Golf Club Atlas
GolfClubAtlas.com => Golf Course Architecture Discussion Group => Topic started by: John Blain on February 15, 2010, 07:48:08 PM
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What is the general opinion out there about the two trees on the right side of the fairway in the landing area on the 18th hole of Pebble Beach? Good idea or Bad idea? It just seems like a strange place to have two trees, after all it's not the easiest driving hole and you sure can't bail left! Seems like you could pipe one onto the right side of the fairway and end up with nothing.I know the game isn't always meant to be fair but it just seems a little contrived.
I have a feeling if any other course did this it would likely get a lot of criticism but since it's PB they get the hall pass.
Thoughts?
-John
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You get nothing is where your premise is inaccurate.
There's tons of ways to play under and or around. The player who gets stuck directly behind the tree within the tree well, can even get a club on their ball to make a stroke.
There's a ton of width out there and the trees in question only affect those who bail a little too much right. Fair hazard, and not over used at Pebble.
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Adam,
We know that if you are blocked out by the trees, you have hit a rotten drive and need to be punished.
Bob
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John,they don't get a pass here.The one by the green and its death filled pages a few years ago.
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Ah, one of my favorite pet peeves - those awful Stupid Trees on the 18th at Pebble.
I don't know how to search and paste the archives, but we've had our share of threads on this before.
As you can tell from the above, I have a strong opinion on the subject.
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In the early seventies there used to be three trees there....pines btw....I used to mow around them.
Things change.
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I don't remember ever see a tree(s) that improved a hole.
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Stupid trees on the 18th at Pebble Beach. My God, wait till you play the 18th at Cypress Point.
Bob
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Anybody have a tee shot of the 18th PB, or 18 CPC for that matter?
Thanks,
Pup
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Bob Huntley,
Yes, #18 at CPC, as well. That hole doesn't get on TV any more, so PB #18 takes all the heat from those of us that abhor such things.
Chip
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I don't remember ever see a tree(s) that improved a hole.
Jim: Have you seen a photograph of the 18th hole at Ballyhack?
WW
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For Pup
(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/cohnhead72/IMG_0913.jpg)
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I don't remember ever see a tree(s) that improved a hole.
12th at Stanford in the old days?
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For Pup
(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/cohnhead72/IMG_0913.jpg)
Thanks Matt.
Those trees seem like a good aiming point to me. So from my perspective they should be removed.
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Did they move right with the most recent replanting or has the fairway shifted?
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Look at how much actual width is out there. The trees are a mere fraction of the lines of play.
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For the uninitiated (my only experience is having walked from the Lodge, down the cart path to the Beach Club, not playing the hole) can somebody just give us a brief history of the hole and its trees?
As I understand, the current trees are the third(?) effort at creating interest/hazard in that fairway. There was originally an old pre-construction Cypress tree there, from when the course was originally built. (Or were there two?) Then, when that tree or pair of trees was lost to old age and/or disease, there was a stand of three pine trees planted there, to preserve the original "interest" created by the accidental location of the originals. Then, after one or two of the second-generation pines died, they re-did the entire hole, and planted the current pair of Cypress trees, in a slightly different, deeper location.
Have I got that right? I welcome the inevitable corrections from the GCA membership's expertise...
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Chuck, I'm unfamiliar with the past history of those specific trees. I do recall seeing a very old photo of the hole where there was a lone short scrubby pine (maybe a young Cypress?) on the left side of the fairway, approx. 200 out from the teeing ground, on the aggressive line. Just about where someone would aim to hit a slight fade, straight up the coastline.
I never played the course with the goal posts on #2, at that time there was only the lone tall tree on the left portion of the baranka that guarded the left half of the green. If that was an original concept, I could see where having the goal post affect also on #18, would makes some sense.
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I actually have no problem with trees there. It requires two incredible shots to hit green in 2. The tee shot left to theright is really not punished just made a bit more challenging. The landing area is fair and left is dead. The same with the 2nd shot.
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The tees do a service to the hole. Without them, the bombers would hit their seconds to the green every time. The trees make them think and hit good shots if they have a dream of going for it in two. However, the trees will rarely negatively affect the player who plays the hole as a three-shotter out of necessity.
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I'm glad I found this topic as I wanted to start a new one, but then searched again before submitting.
Though the original topic was about the two trees on the tee shot, I wanted to discuss both trees - the tee shot tree and the green side tree. (There are two images below, side by side; you may have to scroll the image laterally to see the other.)
(https://cl.ly/673fe3dc842e/18th_pebble.jpg)
If anyone else has thoughts on these, I'd love to read them.
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I remember playing no. 18 at Pebble for the first time when there were no trees present in the fairway off the drive. The old ones had to be removed and the new ones not yet in place. I was disappointed. Just didn’t seem the same hole we had watched for years on television. I was glad to see them replaced (and I am far from being a tree hugger - nickname back home is “Chainsaw Jim”).
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The trees in the fairway landing area serve one purpose -- to make it more difficult to bail out on the tee shot, because then you might have something in your way on the second shot. Without them, everyone would take a prudent line off the tee, and only the dumb player would ever bite off more than he could chew.
It's an awkward solution, always has been, but they do serve a purpose.
Same goes for the tree by the green. If you don't stay left with your second [or whatever] shot, that tree could very well be in your way for the pitch to the green. In that case, it encourages a more conservative play on the second shot, as the further up the fairway you get, the more the tree will come into play.
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Anybody have a tee shot of the 18th PB, or 18 CPC for that matter?
Thanks,
Pup
Actually 17 at CPC is the one with trees in the middle, right? 18 is a mess of trees but on either side...
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I don't remember ever see a tree(s) that improved a hole.
12th at Stanford in the old days?
Those are still there, right? Hated the damn trees.
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Looking at HistoricAerials.com its interesting how much coast line eroded between 2009 and 2014, just to the left of those trees, presumably by a few big storms.
The current aerials on Google Maps seems to show where they've built it back up with concrete walls, but i learned my lesson from Jeff not to say for sure! ;) In 2014 they still had two trees, I wonder if they took one out for "fairness" with reduced real estate in that area.
P.S. The other interesting thing to see is how much more that giant bunker eats into the fairway at the corner of the dog leg. The older shots prior to '98 seem to suggest a much less intrusive bunker...
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The trees in the fairway landing area serve one purpose -- to make it more difficult to bail out on the tee shot, because then you might have something in your way on the second shot. Without them, everyone would take a prudent line off the tee, and only the dumb player would ever bite off more than he could chew.
That I don't really understand. The fairway is only 24 yards left of the tree, and only 42 yards from the sea wall to the bunker. It's only 60 yards across the cart path and presumably OB (right?).
(https://cl.ly/1677b7618aa8/Image%2525202019-02-12%252520at%2525205.33.19%252520PM.png)
Those "bailing out" are hitting into rough, a bunker, or across a cart path and presumably OB, no? Why narrow a fairway to 24 yards with a tree? Does it "play" differently than my measurements?
Genuinely asking here; I've never played Pebble.
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Erik, it does play differently, because the tee shot is coming from an angle that makes the fairway feel much wider. When you stand on the tee, everything to the right looks like fairway, even though you know that if you bail out that way you can go through the fairway and get into trouble, whether bunker or OB. But without the tree, the fairway is effectively very wide, because you're playing more of a "cape style" (don't come at me, y'all, I know it's not really a cape hole) tee shot, not one where you're lined up and driving between the ocean and the bunkers. This picture, which shows the old location of the trees, gives you an idea of the visual.
Without the tree, it's actually not a very intimidating drive, if you're a decent driver of the ball. If you take it on a line where the trees are (but assume they're gone), so just left of where the last fairway bunker is, you don't have to even carry very much ocean (around 170 yards, per Google), and the fairway doesn't run out until 295 so you can really bang a drive and have a chance to attack the hole while taking a pretty safe line (you're biggest threat would be that a slight push would find the bunker). Really you can just stand on the tee aim just left of the bunker and if you can make a swing that eliminates a pull, you're golden.
The tree(s) make that a lot more dicey, as you can see. You have to either hit a drive that draws, or take a line that carries a lot more of the coast and has a lot less room for error in terms of a pull.
It's not that anyone plays the hole by deliberately trying to play right of the tree. If you're playing it as a three shot hole, you tend to play a drive that's well shirt of the tree and it's not an issue on the second shot at all (see Phil with an iron off the tee on Monday morning). What the tree really does is ensure that if you're driving to be aggressive, you have to hit a good aggressive drive up the left side to be rewarded with a good chance. If you bail right, you don't get away with it (but you'll styill have a shot and be able to reach the green in 3--maybe even 2 if you're Tiger in 2010).
(https://i.ytimg.com/vi/TnpIp3HjyhI/maxresdefault.jpg)
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The trees in the fairway landing area serve one purpose -- to make it more difficult to bail out on the tee shot, because then you might have something in your way on the second shot. Without them, everyone would take a prudent line off the tee, and only the dumb player would ever bite off more than he could chew.
That I don't really understand. The fairway is only 24 yards left of the tree, and only 42 yards from the sea wall to the bunker. It's only 60 yards across the cart path and presumably OB (right?).
(https://cl.ly/1677b7618aa8/Image%2525202019-02-12%252520at%2525205.33.19%252520PM.png)
Those "bailing out" are hitting into rough, a bunker, or across a cart path and presumably OB, no? Why narrow a fairway to 24 yards with a tree? Does it "play" differently than my measurements?
Genuinely asking here; I've never played Pebble.
Eric:
I haven't played Pebble in many years myself. But your post caused me to go to Google Earth and do my own measurements.
For one thing, that bunker next to the tree never used to be there . . . must have been added by Palmer's company sometime in the last 20 years. The fairway was a little wider around the tree, and then it was rough to the o.b. line. Also, it looks like they've lost a big of fairway on the left to erosion, even with and just past the tree.
The o.b. is not as much in play as you'd imagine because of the angle . . . from the back tee, if you play to the right edge of the new bunker (well right of the tree), you've got to carry 260 yards to get to the cart path.
The tree is 270 yards from the back tee. If you aim right at it, you've got to carry 195 yards to get to the fairway. If you aim left of it, the carry is 225. That's a pretty big difference for most players, though obviously not for professionals anymore.
What hasn't changed is that the pros now HAVE TO aim left of the tree, a bit more uncomfortably than they would choose, if they are going to hit driver; while the 10-handicap playing safe risks winding up behind the tree for his second shot.
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The trees in the fairway landing area serve one purpose -- to make it more difficult to bail out on the tee shot, because then you might have something in your way on the second shot. Without them, everyone would take a prudent line off the tee, and only the dumb player would ever bite off more than he could chew.
That I don't really understand. The fairway is only 24 yards left of the tree, and only 42 yards from the sea wall to the bunker. It's only 60 yards across the cart path and presumably OB (right?).
(https://cl.ly/1677b7618aa8/Image%2525202019-02-12%252520at%2525205.33.19%252520PM.png)
Those "bailing out" are hitting into rough, a bunker, or across a cart path and presumably OB, no? Why narrow a fairway to 24 yards with a tree? Does it "play" differently than my measurements?
Genuinely asking here; I've never played Pebble.
Eric:
I haven't played Pebble in many years myself. But your post caused me to go to Google Earth and do my own measurements.
For one thing, that bunker next to the tree never used to be there . . . must have been added by Palmer's company sometime in the last 20 years. The fairway was a little wider around the tree, and then it was rough to the o.b. line. Also, it looks like they've lost a big of fairway on the left to erosion, even with and just past the tree.
The o.b. is not as much in play as you'd imagine because of the angle . . . from the back tee, if you play to the right edge of the new bunker (well right of the tree), you've got to carry 260 yards to get to the cart path.
The tree is 270 yards from the back tee. If you aim right at it, you've got to carry 195 yards to get to the fairway. If you aim left of it, the carry is 225. That's a pretty big difference for most players, though obviously not for professionals anymore.
What hasn't changed is that the pros now HAVE TO aim left of the tree, a bit more uncomfortably than they would choose, if they are going to hit driver; while the 10-handicap playing safe risks winding up behind the tree for his second shot.
By playing with the history scroll on Google Earth, the major changes happened sometime between 1998 and 2005. The bunker was indeed added, and there is a little bit of coastal erosion that eats into the fairway. What else is notable however, is that the location of the trees changed as well. By marking my screen and using the measuring tool, it looks like about a 40 yard difference further down the hole from the original first tree to the later version of the first tree. The second little tree was lost sometime after summer of 2013.