall, Putting aside the fact that if you teed off a million times from 3" uphill to the hole, you would miss it once in awhile, so you probably would need some handicap, perhaps like .00001, I did want to address your ski hill analogy. I mostly like to ski in the blacks, which would be the back tees or the stones if applied to golf, but why wouldn't I want the people who ski the greens to have the same type of decisions and thrills that are the essence of what makes skiing fun? Sometimes they might choose to ski the safe slow way down and sometimes they might venture onto a blue and take more risk. If they go over a mogul and get some air and lose their balance, and then recover, they're hooked for life! I don't think everybody should be forced to take a chair lift to the top of the mountain, but most ski hills have green runs all the way down to give people the option.

[Ben Sims]

Ski comparisons all over the place these days!


I’ve never really understood why people insist on stating the color of runs they ski. Those ratings are intended to be useful only on the mountain you’re currently skiing. And it also doesn’t really explain whether you were in trees, open piste, off piste, bumps, groomers, etc. Skiing a wide groomed “black” is significantly less taxing for most skiers than a lower angle tracked out “blue” with gladed trees.


As for golf, it’s much different. Most places have a course rating of some sort. The places that don’t almost all have at least a handicap rating for their specific holes so matches can be determined. This is what the handicap system is for. Skiing has no such rating.


Lastly, competition is pretty much non-existent for recreational skiers. Someone in a group is always either slightly over their head or skiing down to the rest of the groups’ skill. Which isn’t a big deal since no one is judging their ski day via score.

[Tim Gavrich]

Kyle,
You might have missed my post, but the technology exists and will become widespread in the near future where you could start each hole from wherever you want and your GPS app will record the course and slope rating from those locations (for handicap purposes).  I just played in a GAP (Golf Association of Philadelphia) tournament and the course and slope rating for the set up we played that day was calculated using that method.  It took into account the tee and hole locations and generated the ratings.  This will be common practice in the not too distant future so golfers could literally start each hole wherever they want.

Mark--


I agree we're probably headed for this eventuality, but doesn't the embrace of functionally infinite tee choice take a potentially interesting task away from both architects and superintendents?


Especially around major championships, course setup seems to be a pretty common discussion point among golfers. It was certainly a big factor in the 2023 U.S. Open, where the USGA embraced at least some of Thomas' course-within-a-course concept at L.A.C.C. Certain tee positions corresponding to certain hole locations, as determined by people who have put a great deal more thought and work into course setup than the average golfer.


It seems like by giving golfers permission to tee off from wherever they want on a given hole, we are stripping both architect and superintendent of some of the opportunity to create a distinctive daily setup and make the affirmative statement to golfers, "You will enjoy *this* form of the golf course today." Is that something you regard as a positive evolutionary step for golf? I'm not sure myself.


Choice is a funny thing. When I go to a restaurant and see a fellow diner try to make all sorts of substitutions and amendments to a particular dish on the menu, I get a little uncomfortable, because that person is negating some of the chef's hard-earned expertise, essentially saying "I know better than you." Restaurants whose menus include the admonition NO SUBSTITUTIONS are almost always excellent, because what some diners may see as stubbornness is actually an assertion of the chef's confidence in his or her abilities to make something delicious. If it's not two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun, it's not a Big Mac.

[Jeff_Brauer]

Tim,


What happened to "The customer is always right" when it comes to menu or golf choices?  I sort of understand your point, but in the end, I think it is the architect who should be trying to design for golfer enjoyment, not the golfer being required to necessarily play something he/she can't handle just because we said so. [size=78%]  [/size]Just like the mantra here that we should "design for the land" which is true, of course, but only to the extent that it will probably create the best overall experience for golfers in most cases.


I also don't understand the mention of "pandering" to golfers of average ability.  I mean, that is a pretty aggressive use of language to demean most of us.  In fact, more course designs should consider the average golfer more and better.  So, I support the idea of more length proportional tees, so most have a chance of hitting greens in regulation.  If the middle shot on par 5 holes is usually considered "boring", why should we design 1 to 3 of those shots for shorter hitters on each hole?


I do agree 7 tees can be a bit much, and found that golfers really objected to more than 5, because in the end, there is no real harm in playing a bit too long or short (i.e., no one gets hurt making those decisions)  On the other hand, if a course membership wants that, then back tee players who object to the looks really need to take an attitude of tolerance in the name of other, less talented players playing forward.  (91% of men prefer playing 6,300 yards or less according to recent studies, so why should further back tee players be the ones who affect others' play out of their desire not to see other tees?)


The best gca I know at hiding those tees, btw, is Fazio, who goes to great lengths in many cases to hide them.  However, in a housing course, where the land plan usually pinches in at the tee, it is difficult and requires more width to stagger tees, hide them with small ridges, etc., which he does, but not many of us get that luxury with developers.


I can't really comment on what CBM was thinking during design, but in reality, the history of tee design is at best, one of benign neglect and insufficient thought as to how average golfers play.  I do believe he believed in "pandering" to himself, i.e., he had a huge slice, so he always put O.B. on the hook side.  He probably didn't think of the various classes of golfers as he might have, although accommodating his slice also accommodates others, which worked out okay.

[Ken Moum]

Tim, you're completely correct about giving golfers an experience,  and it makes even more sense for serious competition. Especially when the competitors are somewhat similar...your LACC example being perfect.


The situation,  IMHO, is different for a lot of daily play. I play a lot of golf with women, especially senior women,  and asking someone who hits most of their shots a max of 125 yards to play 5700 yards dooms them to a looong day.


Most of which is just beating the ball as far as possible.


If Mark's idea let them choose where to start might be a path to a fun day.

[Charlie Goerges]

I'm highly sympathetic to the greatly reduced tees viewpoint, but Ken's point is tough to get around:

 asking someone who hits most of their shots a max of 125 yards to play 5700 yards dooms them to a looong day.

Just try to imagine if virtually every hole you played was: Driver, 5-wood, 5-wood, chip or Driver, 5-wood, 5-wood, 5-wood, 7-iron.

[Peter Flory]

I'm highly sympathetic to the greatly reduced tees viewpoint, but Ken's point is tough to get around:

asking someone who hits most of their shots a max of 125 yards to play 5700 yards dooms them to a looong day.

Just try to imagine if virtually every hole you played was: Driver, 5-wood, 5-wood, chip or Driver, 5-wood, 5-wood, 5-wood, 7-iron.

I'm not saying it should be like that, but there was a time in golf history (perhaps the majority of golf history) where that was the case for pretty much every golfer.

[Tim Gavrich]

Jeff--


"The customer is always right" always seems to leave out the preceding three words, which change the complexion of that aphorism quite a bit. Here is the more complete quotation:


"Right or wrong; the customer is always right."


Those three words point elegantly to the sentiment I was expressing. The customer is often ignorant, or at least unwilling to trust the chef/architect/superintendent to craft a pleasurable experience. I think that's a shame.


I don't think I used the word "pandering" in my post(s), but it's not that far off as a descriptor for the hysterical tee marker arrangement I posted. It's a result of golfers who are unwilling to stray at all from their perceived comfort zone being allowed to overrule people who are better qualified to curate their golf experience.

Tim, you're completely correct about giving golfers an experience,  and it makes even more sense for serious competition. Especially when the competitors are somewhat similar...your LACC example being perfect.


The situation,  IMHO, is different for a lot of daily play. I play a lot of golf with women, especially senior women,  and asking someone who hits most of their shots a max of 125 yards to play 5700 yards dooms them to a looong day.


Most of which is just beating the ball as far as possible.


If Mark's idea let them choose where to start might be a path to a fun day.

Ken--


Just for the sake of clarity, nowhere have I advocated that 5,700 yards is an acceptable shortest tee yardage on any golf course. I think more courses need a set of tees below 5,000 yards for beginners and the shortest hitters. I just don't subscribe to the notion that any course needs more than 4 or 5 discrete sets of tees. How those tees are spread out is up to the architect initially, and then the superintendent on an everyday basis.


One point that gets lost in any discussions of who should play from what set of tees is the fact that only a very small fraction of golfers even enter their scores, so the vast majority of golfers are completely free - as they've always been - to play from wherever they want on any given hole. Recreational golfers have no cause to complain about a course being too long because they are radically free to set aside the formality that the scorecard imposes.

[Thomas Dai]

In some countries a significant amount of play is in formal club member competitions, club member matchplay events or clubs member team events. In such situations the tee played from cannot vary and therefore the choice of tee becomes important.

Also worth noting that the choice of tee whether for club competitive play or social play purposes has a huge effect on pace of play and thus the fun and enjoyment not only of the players in any one particular tee-time grouping but also of the players playing in groups behind (and some in front).
Atb

[jeffwarne]

I'm highly sympathetic to the greatly reduced tees viewpoint, but Ken's point is tough to get around:

asking someone who hits most of their shots a max of 125 yards to play 5700 yards dooms them to a looong day.

Just try to imagine if virtually every hole you played was: Driver, 5-wood, 5-wood, chip or Driver, 5-wood, 5-wood, 5-wood, 7-iron.

I'm not saying it should be like that, but there was a time in golf history (perhaps the majority of golf history) where that was the case for pretty much every golfer.

Exactly-I pretty much laughed out loud at that post.
Imagine the horror of an 18-25 handicap having to hit a 5 wood into a green laying...wait for it.... zero or -1.
Once upon a time kids came into the game hitting two-three wood shots per hole, and seniors left doing the same.
Now they all have tees and formulas based on 5 iron distances so they can be like pros and hit wedges in.
Gone is the days of the kid or old guy who never reaches a green in regulation and kicks your arse by pitching it dead every hole.