Do Scotish Courses have better bunker placement?

[Anthony Gray]

  Seems in the US bunkers just flank the fairways at landing areas for drives. seldom do you see the odd placed bunker that you see in Gb & I. The US bunkers seem to be placed solely for strategy. This can leed to a boreing pattern. Again no absolutes but has anyone else noticed this?

  Anthony

[Melvyn Morrow]

Anthony

Are you referring to the sheep base one, those built by designers or those who convey no tone and always seem anti American Golfers?

Melvyn

[Garland Bayley]

I think you mean in the US bunkers are placed penally. If you miss your shot on the line of instinct you end up in one. Strategic bunkers are placed so you have to think about how you are going to avoid them. They are on the line of instinct. E.g., the Principles nose on the 13th (I think) at Rustic Canyon.

[David_Tepper]

Anthony -

Like all generalizations, you are likely right (and wrong) some of the time.  I have played a fair amount of golf in GB&I and have not noticed a significant number of oddly placed bunkers that you refer to.

It is also worth mentioning that, since the wind can be a significant factor and blow in a number of different directions, some fairway bunkers may appear out of play and oddly placed when the wind is blowing in one direction, but very much in place when the wind is blowing in the opposite direction.

DT 

[Philippe Binette]

Better placement, maybe, maybe not...

but their are more important in the play because they are more severe, but more importantly... the firm ground makes playing around them more daring and strategic.

[Tom_Doak]

The short answer is ... no, Scottish courses do not have better bunker placement on average than anywhere else.

The championship courses do have better placement -- if MORE bunkers constitutes BETTER bunkers.  They have bunkers for the best players of the 1920's, bunkers for the best players of the 1960's, and bunkers for the best players of the 1990's.  But overall, they just have a lot of bunkers to avoid.

The non-championship courses don't have nearly as many bunkers as the above.  At North Berwick and Cruden Bay and Prestwick, the golf is more about the greens and the fairway undulations than it is about the bunkers ... as it should be.  So maybe they deserve kudos for NOT HAVING SUPERFLUOUS BUNKERS, but the bunkers they do have are not dramatically placed.  And that's fine.  People still pay way too much attention to bunkers.

[Sean_A]

The only Scottish course I can think of which has superior bunker placement is TOC, but even at TOC there are way too many bunkers to make the placement realize their full impact.  For the most part, especially on the high profile courses, the bunkering is much like in the USA - a mix of good, bad and indifferent placement.  I think what makes the bunkering more interesting in Scotland is their penal nature in trying to escape and the gathering effect which makes them play much larger than the sand pit itself.  The best bunkered courses in the UK tend to be in England.  That said, I haven't seen Castle Stuart and a few other new Scottish courses which could be a huge improvement on what existed previously.

Tom

Its easy to say people spend way too much time thinking about bunkering, but when archies go to such great lengths in what is normally an over-bunker job its hard not to pay attention to bunkers.

Ciao

[Brett Hochstein]

The places where I think Scottish bunkers are better are at the casual courses or council courses--something akin to a muni.  I have not actually been to too many, but I have ridden by plenty on train and bus and noted that there are rarely flanking bunkers.  The bunkers, if any, usually interject into the fairway or bank along the green (generally breaking up that line of instinct) and rarely seem superfluous.  They are council courses, after all. 
Many of the links and big name courses cannot quite say the same though.  Some places are reliant only on bunkers, and they certainly over-do them.  I would like to bring up the issue of surface area, though.  Sure the Old has over one hundred bunkers, but a majority of them are 100 sq. ft. or less.  In the two times I have played, I have been in the sand twice, and those are both because of just terrible shots on 9.  I would say total surface area has more impact than total number of bunkers with placement having obviously the greatest impact upon play. 

[Anthony Gray]

   Randomness adds to the aesthetics of the course.


  Anthony