Played the Lake Course on Wednesday with a friend who's hoping to qualify for the US Amateur this year. I invited him out so he could see and play the course, so we played a couple shots from the new tee boxes. My observations:
#2: This new tee box fits nicely with the hole in general. It keeps the same line off the tee, dictating the same kind of shot (typically a fade) only resulting in a slightly longer iron into the green. For him, it was a matter of hitting 2 clubs more.
#5: I don't think this teebox fits with the scale of the hole or the course. There are actually two (maybe 3?) new boxes, the deepest one stretching the hole to 505 yds. They are BIG, square tee boxes that, to me, seem a little out of character with the "tightness" of this course. From the penultimate box your tee shot is kinda blind, since you can't see over the ones in front of you; however, one does get clear vision of the fairway from all the way back.
As for me, this tee shot just makes this hole REALLY long since i'm not that long off the tee. For my playing partner though, it does change the strategy of the hole. Whereas before a longer player has to either hit a controlled fade with a driver or play a 3-wood to ensure holding the fairway, his take was that this "thinking" process is basically removed when playing from the new back tee. He hit a couple balls, and realized that just bombing it over the edge of the right-tree line was best.
#12: New tee boxes being built adding about 30-50 yds. (from 410 yds to 450/460). The tees are offset to the right, and it is stated, to keep the chute effect intact through the corridor of trees. They are triming up some of the branches to clear it out a little, and cleared the brush from behind these tees which offers a very cool "visual" of the hole as one walks down #11. Should be interesting to see how this plays when finished.
All in all, the course played fantastic. Firm and fast.