Something Cool @ Lido Club

[Sean_A]

I was perusing the pages of The Evangelist of Golf yesterday and came across this stunning photo of Lido's 18th.  At first it was the potato chip green which grabbed my eye, but then I noticed the green cut.  Look how close to the crest the green stretches...I think the green actually goes over the crest!  Where has this sort of presentation gone?  I played Roaring Gap and there was talk of pushing the green lines up the high points of the pad, but not like below.  It is also interesting to see there is no short grass feeding down the slope.  There is green and fairway...likely a fairway length as long as the first cut of rough these days, but fairway nonetheless. 



Ciao

[Peter Pallotta]

Wow, thanks Sean.
My first thought was: who cares if it's not "pin-able" space at today's green speeds -- it's still certainly "putt-able" space!
Maybe that's what's changed: too much of a focus on *where* the hole is and not enough on *how* we might get the ball there

[Tom_Doak]

I was perusing the pages of The Evangelist of Golf yesterday and came across this stunning photo.  At first it was the potato chip green which grabbed my eye, but then I noticed the green cut.  Look how close to the crest the green stretches...I think the green actually goes over the crest!  Where has this sort of presentation gone?  I played Roaring Gap and there was talk of pushing the green lines up the high points of the pad, but not like below.  It is also interesting to see there is no short grass feeding down the slope.  There is green and fairway...likely a fairway length as long as the first cut of rough these days, but fairway nonetheless. 



Ciao

Sean:


I'm not sure exactly where you are pointing to in your comments, but there are a lot of courses today where we try to make the putting surface disappear into the horizon.  It's not an "infinity green" if you can see the rough at the back edge, or if there are visible mounds back there to contain your shot.

[Sean_A]

Tom

Look at the left side of the green.  Nothing to do with infinity, just the cut line.  I don't see greens cut like that...if so, very rarely.

Ciao 

[Bob Montle]

Look at the slopes on that green!  Any idea what speed it rolled?

[Peter Flory]

By the way, that is the 18th green (not sure if it was labeled in the book). 


Are there any other photos in that chapter that haven't been posted in the Lido threads here? 

[Cal Seifert]

So cool. I need this book.

[Mike Sweeney]

I am trying, but they don't really listen to me at either place





PS - I am determined to make that Handicap real this year!

[Sean_A]

This is a terrible image of Lido's Biarritz (I think it was the 8th), but it does offer an idea of how close the ocean is.  I have to wonder what folks were thinking when this place was built.


Ciao

[Mike Sweeney]

I have to wonder what folks were thinking when this place was built.

I think that is the magic of the "old dead guy" courses - they did not get bogged down with environmental restrictions or "100 year floods". They just built good/great golf holes. Obviously they had seen storms when Lido was built, and my guess was something along the lines of "we can build a new hole on the other side if a storm wipes it out".


Just as a frame of modern reference, I walked that beach last fall with a group of students from a Surfers Healing outing at Lido and the beach today is very wide. I am sure it has not always been that way.


The modern Lido Golf Course is pretty average at best, but they let you do an online handicap and I wanted a handicap in The Met this year for an event.


Thanks for posting.

[Shane Wright]

I was perusing the pages of The Evangelist of Golf yesterday and came across this stunning photo of Lido's 18th.  At first it was the potato chip green which grabbed my eye, but then I noticed the green cut.  Look how close to the crest the green stretches...I think the green actually goes over the crest!  Where has this sort of presentation gone?  I played Roaring Gap and there was talk of pushing the green lines up the high points of the pad, but not like below.  It is also interesting to see there is no short grass feeding down the slope.  There is green and fairway...likely a fairway length as long as the first cut of rough these days, but fairway nonetheless. 



Ciao

Good observation Sean. 


I'm not sure if one will be able to tell on TV but Shinnecock will have this kind of cut line in many places next June.  I was fortunate enough to see it this past fall and this was one of the first architectural details that really stuck out at me.  The USGA will be able to use these cut lines with some fantastic pin locations if they need to.


The only other place I can recall having cut lines like above (off the top of my head) is at Sand Hills GC.

[Jim Nugent]

This is a terrible image of Lido's Biarritz (I think it was the 8th), but it does offer an idea of how close the ocean is.  I have to wonder what folks were thinking when this place was built.


Ciao

I don't think the hole lasted long there: IIRC they moved it within several (?) years due to erosion/ocean issues. 

[Phil Carlucci]

I don't think the hole lasted long there: IIRC they moved it within several (?) years due to erosion/ocean issues.

It was destroyed and remodeled after a few years.  By the mid-1930s it was separated from the ocean by cabanas.

[Sean_A]

I don't think the hole lasted long there: IIRC they moved it within several (?) years due to erosion/ocean issues.

It was destroyed and remodeled after a few years.  By the mid-1930s it was separated from the ocean by cabanas.

Which is why I asked what were they thinking?

Ciao

[Sven Nilsen]

They were thinking about building a UK links course in the United States, and making it a severe test of skill from the back tees yet playable from the up tees. 

The green that replaced it was built mere feet from where the old one sat.  Wouldn't be the first time a course underwent a minor adjustment in its first few years.  Even today folks don't always get it right. 


Lido was also an engineering marvel, and the techniques used to build the course were replicated many times over in the years to follow.[size=78%]  [/size]

[Craig Disher]

The green site became beach cabanas and a wall which shielded the beach holes from further erosion and probably the wind. They disappeared as soon as the Navy procured the site in 1942. What I noticed in the photo of the 18th is that the 7th green which is just behind the 18th is not visible at all suggesting perhaps a 5-10' elevation change between the greens. Too bad we don't have Mayo's hole photos.

[Jim_Kennedy]

I don't think the hole lasted long there: IIRC they moved it within several (?) years due to erosion/ocean issues.

It was destroyed and remodeled after a few years.  By the mid-1930s it was separated from the ocean by cabanas.

Which is why I asked what were they thinking?

Ciao

They were probably thinking that they were going to use as much of the 'land' as was possible after spending months pumping it out of the marsh, waiting for it to all drain, spreading and shaping it, etc.
 

[Sean_A]

They were thinking about building a UK links course in the United States, and making it a severe test of skill from the back tees yet playable from the up tees. 

The green that replaced it was built mere feet from where the old one sat.  Wouldn't be the first time a course underwent a minor adjustment in its first few years.  Even today folks don't always get it right. 


Lido was also an engineering marvel, and the techniques used to build the course were replicated many times over in the years to follow.

Alternatively, one might say this is the first example of a mega golf development which was completely and utterly unsustainable.  But let us not get too caught up in reality 

Ciao

[Jim_Kennedy]

They moved a couple holes away from the ocean, the course remained open until it was used by the military in WW11, but reopened after the war, eventually becoming what is is today.




Unsustainable? Hardly.

[Craig Disher]

They moved a couple holes away from the ocean, the course remained open until it was used by the military in WW11, but reopened after the war, eventually becoming what is is today.

Unsustainable? Hardly.

Jim,
You don't mean the original Lido reopened, do you? For certain, the course was completely lost after 1943. Had the Navy not taken possession, I think the club could have survived, at least until the 60s or 70s when development pressures closed many of the courses on eastern LI.

[Jim_Kennedy]

Craig,

No, I did not. Just making the observation that a golf course on the property was sustainable. 

[Sean_A]

They moved a couple holes away from the ocean, the course remained open until it was used by the military in WW11, but reopened after the war, eventually becoming what is is today.

Unsustainable? Hardly.

With the gin palace and the dividing road?  We can agree to disagree, but I don't believe the club ever had a chance to survive as envisioned...though I wish it did. 


Why did they knock down the orginal house to build that, that, that thing?

Ciao

[Mike Sweeney]

Why did they knock down the orginal house to build that, that, that thing?

Ciao

Fishers Island Club has an interesting background and the BIG original clubhouse too:


http://fergusonmuseum.org/the-role-of-cottage-colonies-in-shaping-fishers-islands-development/









Lido probably had a similar story.