Scott,

I was just looking at the distances for a couple of the upcoming Div 1 championships. This year at Caves Valley 6,942 yards and Golden Horseshoe Gold Course in 2007 at 6,817. I've never been to Caves Valley but par for these College Kids at Golden Horseshoe might be around 67-68 with two par fives playing as fours (holes 2 and 6) and two par fours that some may reach off the tee (holes 5 and eight).

Also Caves Valley has a good website for course pictures. www.cavesvalley.net

I think it depends on how fast the fairways (and rough play).  If the fairways are firm and the ball is running, it won't be too long.  If it is very wet, and they don't get any roll,  then it would be too much.

Actual yardage often can be misleading based on the conditions.  A 7000 yard course in the NW where I live is brutally long most of the year until it firms (and warms) up.  Then it doesn't play that long

Scott
Happy to say I won't be entering any tournaments there... 215 for the average par 3!! Good to break it down this way to see what those numbers really mean to us mortals.

As Mike Clayton has pointed out innumerable times about Barnbougle and St. Andrews Beach, it is the shorter holes which have been the most interesting for the good players to play.

All this focus on length [in and of itself] is misplaced.  It's the character of the holes which counts.

To quote a couple of GCA posters...

Bradley Klein has written…
“Long holes are boring, or at least they are interesting for only some players some of the time. The best thing that ever happened to tournament golf was the advent of the reachable par-5, what came to be called the par 4 ˝. One of the many ways in which Augusta National revolutionized course design was by championing the cause of the short par-five. Besides, reachable five-pars are fun for middle-handicappers who can have a fair go at the green in two, achieving, for the moment anyway, what they have dreamed about for years. The same now goes for the short four-par. It breathes new life into that great majority of us golfers for whom a green hit in regulation and maybe even a birdie are the exception rather than the rule.”

Tom Doak has written…
“Alister Mackenzie, noted course architect of Augusta National was probably the first golf architect with the perspective of providing fun for the average golfer. He knew there must not be impossible carries to frustrate the golfer, but that there had to be enough formidable hazards to excite the golfer. He knew there had to be potential birdie holes – par-3 holes & short par-4’s – to encourage the weaker player, and that the beauty of the golf course could inspire and console the golfer off his game. Mackenzie’s courses are always sure to include at least a couple of short par-4 holes, relatively easy from the standpoint of par.”

JJ

at the same time, you cannot say that a course is not good just because it is 7900 yards...

Before we denounce this course as stupendously long, isn’t it important to note that Pete’s Ocean Course at Kiawah stretches to a similar length from the back of each tee? But it's never set up at it's full length is it?

I don’t know the first thing about the new course at VT, but I would suspect that it will never be set up at 7900 yards (at least in the next 10-15 years). I would assume that Pete is just designing in a bit of elasticity. If so - this could, and perhaps should be, the design of the future.

Properly designed, wouldn’t a course whose holes could be lengthened or shortened by 80 yards or more with the simple adjustment of a tee maker, provide the ultimate form of variety?

If you have the land and the money, why not use it?

To give you an idea, the very, very back tees at The Ocean Course are 7,937 yards.  Slope maxes at 155 and course rating is 79.6.

So Mike, what have you shot from back there??    

Quote from: Mike Vegis @ Kiawah on May 13, 2005, 02:39:29 PM

To give you an idea, the very, very back tees at The Ocean Course are 7,937 yards.  Slope maxes at 155 and course rating is 79.6.

So Mike, what have you shot from back there??    

Once, on a dead calm day, I played it one club-length from the back of the back tees (well over 8,000 yards).  I had one of the best rounds of my life and shot a 99.  Only par all day was on No. 2 (with a good up and down).  By the time we got to the back nine, there was a slight breeze into the closing holes.  Because of it, I could not reach 15 or 16 fairway...  It's like hitting yourself in the head with a hammer.  It feels so good when you stop.

BTW, the caddie master at The Ocean Course has shot a 76 from back there.  The guy's got some serious game...

I checked up on this course, as it opened last August, and you'll be happy to hear that the finished course did not end up being 7900+ yards, as orginally published.  It opened up at a pawltry 7665 yards, merely a pitch-and-putt course.

Here's the scorecard:


Four par 4's 488 or longer.  Only one <400 yards....at 399.

CR from tips:  76.2, slope: 138.


Rates for students:  $32-$42.  Rates for students on old campus course in 1985 (my freshman year):  $4.

I recently did some quick math on how long a course might be using the old "every club in the bag" axiom, Bill Amick and other studies on distances actually played by most golfers, with the average drives of PGA Tour players at 291 yards.  I also used average drives of 260,230,200 and 140 based on a recent USGA study and other data.

Assuming the desire of each player to reach all greens in regulation with good shots while using a variety of clubs, I used:

• Par 3’s range from wedge to about 90% of driver distance,
• Par 4’s range from a potentially drivable hole (110% of typical tee shot distance) to the maximum distance reachable in two shots
• Par 5 holes range from reachable in two to Driver, Wood,  5I

The “ideal” total length might look like this table.  For the forward tees, I did have to adjust upwards to keep the USGA minimum yards for women's par, and on the Pro tees, I had to ignore the upper limits of par, and still, 510 yards might be too short for the longest championship par 4:

Par 3 Holes

260   225   190   170   125
220   195   170   165   110
180   165   150   145   95
140   135   130   125   80

Par 4 Holes

510   475   405   365   290
490   455   390   350   280
470   435   375   335   270
450   415   360   320   260
430   395   345   305   250
410   375   330   290   240
390   355   315   275   230
370   335   300   260   220
350   315   285   245   210
315   280   255   230   205

Par 5 Holes

710   625   555   480   420
650   550   530   470   415
590   525   505   460   410
530   475   480   450   405

7465 6705 6070 5440 4515

You may debate some assumptions – like the long par 3 which some don’t like, or using a wedge par 3.  You might not think that all players should reach all greens, but of course they wouldn't after a duffed tee shot.    

However, these back tee yardages are similar to current PGA Tournament course lengths.  I don't know how they break out their 7400 yards on a typical course, but at least my version has four sub 400 yard par 4 holes!

The other tees may surprise many at how short courses should be for most player groups, but management companies and course operators know that these lengths are pretty effective. In fact, most courses are a about 150-300 yards longer through the middle tees - more like 6850/6300/5700/4800, which is okay, as well.  

Of course, its a highly theoretical excersise, length isn’t everything in golf and neither is total yardage.  It’s not as important to get to any ideal yardage as it is to judge how each hole plays and fits the land. Nonetheless, I think it has some value to this thread.

Scott,

That's a long golf course.

But, many on this site don't think there's a distance problem, hence, I wonder why they made the course so long ?