A couple of questions on a course with a permanent fairway height of cut of greater than or equal to 1 inch and a stimp reading of less than or equal to 8...
Would you join/frequent such a course?
Architects, how would you design such a course differently (if at all)?
Edit: ...And supers, what would maintenance be like assuming a goal of firm and bouncy?
Green speeds of 8 can be perfectly acceptable and even desirable on a course with interesting contours and could certainly provide way more interesting pin placements on a green. I remember when I went to Long Cove in 1988 and the greens were at 8 and provided an extreme challenge due to the slope, tilt and contours.
So 8 just isn't a real hard pill to swallow at all on well designed greens such as say Palmetto or Old Barnwell-they just would have more pins to use.
But a one inch high fairway is not a recent thing and would mostly make the golf worse.
A couple of the country courses I played in NZ were less unenjoyable due to the fairways being too long.(higher than an inch)
I'm aware of fairways cut at .22 of an inch which is super extreme and not enjoyable variable golf IMHO.
Very hard for mostplayers to get the center of the club at that height and it results in terrible wedge play and resorting to "putting" type shots.
I'm not sure of the exact number and it would depend upon the kind of grass but somewhere between .45 and .75 could certainly work, especially if the water use was minimized.
I inch HOC "COULD" work in extreme drought conditions.(not sure what the Goat is
)
So I'd say I could go "6-9" and .50-.75
I play a lot of golf at a course cut to maybe "6" on highly contoured greens and they work perfectly and highlight great putters and expose poor putters.