Ground Contouring vs Bunkers In The Landing Area

[Derek_L]

Jeff Brauer brought this up a few topics ago.  Why can't you change the contouring in the landing area instead of placing bunkers.  You know it would really make some of these guys think, they either have to go for it, in which case if they hit it just right they will get one hell of a roll.  Or they need to lay up and play conservatively.  On the other hand if the ball lands in a manner that the lie is not flat, ie. below or above the players feet, it may make you think how you are going to hit the ball to get it to fly straight.  Of course I have seen courses where the whole fairway looks like this, in this case the damn triplexes leave marks too!!!!

[Richard_Goodale]

This is to me one of the charms of a lot of links golf.  An added benefit is the uncertainty factor--sometimes your ball will kick off the contours back into the middle of the fairway, sometimes it will kick even deeper into trouble.  These sorts of things, however, would seem to be hard to design without going over the top and, as you say, hard to maintain, particularly if drainage is not good.

[Ran Morrissett]

Derek, I agree with your thinking as long as the contours  feed the ball into several spots due to both divot and drainage concerns.

My old home club in Australia was built on sand dunes, is blessed with GREAT topography with lots of nice little rolls, and consequently, the need for fairway bunkering was minimal. However, one of its wildest fairways (the 5th)  tended to funnel tee balls into a similar area, though drainage wasn't a problem given its sandy base.

Newcastle doesn't get much play by American standards but if it did, landing in a divot on that hole would be a relatively frequent occurence, I imagine, and I don't think many US public/resort course operators would want to hear the frequent resulting complaints.

But at a private club with limited play, the 5th works beautifully and has long been recognized as one of the great, unique holes in Australian golf.

[corey miller]

many of the courses in westchester county and connecticut have this contouring in the fairways created by the rocky nature of the sites.  The holes seem to be layed out to provide the turbo-boost to balls played to the proper area of the fairway.  The ones i am familiar with are natural landforms.  Unfortunately, many of these features do not play properly because of damp conditions, loss of fairway width, and tees having been moved.

[Brian Phillips]

Ran,

You brought up a great point there...Drainage..

When we are shaping up a fairway for an architect my guys are always (at least I hope they are!!) where are we going to get the water off!!

It is great shaping up a fairway which look like a Links course but on a clay based area you are asking for trouble.  You cannot put in the same sort of humps and hollows as there is in links as you need to lead the water away.

On a Links course which is usually built on a sand base the water drains away through the sand.  

Most Scottish Links courses are a USGA green all over the course.  

In fact if you analyse the particle curve on a USGA green with the sand found on the East coast of Scotland...guess what they are nearly identical...but you won't get anyone from the USGA to admit to that!!

 Ask anyone who teaches at Elmwood College in St. Andrews where they think the USGA curve came from....



Brian

[Tim_Weiman]

Derek:

If you are looking for a course that has interesting contouring in fairways, check out Burnham & Berrow.  It has some fairways worth studying for days.