Is pace of play a consideration when designing a course?

[Duncan Cheslett]

Routing no doubt a consideration but I find the bigger problem on a lot of courses is how the superintendent has it set up. Narrow fairways bordered by high rough and then unmaintained “rough” with tall grass, brambles, trees and bushes greatly slows down play. Recent rainy weather left our rough grown up with a tendency for the ball to sit down making searches difficult even with a good idea of where the ball went. Keeping the course maintained so that wayward balls are findable will keep players forging ahead in a timely fashion.

This.


As a greenkeeper on a municipal course I very quickly learned that eliminating deep rough speeds up play immensely.


I see a worrying tend at many local club courses of encouraging wispy long grass between holes as an aesthetic feature. If the grass was genuine fescue it would work well. Unfortunately it is generally dense pasture grass with long wispy shoots. Finding a ball is next to impossible and even if you do, playing it IS impossible!


Greenkeepers and managers love it because it saves man hours and money. Members hate it because it means lost balls and longer rounds.

[Forrest Richardson]

Tom D says it well, with fun being the primary goal. Mike N is kind to mention Bill Yates, who did more for pace (flow) than anyone in history. Bill brought science to an often ‘personal opinion’ topic that most people have no idea about.

A few tid-bits:

Bunkers can have a consequence, but greenside bunkers usually have a clear club choice — unlike all sorts of grass cuts where any of 3+ clubs might be among the selection. Greenside bunkers really don’t affect pace that much.

A par-3 opening hole is the most efficient in any routing — but our clients won’t have that!

Flow is a better goal. No one complains if they’re hitting shots and actively playing the game. It’s waiting that stimulates the negatives of ‘pace’. For this reason Yates slowed play at Pebble Beach’s 5th and 6th holes by moving tees and recommending difficult cup locations. This way there is not as much backup on the iconic 7th with its delay of 6 minutes worth of photo ops.

Few know that the USGA has a pace rating manual. There are 3 great questions Bill Yates always asked:

How much time should it take? — that’s answered by a pace rating developed by a set of analysis steps.

How much time does it take? Gleaned by tee sheets and studying actual round times.

How much time would you like it to take? Which often involves the golf architect to make changes, along with maintenance, management and starting time protocols.

[Adrian_Stiff]

We had DP World Q School at our place last week.


THEY TAKE FOREVER ON THE GREENS.


I studied 7 groups and from the time the first person marked the ball to the time they put the flag in varied from 5 minutes 5 seconds to 7 minutes and 37 seconds. Most were about 6 minutes, AIMPOINT takes forever.


The next day our members played the same pins I studied 4 groups. quickest 1 minute 28 seconds, longest 3 minutes 12 seconds, the others were low two's!!!!


So the pro's took more than double the time of the Amateurs to hole their putts.

[Forrest Richardson]

Real life golf -vs- televised and pro tours is night and day. Like film production. Time taken for dialogue in movies is far apart from real life conversation. Two different time standards.