tee box placement...

[Jon Sweet]

Watching my home course go through a renovation.  As a caddie there over the last 21 years(not full time anymore) I have likely seen more golf than just about anyone there.  Watched how the holes are played and see a lot of the same misses over and over.  There is a push to get the tee boxes effectively in a line.  I am guessing this leads to ease of maintenance although they aren't one big box.  I also heard it argued that all the big name courses do this but that doesn't line up with my experience.  Is the goal generally as an architect to have the hole play the same for each set of tees per player or more so to provide variety?  Disappoints me a bit as moving a box say 10 to 15 yards left really changes the shot value of the hole IMO.  Especially ones where the angle really gave players fits and called for a certain shot.

[Ally Mcintosh]

Generally speaking I first attempt to go the opposite way to what you are suggesting, off-setting the tees. The objective of this (after providing interesting playing angles) is about aesthetics, so that you are not staring at another tee box at the front of your own.

[Tom_Doak]

Generally speaking I first attempt to go the opposite way to what you are suggesting, off-setting the tees. The objective of this (after providing interesting playing angles) is about aesthetics, so that you are not staring at another tee box at the front of your own.

Me, too.  And in America you could be staring at 3-5 tee boxes in front of your own!  It’s so ugly.


My thought is to make the angle of play somewhat easier as you move up to forward tees, so maybe you don’t have to change the distance as much.  Also, sharp dogleg holes are harder to reconcile with five tees, so you need to be concerned with running through the fairway.

[Sean_A]

Sometimes forward tee boxes can be very attractive. Beau Desert generally does it well with grade level tees surrounded by attractive rough. It’s when tee boxes are raised that things get ugly. That said, if there is space, I am all for building tees off centre. If land allows, the tees can be built so that they aren’t noticeable. It’s one area of design I rarely hear people talk about. Burnham does this very well. Tees are all over the place and several holes play quite differently depending on the tee.

Ciao

[Ally Mcintosh]

Yes Sean,

Firstly one has to think about how the hole plays from a chosen position (like Tom says, reducing the angle of the dogleg the further forward you move gives more advantage than just the distance).

But after that, it is all about making the tees not pop out into your eyeline. On a heavily undulating links landscape, it is often easy to find a natural pad and hide tees altogether, using the native grasses and off-setting the position. But where this isn’t as easy - less movement, vegetation or you don’t have the width to play with - and you end up with two or more tees in a line, the closer you can build them to grade and marry them to the landscape, the less obtrusive they are to the eye.

Remembering The Loop. For me, the single greatest element (among many) of that course was that there were no erroneous tee-pads visible from the alternative routing. None. They were all hidden in plain sight among the fairway.

[Jim_Coleman]

   We just went through a “restoration” by Hanse where it seems he tried to line up the tee boxes in a straight line. Not sure whether he thinks that’s the way they were 100 years ago or whether he just likes the look. I don’t think it makes all that much difference, now that we’ve removed most of the trees that made which side of the tee you hit from relevant.

[Ally Mcintosh]

Hi Jim,


A “restoration” of what original design (I.e. who)?


If it had an element of geometric style design in the first place, this might make a lot of sense.

[Jim_Coleman]

Ally:  Rolling Green, [size=78%]1926 by Flynn, outside Philadelphia [/size]

[Steve_ Shaffer]

Speaking of the Tee Box, Forrest Richardson has a history of the Tee Box:









Tee Box — A Historical Term - Forrest Richardson Golf Course Architects

[Michael Felton]

There is one hole at the Ridge at Back Brook which has about 6 different tees. 3 each in two directions that are pretty close to at right angles to each other. It's a completely different hole depending on which tee box is in use on a given day. One of them is slightly uphill with water short and left. The other is quite a lot downhill with water left and long. Looking at the golf course aerial on google maps, the tee boxes there look like minecraft world.

[Carl Johnson]

Excerpts (without comment) from two chapters on tee boxes from Golf Has Never Failed Me (Donald Ross).


"The modern golf course should either have tees fifty yards long or three or four separate tees at every hole.  Tees that point from various angles to the green also give a chance to take care of conditions [sic]." 


" . . . it is sometimes necessary to build the tee up so the view of the landing place of the ball or the green will be clearly in sight.  When such is the case, by all means do not make the terraces abrupt. . . . Make them [elevated tees] big enough so that the player will have a breadth of feeling, and not feel as if precariously placed on top of a packing box, where any unguarded move endangers his falling off." 

[Simon Barrington]

Think that linear, in-line, or "runway" tees came far later, possibly even post WWII?

Variety in angles of drives is evident on most Classic "Golden Age" courses over here

For more writing on the subject, James Braid on Teeing Grounds in "Advanced Golf" 1908:

"There should be alternative tees, in order that the course may be easily adapted to varying winds and dry weather, when there is more run on the ball. Unless this is done a medium has to be struck in the arrangement of the holes, which seldom makes a really good test in all conditions; or, on the other hand, the holes have to be planned to suit the prevailing wind, and are much reduced in quality and testing power when it comes from the opposite quarter."

AND...

"Less attention is given to the matter of the preparation of suitable teeing grounds when making a golf course than its importance requires.
There are seldom enough alternatives, and such as there are do not always get placed in the right positions.
Often they are too small. There is nothing so good as a big tee, not only for the opportunities that it affords of making slight variations in the drive, as suggested by the weather conditions, but also, by moving the box and plate, preventing too much wear and tear in one place.
Small tees necessitate more alternatives, or else they are quickly worn away.
In making a tee, a point to be remembered is, that while it should generally be level, or the lie of it should correspond to the general lie of the ground all the way to the hole when that lie is uphill, there should also be a part of it on a slight slope upwards, so that if the player needs a stance of that kind for the playing of the shot that he wants to make, he can have it.
If space and cost are not the chief considerations, every hole of any length should be supplied with not fewer than three teeing grounds.
The arrangement of these may vary, but the most useful system is to place them in triangular form, with the base of the triangle nearest the hole, and at right angles it. Of course, the distance that these tees are separated from each other will depend a little, perhaps, on the length of the hole, but more particularly on the length of the carry that has to be made with the drive; while it may, of course, also be regulated by the extent of ground there is available."

[archie_struthers]

 


Love free form tees, and hiding them if possible. The rectangular monolithic cutting of tee boxes doesn't do it for me either.

[Jon Sweet]

Generally speaking I first attempt to go the opposite way to what you are suggesting, off-setting the tees. The objective of this (after providing interesting playing angles) is about aesthetics, so that you are not staring at another tee box at the front of your own.

Me, too.  And in America you could be staring at 3-5 tee boxes in front of your own!  It’s so ugly.


My thought is to make the angle of play somewhat easier as you move up to forward tees, so maybe you don’t have to change the distance as much.  Also, sharp dogleg holes are harder to reconcile with five tees, so you need to be concerned with running through the fairway.

Excuse my crude drawings... I think moving the boxes to the left is what really changes the hole.  The tips and 1 up play from there.  You have to make choices of what to hit and it demands a good shot.  Hit too much club and pull it left, you run through the fairway and get blocked out from a look at the green.  You hit too little and miss right you will not make the corner and have far too much coming in.  Tee shot plays semi blind in that you cannot see the green.  The fairway runs left to right and there is a little downslope you can catch and pitch down.  Other good part is hit too much club you can carom down into the water or end up in the rough.
To me, squaring the boxes up and in a line really changes the hole.  The demands on the tee shot are far less and it takes a great hole and just makes it meh.

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