"That is why they lost control of the greens at SHGC, they were all poa which rapidly loses moisture and wilts in warm, dry windy conditions. This has the effect of offering no resistance to the roll of the ball, hence the ludicrous putting speeds of that fateful day. On a bent grass green, especially a natural one, the strength of the leaf is maintained and resistance to ball roll remains the same. That is why the greens are similar pace at the end of the day as at the start. It may turn a little brown but if it does, unlike poa, you don’t have to call it dead grass."

Marc:

That's a very interesting remark. You seem to be saying or implying that bent grass greens will maintain their speed (consistent speed) throughout the day while a poa annua green, if the plant starts to wilt over the course of the day, will create a condition where speed will dramatically increase through the course of the day.

I'm not sure I agree with that take, or at least I must say I've never exactly noticed that dramatic increase in speed on a golf course with poa greens from morning into later in the day.

I must say when you look down at predominately poa annua green (such as PVGC's) when they are maintained fast (whether you look at them early in the morning or late in the afternoon) they do look like a series of little pin-heads bunched together but when you look down at a bent such as our new A-4 you can see the little leaf blades laying down.

If you stimp either strain at some particular reading such as 11 I don't see that either strain changes speed (increases in speed) later in the day.

Resistance of the leaf or surface to the roll of the golf ball is basically all about friction. If that friction doesn't increase or decrease much the golf ball doesn't know or care what the surface is--it could be bent, poa or even linoleum, for that matter. It's basically all about physics.

Moisture (water) does have volume and mass too and syringing any green even if it's for the plants long-term health and maintenance (poa) also creates resistance or friction to the roll of the golf ball no matter what the surface is or the plant that creates that surface (poa or bent).

Basically, what you seem to be saying is when poa annua greens become very stressed compared to bent greens they dramatically speed-up through the day. Is that really proven or provable, in your opinion? That's something I've not ever heard regarding poa annua greens compared to other strains of greens.

By the way, we've done so much greenspeed analysis in the last month or so at my club I can see on those greens at Troon (on a flattish surface) that they cannot be rolling more than about 10 on the stimp, which in my opinion is just about perfect for the British Open and any expected weather condition (particularly excessive wind or green surface firmness!)

Thank you Tom for pointing out that the greenspeeds are less than perfect....or under the top so to speak.  

Is that what Tom said? Interesting. The ball does seem to be throwing out the anchor as it loses its pace though.

That to me is too close to the fire--and that's probably exactly why the greenspeed of Troon is just where it is!

Tom...this is exactly why I think the over reaction of the media and some of the people on this site about the conditions at Shinnecock on Sunday was a very sad day for golf.....conditioning from this day forward will always be under the top...you will rarely if ever see perfect conditions again because of the safety factor that we see today.  It's just golf Tom...so why not play with a little fire for the chance to either see or experience perfection.....at one brief moment at Shinnecock we saw it...but you got to get to the top of a hill to go over it.

I asked this on one of the recent green speed or course setup threads, but it went unanswered:

How difficult is it to tweak the green speeds on a daily basis? Is it possible to shoot for 10 stimp and speed it up to 11 if no winds appear? Or prepare for 11 and then slow them down if the weather forecast is bad?

I'm not asking to be a jerk, I just don't know much about agronomy.

Steve, thankyou, I couldn't have put it better myself.

Couple of other things. The natural agrostis tunuis at those old links courses is an entirely different grass from the hybid varieties. In fact there are very few similarities. Also, those greens would have recieved very low levels of nitrogen over many years. This has the additional effect of increasing the cell wall strength, it is very fibrous and will as a result resist wilting.
Tom Paul, have you ever experienced greens when they get shiny and the footprints start to show. Well with that type of grass at Troon, that is not going to happen. It happened at SHGC but will not happen over here.  

Now calling Eddy Adams ex links superintendent at TOC. He's a sometimes GCA'er and he'll know alot more than me.

Thanks Brian.
Those greens @ TOC were lean 'n' mean back in 2000.

Going back to your earlier question, I didn't get to meet the Super at Troon when I was up there, but if I did, I'd have shaken his hand.
I don't think they'll do much different to the prep of the course as they would for most other years. After all, they get big events all the time and what they are looking for is traditional firm and fast links conditions. I think the main thing they keep in mind is not to get into aeration too close to the event so as to keep the greens running as pure as they are.

It's a stressful time though. I know Neil Metcalf at St Georges had some health problems after the event last year.    

I like to be the first to express my deep sympathies to the R&A for the horrible way Mother Nature has treated poor old Royal Troon this week.
 
What a pity!

Marc H and Steve O:

Sure I've seen greens that're shiny where you can see a heel print and such (also greens where you used to hear your metal spikes go "crunch"). In my tournament days we saw plenty of that. I used to call that condition "That sickening light green sheen". What did it mean to me? It meant if I was putting down it to really watch my ass because that putt was gonna be faaaast!

But I'm trying to ask you both an important question here about green playability and speed on certain strains of grass. It looked to me in a previous post like Marc said when some poa greens start to wilt, perhaps toward the end of the day from stress, they may really speed up on the stimpmeter due to lack of resistance (lack of friction) due to the wilt of poa while on bent greens that won't happen. I just want to know if you really think that condition (increased speed through the day on some poa greens due to wilt vs lack of same on bent) is really true and provable.

Steve:

How can I tell the speed of greens on TV? It's not hard really. I can do it from experience of putting on greens of all kinds of speeds. If I'm watching a putt on TV across what I know to be a pretty flat surface I can tell at the end of a putt. If the ball continues and continues to turn very slowly that green is really up there in speed. If the ball comes to a stop quite quickly that green is not that fast on the stimpmeter. The difference of roll-out at the end of a putt between say 9 on the stimp and 11 and above that way is pretty dramatic and very idenitfiable to see even on TV. I'm starting to think that around 11 on the stimp just might be the magic number that putting greens anywhere really do not need to exceed. Of course if some greens are super flat it's not that dramatic to playability but if they have good slope and contour and are around 11 (or above) playability changes exponentially. I call that playable condition at 11 or above on contoured and sloped greens "ball creep" (the surface has very little resistance or friction to stop the ball from continuing to roll!!).

Again, a ball doesn't know or care what it's rolling across---if the surface has a good deal of resistance to the roll of the ball (friction) no matter whether it's a carpet or a strain of grass the speed won't be great. If there's very little resistance to the roll of the ball (lack of friction) not matter what the surface is it's gonna be fast! It's nothing more than a matter of physics!

And I'm beginning to think that slight differential on the stimp which can produce exponentially different playability is in the 10-11 foot range. At 10 playability is still OK, quite manageable with playability but at 11 and above things start to change dramatically in playability on putting greens.

Adam:

I could be wrong about this but bent grass is a "creeper". I'm not sure what poa strains are though because I'm no agronomist. Encouraging leaf size or not is basically a management process of controlling grain or not, I think. Almost all maintenance practices today are geared toward removing or minimizing grain (verticutting) in greens because it can have such an effect (a complex one) on playability.

But there are some courses, most notably HVGC that actually cultivated and encouraged grain in their greens. The club thought that condition basically restored some interesting and complex "playabilities" from the old days.

The way they make it work and keep the speed up is to encourage leaf length and then roll it! It really is something to see and play---some of their greens have that shiny and dull look going all over the place and the golfer has to really factor it all in on both break and speed!

There's a green at HVGC that's really notable for this complex playability of differing grain direction. On the back of #15 if you're on the back left and the pin is back right the grain on the first half is into you but when the ball gets over the slope going down hill the grain runs away from you. Talk about a complicated putt!!

Tom- If i'm not mistaken, Poa annua is a Bluegrass. There are those who say Poa has no grain. Resembling a brocoli top, One could argue it has grain, going every which way.  I Have seen little to none "grain effect", when Poa greens are running above, about 8 on the Stimp. I do see some, sometimes, But, For all intense and purposes, it has no noticeable effect on the ball, until it grows out and gets slower.

Mo' on Poa

http://www.agronomy.psu.edu/Research/poa/poa.htm

Barney

The mantle of USGA apologist does not hang comfortably on your ample frame--but to each his or her own, as I am wont to say.

Troon was superbly conditioned.  As good as could have been expected foir the wettest summer in 50 years in Scotland (and that's saying something!).  And, it led to one of the best and most gripping "Majors" that I have ever seen.

The more time passes, the more the 2004 US Open will be confirmed as the poster child for maintenance unmeld, and as the point at which the USGA's Open philosophy turned from childish arrogance to minimalism and humilty.  IMVHO, of course, but.....you read it here first!

Steve and Marc, your thoughts on this article?

Poa annua: Australian for green
By David R. Huff, The Pennsylvania State University
Aug 1, 2002 12:00 PM
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I just completed a sabbatical in Melbourne, Australia. It's a fun place with “heaps” of trendy restaurants, fine wines and great people. But it's also a strange place, too, at least to an American. The sun rises on your right and sets on your left; the constellation Orion is standing on its head; and I kept looking the wrong way for traffic. (I forgot to check which way the water turns as it goes down the drain!)

Oddities such as these served as constant reminders that I was in a foreign land. However, as a turf breeder specializing in Poa annua, there's one thing going on “down under” that seemed anything but strange to me.

POA ANNUA DOWN UNDER
As you might expect, Poa annua is a major weed of golf course putting greens and fairways in Australia, just as it is in many parts of the United States. However, a few golf course superintendents in Australia and New Zealand believe that Poa annua playing surfaces are among the best. And if nature is going to supply you with Poa in such great abundance, then why not embrace it, nurture it, give it a decent home and turn it into a benefit instead of a bane?

Annual bluegrass is known as “wintergrass” in Australia because it normally behaves as a winter annual just as it does in our Southwestern and Southern states. However, unlike the United States, where it's common practice to overseed dormant warm-season grasses in the fall with perennial ryegrass or rough bluegrass, some Australian superintendents simply use Poa annua as their naturally re-seeded winter playing surface for their bermudagrass (which they call “couchgrass”) fairways. At many Australian golf clubs, Poa annua is a desired fairway playing surface from May through November.

Superintendents regulate the amount of Poa in their fairways by the timing of a light application of non-selective herbicide during spring transition. If the Poa is a little thin one year, then fairways are sprayed after seed-head formation to ensure plenty of seed for next year. If the Poa is too thick, then fairways are sprayed prior to flowering to reduce its abundance next year.

BUT WHAT ABOUT GREENS?
With Poa annua being an important part of golf course fairways here, you might wonder whether this creates a weed problem for their greens. In fact, it does, for some.

Australia is roughly the size of the continental United States, but with a population of only 19 million. Most of these live in the eastern coastal cities of Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide. Brisbane is too tropical for perennial forms of Poa annua to evolve and courses there use bermudagrass greens year-round. However, Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide have a more Mediterranean-like climate, while Tasmania and New Zealand have a cool, oceanic, temperate climate. Thus, greens in these locations typically consist of bentgrass and most superintendents fight to keep them free of Poa, just as in the United States.

However, some Australian superintendents have welcomed the Poa onto their greens and are satisfied with the result.

BREEDING NEW POA ANNUA
The goal of my Poa annua breeding program is to provide seeded commercial cultivars of high quality Poa annua for use on golf course putting greens. After screening thousands of perennial types, I've narrowed them down to the top 12 selections. These 12 were planted as seed on golf courses in Pennsylvania, New York and California during the fall of 2001, to evaluate their performance. We also established a similar evaluation trial in Melbourne.

Australia and the United States share many of the same problems associated with Poa greens: susceptibility to anthracnose, lack of heat tolerance and seed-head production under greens height of cut. In addition, the qualities of Poa annua on greens are highly variable, both within and among golf courses. My breeding program is focused on improving many of these deficiencies of Poa. However, I believe it's the lack of high-quality seed required for putting green surfaces that is the most pressing problem right now.

We're making progress towards solving many of the former problems and it has been the support of Pennsylvania golf course superintendents, the GCSAA and the USGA that have enabled me to continue this project.

When I got to Australia, I didn't believe I would find anyone there actually using Poa as a putting surface. I was surprised to see that many superintendents have come to accept and encourage Poa as a putting surface.

In almost every region I visited, I met superintendents with nearly pure Poa greens who have no intention of switching back to bentgrass. The acceptance of Poa annua is reaching a pinnacle in Auckland, New Zealand.

At Patanuga Golf Course, where I gave a Poa workshop, I witnessed 80 to 90 percent pure bentgrass greens being lifted as sod and thrown into the compost pile. These were creeping bentgrass greens, not the Colonial or Highland types of bentgrass that can be found on minimal maintenance golf courses in these parts. Superintendent Mike Davies was replacing the bentgrass vegetatively with mini-tine cores of Poa annua collected from his old Poa greens. Davies has been able to establish puttable playing surfaces after only 6 to 8 weeks grow-in and he is on a program to re-surface all of his bent greens.

At another of New Zealand's top golf clubs, Titirangi Golf Club, Superintendent Steve Hookway has developed and perfected this technique of Poa establishment and is similarly re-surfacing his remaining bent greens to Poa.

When I gave my Poa annua workshop in New Zealand, I found that I was, essentially, “preaching to the choir.” These superintendents were doing things with Poa that I had only thought about. It seems that Michigan State's Dr. Joe Vargas had visited here about 10 years earlier and had suggested that Poa might make an excellent putting surface. Three years after that, a visit from Oregon State's Tom Cook reinforced Vargas' ideas. After Cook's visit, New Zealand superintendents began changing their management techniques to favor the Poa.

Several years ago, Steve Hookway went further and began re-surfacing his bentgrass greens to Poa. Steve has also tried something that I and another Penn State faculty member are only now beginning to play with: growing Poa greens in less than the standard 11 to 12 inch depth of a medium-sized, uniform sand profile. Four years ago, Hookway built a practice green using only 8 inches of his standard root-zone sand mix. This green has performed no differently than his other sand-based greens built to 11-inch depths.

While I wouldn't recommend this practice right now (it's a potentially risky undertaking), Dr. Andy McNitt (also of Penn State) and I are currently investigating the potential of shortening up the depths of sand-based root zones by measuring water use rates at various depths using different sized sands.

So maybe these down-under supers are way ahead me and doing things I've only begun to think about. But that's what sabbaticals are for: to learn new things. Sometimes, you find the newest things are in the strangest places.

Dr. David R. Huff is a turfgrass breeder and professor of turfgrass science at The Pennsylvania State University (University Park, Pa.).

Acknowledgement

I would like to thank all the down-under superintendents who showed me around their courses and special thanks to Brian Way and Peter Munro of the New Zealand Sports Turf Institute; John Neylan, Australian Golf Course Superintendents Association; Dr. David Aldous, Melbourne University; and Jyri Kaapro, Bayer Corp., for their persistence, patience and friendship.