Strategic Bunkering..It's starting to make some sense

[Brian_Gracely]

Like alot of people, I first found this site looking for some information on a course I was visiting.  I've been a collector of books on golf history and architecture for a while, but they were basically only serving as picture books .  After reading the Discussion Groups for a while, the picture books started to become reference books to verify some thoughts I read or ideas that came to mind.  

For a while, I've been trying to figure out the fascination with C.B.MacDonald and NGLA.  I've never been to the site, so my only references are GCA.com and "Scotland's Gift".  I understand his presence in the foundation of golf in America, but I was struggling with the intoxication over someone that continued to replicate hole.  

On a recent flight I had some time to read Max Behr's "The Nature and Use of Penalty in Golf Architecture".  I read the sections that talked about bunker placement to challenge the player towards the best line towards the hole,and while it made alot of sense, and it left me scratching my head about where this was actually deployed.

Tonight I'm watching something on The Golf Channel and looking at the bunkers and it finally dawns on me that so many courses have it ALL WRONG!!  They are designing bunkers to punish the poor shots or poor players.  I then go back and take a look at #6 at Seminole and it starts to make alot of sense.  Then I went through the GCA.com review of NGLA and the lightbulb came on!!  The angles are unbelievable, and actually challenge the better player to gain an advantage by playing close to them.

This is probably Architecture-101 to 99% of the folks on here, but I wanted to say thanks to the group for opening my eyes to something that I hadn't realized in the past.  

[spooky]

Aparently that is why Moonah Links in Australia is lacking, due to the seemingly random placement of the bunkers..

[Andrew Summerell]

The random bunkering at ML is meant to give the player multiple options. Of course, all the holes have one obvious route, so everyone takes that.

Strategically placed bunkers, especially using diagonals gives what Brian is talking about. A chance to gain advantage, but at greater risk.

[BCrosby]

Brian -

Many of us, including me, went through a similar process.

At some point it hits you that you love Golden Age courses not because they are prettier, or more natural, or built on better land, or built with more care.

It hits you that you love so many Golden Age courses because of the quality of the thinking that went into them.

They are better courses because they embody certain design theories that are unrivaled at enhancing the pleasures of the game. For you, me, all players, good, bad or indifferent.

(Why and how the architectural profession lost touch with these design theories will always be a mystery to me, though I think that may be changing.)

In my case, I never saw golf courses quite the same way again after some of the stuff you talked about finally sank in.

Bob

 

[Michael Dugger]

Geez, guys, all this gushing has me wanting to cite some of the finer quotes from these geniuses.

"That bewhisked old timer there hitting to position, rolling his ball almost along the ground, may do his round in the eighties; while siege guns boom in vain and youthful champions with their prodigious power return from a campaign they have never wholly understood with a score which sickens them."

--Robert Hunter--

"The ideal course yields nothing to power unless it be used with wisdom. There it, too, must be disciplined and refined. Like all other courses it must possess weaknesses, but rest assured that shots taking advantage of these weaknesses must be well-struck. Let one be a little off center and all one's most powerful blows fall futile...To be down the middle may mean nothing, quite often it may be quite the wrong place. To be long may mean nothing the same, provided it is not schrewdly used...One must hit to position. To succeed at the game of golf one must open up the hole. One must consider the slope of the green. One must place him/herself in position to attack it. Every player worth their salt knows that putting is the most important part of the game of golf."

--Robert Hunter--

[Tom_Ross]

Brian,

It's good to see that you're starting to read some Max Behr and seeing the way of the light.  Welcome to the club!!  Hopefully this doesn't cause you a bunch of sleepless nights...

[BCrosby]

A proppos of this thread, the following by D. Muirhead is too good not to post:

"One has a feeling at the Old Course of masterful scale and rightness in the rhythm and sequence of bunkers, a sense that many were placed there not by the Almighty or nature, but by some long forgotten intelligence."

Bob

[Tommy Williamsen]

Brian,  After playing almost 500 courses, reading books and books about golf architecture etc., I thought I was pretty well informed about golf courses---until I found this site.  The best thing that I have learned is that I don't know very much.  This is the best golf learning site on the internet and should be worth an advanced drgree,