Maintenance meld and target golf

[Ken_Cotner]

Thinking back on the many prior discussions of maintenance meld and firm/fast conditions...

Someone (TEPaul?) made the point recently that really firm conditions may not fit a course which demands aerial approaches to the greens.

That makes sense to me, but what about the fairways on such a course?  Can firm/fast fairways work with "aerial" greens that must be more receptive?  If so, are F/F fairways ALWAYS preferable?  Any very good courses which correctly have soft/slow fairways AND greens?

Thanks,
Ken

[TEPaul]

Ken;

Thanks for posting that and it was me who mentioned on some thread recently that perhaps softer and slower condtions work better on some modern target and aerial courses.

Of course the fundamental point of this whole "ideal maintenance meld" thing is to determine what maintenance conditions really do work best to highlight the PARTICULAR style, type and "design intent" of ANY golf course.

I mean come on, isn't it just amazing that most of the entire era of the "Modern Age" got into a "one size fits all" mentality of golf course maintenance practices---that being one of pretty general over irrigation, softness throughout and super receptiveness on the greens?

There have to be a lot of smart people out there dealing with all those courses, right? How the hell could they have let a "one size fit's all" maintenance process be applied to ALL TYPES and STYLES and DESIGN INTENTS to the extent of completely wiping out the ground game that was so optionally important to that old style design architecture and its philosophy? Did the whole world of American golf FAIL to  recognize that there really were different types of courses requiring different playabilities?

When it came to maintenance practices in the last fifty years there was only one way to describe the "ideal" and that was "good condition"---not a phrase or concept that makes any distinctions between styles and types and design intents at all! The all inclusive concept of "good condition" sort of completely homogenize maintenance practices into one thing for all. American players not only didn't have the ground game option, they seemed to have totally forgotten about it to such an extent they forgot how to even hit those shots!

The concept and phrase of the "ideal maintenance meld" is intended to be course specific--the very thing that the old description "good condition" never was!

I'm most interested in the "ideal maintenance meld" of the classic more ground game oriented course with its firm and fast "through the green" requirements and it's necessary green surface firmness (not necessarily greenspeed although that helps) to the point that aerial shots just "lightly dent" and don't pitch mark. That little wrinkle dials down aerial reliance and encourages ground game compromise shots!

But I thought it only fair although the older courses are what I care most about to come up with the "ideal maintenance meld" concept for the more modern aerial target course.

I thought irrigated conditions and receptive greens that very much pitch mark and create easily controllable approach shots seemed like the right thing for that style, type and design intent because those courses were designed and created in that over-irrigated aerial era and the aerial game was what they were designed for.

But you tell me how you think they should be ideally maintained--I'm just trying to throw some logical ideas out there. If these modern courses were designed with all this length and basically flanking hazards on fairways basically dictating tee shot strategy to right down the middle why not irrigate those fairways ("through the green") so players get no roll? If these modern designs are created so long to counteract distance and also are basically target golf then give them the targets everywhere like dart boards and give them no roll!  Let that all be the "design intent" of that style and type and just create the maintenance practices to "meld" ideally into that. Actually you don't have to create those maintenance practices because they're what we've been living with throughout the whole over-irrigated era.

But mostly the whole point of it all this is to look closely at any course, determine what kind of architecture it has and what kind of playability it was designed to offer and highlight that by "ideally maintaining" into it. And the point is those maintenance practices need to be very different depending on what type of course it is---and not all the same for all courses the way it's been for about the last fifty years!

[Bill_McBride]

At Country Club of Fairfax (VA), we used to always tell our superintendent, "No no, firm fairways and soft greens, not vice versa."   Of course that was before I became acquainted with GCA!  

[TEPaul]

Bill:

What you were telling Fairfax to do is pretty much the way it still is with most greens but I'm just amazed how many of the older courses are going with firmer green surfaces now.

You take a place like NGLA and their supers and they pretty much have this "ideal maintenance meld" thing for that type of course nailed. Not only do they do it they understand ALL the nuances and components of it and what it's supposed to acheive from A to Z.

On the older courses firm fairways and soft greens are only half the battle because good players will struggle a little with their tee shots and keeping them where they want to but even out of the rough if the course has soft greens good players can rely on their aerial game all day long. But the worst thing for the old courses is to give good players softer fairways and soft green too.

On the other side of the spectrum an even worse thing to do is give any type of course soft approaches and really super firm greens where there's basically no chance with ground game run-up shots and the greens are so rock hard aerial shots have little chance of stopping.

Bay Hill did that to the touring pros a couple of years ago and Arnold Palmer publicily apologized and said that would never happen again. That would be the absolute "Unideal maintenance meld" where you manage to basically remove all reasonable options from even the best players in the world.

[A_Clay_Man]

Its a big golf world out there now and the "comfort zone" for super's is still based on the Augusta Syndrome. It is gonna take a lot of edjucat'in to get the "industry" to accept such standards which are not standard.

Persuing the logic that an appreciation for an artform can only help bottomline realities in the long term.

Tom P-The irony is that these "target" golf courses are mostly desert courses and under the terms of an ideal meld, they would be the softest. Not really fitting the environs.  

[TEPaul]

Adam:

Then if it doesn't fit the environs--firm up those desert courses more. If you do that all you're going to do is make them play a bit more intense both "through the green" and on and around the greens. It really doesn't matter to me if those modern age aerial courses were firmed up some. But that's going to make them play pretty intense because basically they were NOT designed for the much more firm conditions those old ground game courses were designed for.

Again, the whole concept of the "ideal maintenance meld" is to apply whatever SPECIFIC maintenance practices that're necessary to highlight all those things that any PARTICULAR course was designed to offer architecturally in the way of playability.

Logically I'd think firming up modern aerial courses to the same extent necessary for the older ground game courses wouldn't be that different (in the reverse) from what over-irrigation has done to the ground game option of those old courses in the last fifty years. Many aerial courses rely on green receptiveness and if you take that away from them what do you have?

In a sentence aerial courses need green receptiveness more than the older ground game courses do. "Through the green" on aerial courses is something that should just be looked at course by course. That area, to me, would be sort of just preference.

[A_Clay_Man]

Tom- I think we are on the same page and I feel I understand both the definition of "Ideal MM" and an appreciation for the subtle difference between courses that have the ability to "play" in almost any condition. If a course isn't multi dimensional enough to handle all notches in the spectrum of firmness, it tells alot about the quality of that design. What's so frustrating is when you do have a thoughtful design but the people who are hired to manage that design seem to have little appreciation for the thoughtfulness of the art or the creativity of their client.

[TEPaul]

"If a course isn't multi dimensional enough to handle all notches in the spectrum of firmness, it tells alot about the quality of that design."

Adam:

That thought has been rolling around in my mind for a couple of years. If the time comes when many of these older (pre-WW2) courses that have liberal and interesting ground game features and playabilities do bring those features and playablities back to the function that was originally intended (firm and fast) golfers will inevitably see AGAIN that they probably do offer more, and have more interest than some of the more modern post WW2 courses that have limited options in comparison because afterall those post WW2 courses were designed for the modern aerial game and sometimes almost exclusively! So they definitely don't have much in the way of that interesting ground game even designed into them.

Will this show the more modern designs to be sort of inherently inferior somehow? That of course is the inevitable question but we should probably always remember that;

"Golf and it architecture is a great big thing and there really is room in it for everyone (and perhaps everything?)!"

[Sean Remington (SBR)]

I agree with the "ideal MM" of firm fairways and greens. On my course we don't have the soil conditions or modern construction that allows this to happen but only under the ideal combination of conditions.  This past season saw near record rain fall. Mother nature dictated the situation to us.  I call it "splat" golf and I don't like it.

[A_Clay_Man]

Its more than just firmness. It is also the use of features optimally. If you have noses or knolls that have shaggy soft rough on them they are useless to the creative player. Mow lines and grass heigth are other simple tools to allow for an "IMM".

I think one way to make a one dimensional target like course play more interestingly is to deviate the watering cycle so the course has different periods of transition, from the mushiest mush to the firmest it can get, while remaining an acceptable level of green. (for the unsophisticated)

[RJ_Daley]

Don't we have to look at this MM and the advent of more green, soft and aerial bias game in the context of the times it grew as a concept that those archies thought was the new modern way to showcase their design talents?  I think the whole thing can be looked at as a parallel set of timelines, one tracking the invention and subsequent improvements in irrigation, pumps, sprinklers, and controlers, and also the evolution of the various mowers and their specific capabilities, and the other timeline was the evolution of design philosopy.

If you were RTJonesSr, or RB Harris and the most technologically advanced irrigation equipment were coming out during yor career, wouldn't you feel as a modern professional that your designs needed to take full advantage of the burgeoning technology in that era?  Of course, what irrigation technology that they thought was wiz-bang great new stuff, is junk today, with no real specific application control (rather than on-off, long deep cylce or short time).  Circular dispersal patterns with single row and general area blunt green coverage were pretty much it.  So, the then modern designer began to see that they could really green up the turf, more year around, and not have times of the year that the course became rock hard like cement.

(I would like to hear from George Bahto on how much evidence in the way of commentary and written complaints he encountered from early era members bitching about how rock hard the course got at NGLA, and if there is evidence that the amount of play actually dropped when those conditions were present)

So, with the new irrigation technology, allowing for green (translating to soft due to lack of early application controls) what do you think became conventional wisdom of that new class of golf course architecture mentors and landscape archie programs in the late 20s through 60s?  They started teaching techniques that took advantage of the evolutionary developments of the irrigation and mowing technology.  The most advanced always in picking up those newest turf technologies was ANGC.  They became the ideal.  TV coverage advanced that mindset and lush green became the standard all others were expected to achieve.  

But, also with this new ability to irrigate, came the wider spread popularity to play the game.  So, putting the pressure of increased number of rounds played on the stressed superintendents that were being asked to keep the courses lush and green, caused them to pour more water and fert and chems on their courses, and a vicious cycle of maintenance meld with design ensued.  The mentors and teachers in the LA schools had to adopt or migrate to the mindsets of the aerial game as the ideal that took advantage of the new technology that would naturally present a softer course.  

Nowadays, triple row, partial radius sprinkler heads, and mowers that can be more focused on specific tasks offer the archie the ability to reconsider the maintenance meld they want for their design.  The back to the future trend has set in by some backward thinking archies that saw that they could now have it both ways.  They could design wider, courses with internal fairway features and bigger greens with more contour, and focus water in precise amounts where needed to promote ground and aerial options.  Single row irrigation, with uncontrolable radius and dispersal was really a limitting factor.  Today, the options to design more into the field of play are greater, and mentors like C&C, Doak, et al; and also LA schools can begin to look back at what was great in the old firm and fast school of design, when firm and fast and wide and rolling was a fact of nature that they had to accept, and those early archies made the best of it by designing for it.

[Ken_Cotner]

Well, the above posts have some really thought-provoking ideas.  Thanks!

But...let me get specific for a minute.  Are there any "very good" to "great" courses for which the ideal maintenance meld is a combination of soft fairways and receptive greens (I won't say "soft" greens, just not really firm)?  This is not a loaded question; I'm genuinely curious.

If there are such courses, I'm guessing they're modern?

K

[SteveTL]

I'd be interested in some of the Olympic Club members' thoughts.  I haven't played there for 20+ years, but knowing the golf course, the property, the climate, etc. I would think that overly firm conditions would render some of that golf course nearly unplayable (or playable from trees on the "low" side of the fairway).

It's the only example I can think of where the "ideal maintenance meld" discussed recently may not be ideal.

[TEPaul]

RJ:

That looks like a very fine retrospective of the timelines, events and influences that led to many of today's maintenance practices--particularly over-irrigation.

There were obviously a number of other interconnecting and simultaneous factors involved in the aerially designed courses of the Modern Age (ie, advances in golf equipment and construction equipment) and in the over-irrigation of courses generally with no real thought to the specific designs and the specific and distinct strategic and playbality ramifications of the older courses.  

All things considered this probably wasn't an unusual evolution. Agronomic conditions of the former era would probably seem unbelievably bad and problematic to us compared to what we've come to expect today. The swings in playing conditions due to seasonality and all sorts of other problems would seem remarkably severe to us now. In many ways the better control and prevalence almost everywhere of water due to the modern irrigation systems took care of most of that but in the meantime the fixation on correcting those sometimes deplorable agronomic and playing conditions obviously made almost everyone not notice some of the unintended by-products such as the loss of the ground game!

It does seem amazing that that would happen but if one looks back accurately one can see that sometimes people just get fixated in one area and often forget about some of the smaller pieces of the overall jigsaw puzzle and they also can often forget how the whole thing fits together!

[TEPaul]

Ken:

I've never seen or played Shadow Creek but it would seem to me to be the type of course (and apparently a very good one) that would have receptive conditions most everywhere. To create a "fantasy" course like that one it would seem odd to me if everything was not immaculately maintained and probably over-irrigated, lush and soft. I can't see those that control that course wanting any brownish colored grass or even the lighter green type that often indicates firm and fast conditions.

[A_Clay_Man]

Ken - Pebble Beach would be interesting study for your question(if I understand it correctly). With those small greens and forced carries the need to play for position really increases when its firm. Especially since the "standard" long rough within 4 feet of every putting surface is dominate. The best hole example is probably #11 at PB. When the green is firm even the best shot can take a bounce long. This would increase the need for proper course management by not even trying for the green and opting instead for the apron, which works on many of the holes at Pebble.

[TEPaul]

Adam;

In regard to Pebble and the ideal multi-optional maintenance meld the USGA did have that very penal rough around the greens and particularly the bunker surrounds (making them more penal than the bunkers themselves) in the US Open in 2000 that Tiger won by a mile.

That was OK, I guess (for a US Open), and they got a lot right (in the "ideal maintenance meld"), but unfortunately they got way too much water on the aprons and the available ground game approaches and they completely wiped out that fundamentally interesting and necessary compromise option.

This just all goes to prove that just like Coore's description or analogy of really good architecture as an arrangement of many available "features" similar to the arrangement of the many available "notes" in a musical symphony, if one (note or feature) is wrong or out of place it can ruin the whole symophony!

Obviously the very same thing can be said about maintenance practices!

[A_Clay_Man]

Te- The year before the open they had the AM. As I recall, they replaced all (alot) of the aprons and collars, very close to the competition, with new sod. The timing seemed really odd to me, since I thought in order to get sod to grow-in, it needs an overabundance of water. I know they had the greens 'way firm' for both comps.

Maybe they are tone deaf?