[Mark_Fine]

Many here say they don’t care about their score which is fine and/or are not card and pencil type players so try this for fun next time you get a chance.  It might give you a different perspective as to how some others play the game.


Play a few par fours from where you think they might be “driveable” or at least from where you expect to have a very short iron in your hands for your second shot.  Start play on your par fives where they might become tempting risk/reward holes on your second with a chance for an easy four or even a three.  Play the par threes that you can’t or struggle to ever reach with a club you know you have a strong chance to knock on the green or even hit close. 


This might give you a whole new perspective about teeing locations and how much fun golf can be

[Ken Moum]

I agree completely. I  haven't moved up that far yet,  but 4800 yards means I have a chance to break 80.


I totally get the idea of different routes to the hole but hitting 15+ fairway woods in a round os exhausting

[Jim Sherma]

Why not just add a stroke to each par value and have a bunch of fun ooh-ing and ahh-ing while shooting 5-under next time you shoot 85? It’s effectively the same thing.

[Thomas Dai]

Good post Mark.
Where I play most often have the last couple of years held a few Mens competitions from the front (red) tees. These competitions have proved to be extremely popular with high entry numbers with consistent comments along the lines of how much fun has been had.
The lessor players and shorter hitters like the events because the game is no longer a slog for them (as it is when playing from further back) and the better players and longer hitters like the opportunity to shoot low gross scores, an ego factor perhaps but one that works against them if they don't score low as their mates are quick to ridicule them for their poor play!
And one other thing, from the usual 4 hr competition round the time to play drops to 3 hrs 15 mins or so.
atb

[Joe Hancock]

Sounds like there’s a market for courses that max out at 4800-5500 yards. Would any of you pay the same rate to play a course like that vs. a 7200 yard course dialed back to 4800 yards? In reality, if 5000 yards is your happy place, you should be willing to pay more for the experience and time savings.

[Joe_Tucholski]

Sounds like there’s a market for courses that max out at 4800-5500 yards. Would any of you pay the same rate to play a course like that vs. a 7200 yard course dialed back to 4800 yards? In reality, if 5000 yards is your happy place, you should be willing to pay more for the experience and time savings.

Yeah, they're called executive courses.  There is a place for them in the golf world but the market shows they aren't all that popular.  That being said I figure distance is way down on the list of factors that impact what I'm willing to pay for golf.  Los Verdes cost under $50 at 6617 yards and nearby Terranea cost $80 for 9 holes at 1239 yards.

[Mark_Fine]

There will never be a right answer for where all golfers should start playing each hole.  We all know that when golf was first played, everyone simply started the next hole literally from right next to the hole they just finished.  As formal green surfaces around the hole became a thing, the starting point for the next hole slowly drifted away and formal tees like formal greens evolved from there. 


Some might argue why not go back to one tee (the same starting point) for everyone.  There is some merit to this idea.  But I think that ship has sailed.  Whether it is to provide different challenges, different looks, different levels of fun,…, the list goes on, multiple starting points are probably here to stay. 


The main point of this thread was that you can gain a different perspective playing a course from dramatically different yardages.  I got paired the other day as a single with a threesome who wanted to play a very short set of tees (in this case about 1200 yards shorter than I normally would play on this venue).  I decided to just join them and play the same tees and honestly it was fun and an entirely different experience (and I was happy to pay the same price as if I played the tips) 

[Jeff_Brauer]

Mark,


I have played the 4500 yard tees I have created.  Yes, it is more fun, but in reality, my score doesn't go down because my short game still sucks, LOL>


But, 5-10 years ago I moved from 6700 to 6300, then to 6000.  Hitting 15+ greens per round WAS fun!  And, in all the work I have done to add shorter tees in the last 15 years, almost all reports back are as you suggest...."Hey, golf is fun!"  Much better than "Golf is drudgery, but at least the long hitters like it!"


I don't understand why TD and others here insist golf would be better if we catered only to good players or longer hitters and telling an owner to screw the customers who pay the bills.  In fact, IMHO, moving away from the back tee focus is really one of the healthier trends in current architecture.

[Charlie Goerges]

I don't understand why TD and others here insist golf would be better if we catered only to good players or longer hitters and telling an owner to screw the customers who pay the bills.  In fact, IMHO, moving away from the back tee focus is really one of the healthier trends in current architecture.

I can't speak for all those guys, but my impression is that they're saying to cater to the largest subgroup which I would think would be the medium hitters and mid handicappers.


That said, I understand the idea that focusing on one set of tees would probably leave a much-too-large subset of the players without a fun choice, though as you stated, it's often very fun to move up, I question how fun it would be to move back from 4800 or less to 6000+.

[Thomas Dai]

I can't speak for all those guys, but my impression is that they're saying to cater to the largest subgroup which I would think would be the medium hitters and mid handicappers.

I would suggest this is exactly the subgroup that should be playing a shorter course. With respect many/most of them aren’t good enough players to be playing from any sort of back or even semi-back tee.
There’s too much ego and machismo in men’s golf with a large number of players not being as good as they think they are.
Move up a tee or two, lose less golf balls and have more fun.
Atb

[Steve_Lovett]

Sounds like there’s a market for courses that max out at 4800-5500 yards. Would any of you pay the same rate to play a course like that vs. a 7200 yard course dialed back to 4800 yards? In reality, if 5000 yards is your happy place, you should be willing to pay more for the experience and time savings.

I have yet to see a quality, well-designed golf course that maxes out at less than 5,500 yards. If the goal is to play a well-designed course at this length you almost have to find a bigger course and dial it back.

[Lawson Klotz]

Sounds like there’s a market for courses that max out at 4800-5500 yards. Would any of you pay the same rate to play a course like that vs. a 7200 yard course dialed back to 4800 yards? In reality, if 5000 yards is your happy place, you should be willing to pay more for the experience and time savings.

I have yet to see a quality, well-designed golf course that maxes out at less than 5,500 yards. If the goal is to play a well-designed course at this length you almost have to find a bigger course and dial it back.

Pinehurst No.3 is an exceptional course at only 5,155 yards, though it wasn’t intended to be such length in 1910.

[Charlie Goerges]

I would suggest this is exactly the subgroup that should be playing a shorter course. With respect many/most of them aren’t good enough players to be playing from any sort of back or even semi-back tee.
There’s too much ego and machismo in men’s golf with a large number of players not being as good as they think they are.
Move up a tee or two, lose less golf balls and have more fun.
Atb

I agree for the most part and think most of the people Jeff refers to would also probably agree. The focus could be on them but moving them up.


That said, if we all agreed that courses should be built around a single tee system (with sufficient room for adjustment) in order to facilitate the best design and best walk possible for the specific target market, I worry that the people who are already falling through the cracks would continue to do so. It would smartly eliminate the catering to the top players that can sometimes happen, but would enough 4000+ yard courses be built? I don't know, plus I don't really want to be separated from swaths of the golfing public (whether they're better or worse than I am at golf).

[Brian Finn]

Sounds like there’s a market for courses that max out at 4800-5500 yards. Would any of you pay the same rate to play a course like that vs. a 7200 yard course dialed back to 4800 yards? In reality, if 5000 yards is your happy place, you should be willing to pay more for the experience and time savings.

I have yet to see a quality, well-designed golf course that maxes out at less than 5,500 yards. If the goal is to play a well-designed course at this length you almost have to find a bigger course and dial it back.

Kilspindie is under 5,500 from the tips
Gullane 3 is under 5,300

[Steve_Lovett]

Sounds like there’s a market for courses that max out at 4800-5500 yards. Would any of you pay the same rate to play a course like that vs. a 7200 yard course dialed back to 4800 yards? In reality, if 5000 yards is your happy place, you should be willing to pay more for the experience and time savings.

I have yet to see a quality, well-designed golf course that maxes out at less than 5,500 yards. If the goal is to play a well-designed course at this length you almost have to find a bigger course and dial it back.

Kilspindie is under 5,500 from the tips
Gullane 3 is under 5,300

Fair. A very small handful.

[Craig Sweet]

This summer one of my golf partners and I played every hole as a par 5....the tees we chose played just under 6200.  Another "game" I had fun with was reaching greens in regulation. If I didn't I'd pick up my ball and go to the next tee.  It really makes you focus on your shot to be on in regulation.

[Sean_A]

Sounds like there’s a market for courses that max out at 4800-5500 yards. Would any of you pay the same rate to play a course like that vs. a 7200 yard course dialed back to 4800 yards? In reality, if 5000 yards is your happy place, you should be willing to pay more for the experience and time savings.

I have yet to see a quality, well-designed golf course that maxes out at less than 5,500 yards. If the goal is to play a well-designed course at this length you almost have to find a bigger course and dial it back.

Kilspindie is under 5,500 from the tips
Gullane 3 is under 5,300

Fair. A very small handful.

It depends on what one considers good. For some length means good.

Formby Ladies is under 5500 and it has one set of tees. 😎

The point is building high quality shorter courses is not hard. The hard part is not spoiling the walk because many believe a certain longer yardage range is a must.


Mark, I often play short tees because they are often the shortest walk from previous green. That is my point. I usually don’t want to walk extra yards forward and especially back. The walk gets spoiled. Not near enough attention is paid to dead time in courses design. Either that or dead time is no longer important. It’s one thing to walk extra for a better hole, but that often isn’t the case. They reward is a longer hole with the same angle.

Ciao

[Thomas Dai]

Another different perspective would be only one or maybe two sets of tees but have got balls that perform differently. Say a standard ball, rolled-back ball and a ball that goes further than standard.
Just saying (although probably best we don't go there in this thread!).
atb

[Mark_Fine]

Sean,
Some of the best aspects of some golf courses are the walks between tees.  When I take friends to play Cypress Point, I tell them take some of the walks between holes slowly because they are the best walks in golf. 


Also what you call dead time, others call exercise and or a chance to take in the views, look at nature, gather one’s thoughts, enjoy the day, chat with your playing partners,…etc.  It is one thing when holes require you to be a mountain goat or long distance hiker to get there, but nothing wrong with a little extra exercise. 


By definition, if there are different sets of starting points for holes, golfers will have different distances of what you call “dead”time to walk.  Also just think of how much dead time the poor guy has who hits it 320 yards vs the player who only hits is 110.  All that walking between shots for that long hitter with nothing to do but walk must be boring 

[Sean_A]

Sean,
Some of the best aspects of some golf courses are the walks between tees.  When I take friends to play Cypress Point, I tell them take some of the walks between holes slowly because they are the best walks in golf. 


Also what you call dead time, others call exercise and or a chance to take in the views, look at nature, gather one’s thoughts, enjoy the day, chat with your playing partners,…etc.  It is one thing when holes require you to be a mountain goat or long distance hiker to get there, but nothing wrong with a little extra exercise. 


By definition, if there are different sets of starting points for holes, golfers will have different distances of what you call “dead”time to walk.  Also just think of how much dead time the poor guy has who hits it 320 yards vs the player who only hits is 110.  All that walking between shots for that long hitter with nothing to do but walk must be boring 

I thought I heard all. The game takes 3-4 hours to play and covers 4-5 miles. Yet more time and yards are needed for chatting 😎.

Ciao

[John Mayhugh]

I don't understand why TD and others here insist golf would be better if we catered only to good players or longer hitters and telling an owner to screw the customers who pay the bills.  In fact, IMHO, moving away from the back tee focus is really one of the healthier trends in current architecture.

Who is TD?
I haven't seen anyone post the sort of thing you are talking about. Any examples?

[Mark_Fine]

Sean,
Take a 7200 yard golf course where every back tee is the closest one from the hole you just played, just think how much dead time the poor player has who has to walk all the way forward to play from the 4500 yard markers  Better to think of it this way, those golfers who want a longer or shorter experience might have to make a slight “dead” time sacrifice to get it such as walking back 30 or 40 yards, heaven forbid, to the tips, or walk the same distance forward without having to hit a shot to get to their shorter tee.

Just think how long golf would take if we made everyone start from those back tees just to save “dead” time!  It would no longer be your 3-4 hours. Then again maybe it would be because most players would give up the game. 

[Thomas Dai]

I thought I heard all. The game takes 3-4 hours to play and covers 4-5 miles. Yet more time and yards are needed for chatting 😎.
Ciao

…… and for drinking the beer in buggy cooler boxes!
Atb

[Paul Jones]

Mark,


What I have found is people play golf for different reasons.  Some play to get away and be outdoors.  Some play to gamble and won't play unless some type of bet is made.  Some only like tournament play. Some play to have fun with friends. Some play because they love the game.


If I play Friday afternoons, I just want to relieve some stress and might even drink beer and play music - Friday afternoons are usually very slow round of golf as most at our club tee off a between 12-2pm.  I usually do not keep score and hit a few extra chips/putts.  However, on Saturday and Sundays I have my normal group and we play for a few bucks and play proper golf by the rules.


What I am getting too... is I think it all depends on why people play golf depends on if they would enjoy playing from a closer set of tees.

[jeffwarne]

Another different perspective would be only one or maybe two sets of tees but have got balls that perform differently. Say a standard ball, rolled-back ball and a ball that goes further than standard.
Just saying (although probably best we don't go there in this thread!).
atb

I suggest that many years ago in this forum, and was pretty much laughed off the page.
Somehow more real estate ,more turf maintenance and more isolation(people playing different tees in same group) is deemed to be better......
The no bifurcation argument is so silly-the game is already bifurcated in SO many ways.

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