"Golf course design is so formulaic"

[Michael Felton]

I decided a little while ago that I needed to work on my golf course strategy. Too many stupid shots that cost me, so I dug into it a bit. I found a video on youtube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ziCTTnmGPzU) that talks about strategy off the tee. It's quite long, but the gist of it is to go out and measure 20 drives and figure out what your shot pattern looks like. Then make sure that you only hit driver if 95% of the time your shot pattern will not be in penalty hazards (i.e. water or OB).


Anyway, the guy doing it is aiming it at college players, so a pretty high standard. Carry distance he talks about is about 290-295, which is way beyond what I can do, but he says that for almost everyone, the range from left to right of 95% of their shots is right about 65 yards. So you look at a hole on google earth and figure out where your driver is landing. If you have 65 yards between penalty hazards and the fairway doesn't pinch to less than 40 yards by bunkers or trees, then hit driver.


It's a fascinating video, but one of the things he mentions a couple of times (the quote in my thread title comes at around 30:40) is that for all the differences in golf course design, the 65 yards wide thing is a number that you see over and over again. He says also "it's almost like they are trying to force you to make the right decision". What do people think? Is golf course design formulaic? Do architects put bunkers in to narrow fairways and attempt to make people play a shorter club off the tee? If everyone started figuring out how to play holes in this fashion, would that have an impact on course design at all? I don't think it's likely to catch on other than at a pretty high level of competency, so I don't think it's a big deal.


For what it's worth, I think a lot of this stuff is stuff that I instinctively do on the course. If there is out of bounds or water around, I tend to feel tense with my driver and will often drop back to 3 wood or 2 iron if that's the case. It's much worse if there are houses around. Houses make me feel very constrained, mainly because I'm terrified of hitting them or someone in their yard. If there is room to open my shoulders a bit, then I will. I'm curious to hear an architect's POV on this.

[Tom_Doak]

The 65 yards [200 feet] of playable width is generally accepted in golf course design for the same reason your instructor uses it ... because that's where most shots land.  Architects are not afraid to put water inside of that, but out of bounds is a safety problem and we get in trouble if we create those.  In practice, the minimum distance from boundary to boundary is 300 feet and some architects use even more than that.


I believe the method you describe is pretty much exactly how Tiger Woods used to plot his way around a golf course.  It's the only way anyone could play 72 holes at Augusta without three-putting [because he was keeping his 95% "circle" below the hole except where water intervened], or play 72 holes at St. Andrews without hitting it in a bunker. 


Of course, it helps tremendously when your shot pattern is considerably tighter than anyone else's.  If you looked at my shot dispersal this year, I'd have to hit lots of shots with my putter if I was going to avoid trouble.

[Peter Pallotta]

Michael - I think that what good architects and good designs do is to make us *want* to narrow down the 'playable areas', ie to invite us to choose, seemingly of our own accord, to try for the best/ideal landing area or line of play instead of the safe and sensible ones. Golf strategy may indeed be formulaic, or at least usually quite simple, but the good architects have a bag of tricks that work together to make us  *forget* this fact - that lead us (our psyches and hopes and fears) to engage and interact with the architecture in much more varied and complex ways than are actually necessary. I think that's one of the reasons why Jack Nicklaus was so great: he could hit the shots, yes, but on the golf course at least he 'stuck with the formula' more often and better than anyone else, and rarely let his imagination or ego run away with itself. Tiger Woods was the same way. As the saying goes, 'they rarely beat themselves'; or, we could say, they rarely allowed the architect/architecture to fool them into beating themselves.
Peter

[Michael Felton]

Good points. I think what Tiger was so good at was picking a target and being utterly committed to hitting it to the target. It's all well and good to say that it's best to aim away from the flag sometimes, but it's hard to do. I also think that a lot of times when he missed fairways he was perhaps only 4 or 5 yards from his aiming point, even if it was in the rough. I think a hole like 14 at TPC, where he ended up in those mounds to the right so often, he was trying to hit it right on the edge of the fairway. Well away from the water hazard and the bunker on the other side. He knew he could get it on the green from the right side and so that was his goal. Oh to be that disciplined!

[Jeff_Brauer]

Interesting lunch time viewing, especially since he used DFW courses, with which I am familiar.


Can't help but think (again) that if the Golden Age guys had this kind of data, the old "challenge the hazard" ideas might have been quite different, although, they may still have been more logical given the equipment of the day.


But I have always asked myself, given my distinctly average game - why would I challenge a hazard with my longest, least accurate club to gain an advantage for a shorter, more accurate club?  Playing defense wins championships.


As to overall width, I have often thought it was determined more by irrigation coverage than any formula for design, other than the wider the better for average players, if you can afford the extra rows.

[Peter Flory]

Great topic.  Really enjoyed the video. 


One thing I feel like he is neglecting is that a lot of tree areas are dense enough that they are nearly a 1 shot penalty.  Or maybe they are 0.50 to 0.75 penalty. 

[Jeff_Brauer]

Yes, I noticed he seemed to measure property line to property line, but being under those trees could be a full stroke penalty, but not stroke and distance.  But, enough to affect score.

[Michael Felton]

Yes, I noticed he seemed to measure property line to property line, but being under those trees could be a full stroke penalty, but not stroke and distance.  But, enough to affect score.

He does, but his restriction on trees and bunkers is a 40 yard gap. There is a whole decision tree:


Is it at least 65 yards between penalty hazards?
If yes, does the fairway pinch to less than 40 yards between trees and bunkers (and the property line if that is closer). I think the idea being that 95% of your shots should land in the 65 yard space and maybe 80% land in the 40 yard space. The added distance from hitting driver gives you enough benefit that your added misses in the 40 yard gap don't outweigh that benefit.
If the gap is less than 40 yards then it may still be driver if 3 wood doesn't avoid the narrower gap. In other words, the benefit from driver over less than 3 wood outweighs the penalty of the missed shots, unless the hole is very short and you'd be left with wedge or less.


Funnily enough it's a very formulaic approach to playing the game. I'm not sure how well it transfers to people who aren't good enough that 95% of their drives wind up in around a 65 yard space. He does have a free system available online that is aimed at 80+ shooters. You have to pay for the better standard one. It's expensive though and having two young kids I don't play enough that I think it's worth it for me.