The Old Course bunkers...

[Ken_Cotner]

...lack strategic interest!

How is that for throwing raw meat to the wolves?

Yes, the fairway bunkers have bountiful strategic merit for tee shots (and second shots on the two long holes), in that there are terrific risk/reward opportunities.  Yes, many are appealingly located inside the rough lines, and were built/developed naturally.  Yes, they are fearsome in appearance and demand one's attention.

My contention is that any strategy disappears once one's ball has entered the bunker.  There is only one basic option -- pitch the ball out without trying to advance it any meaningful distance.  The most elaborate and appealing concerto in the golf strategy world grinds to a halt, as it is temporarily replaced by a measure or two of raw punk.

I like the idea of some fairway bunkers being penal.  However, the repetitively penal aspects of the Old Course's fairway bunkers violate Horace Hutchinson's maxim that variety is king.  [Caveat:  I have played the course twice, but don't know if all the fairway bunkers actually take away the aggressive option]

Would not the chess game that is the Old Course be even more interesting if her fairway bunkers tempted the golfer to play a heroic shot to the green, ala some other great courses?

Let the bashing, I mean insightful rebuttals begin!  Emporer, I have taken on a new identity and residence, so don't try to find me!

Fondly,
TEPaul, I mean Ken, apologizing for the length of this post  

[jglenn]

Ken,

I have to disagree.

The very penal nature of the Old Course's bunkers is what makes them so strategic.  Just because you're not trying to reach the green, and just because you trying to get back into play, doesn't mean you're not about to play "aggressively".

Take my misadventure as an example.  Having hit my drive into one of these black holes. My caddy handed me an 9-iron, telling me that if I hit it well, I'd still be able to hit the green with my NEXT shot.  He handed me a sand wedge on my next, which I also used for the shot after that...  That's a difference in philosophy between golf in North America and golf accross the pond.  Here, "aggressive" means trying to hit the green from a bunker.  Over there, "aggressive" means giving yourself a snow-ball chance in hell of reaching the green with your NEXT shot after you got out of a bunker.

Take the road hole bunker (or any other bunker, for that matter).  You can putt the ball towards the middle of the bunker, you can hit it backwards out, you can just try to hit the green, you can be a hero and try to get up-and-down, or you can try to drive it into the sod wall with a shut-down 8 iron and rickochet it out.  How's that for strategy?

Over here?  We complain when the particle distribution has not been lab tested...
_________

Isn't there an old story about these two golfers out on the links playing a match, and one of them hits into it into Hell.  What ensues is a stom of flying sand and a few good cuss words, after which the ball eventually pops out onto the turf, shortly followed by the gentleman.  His opponent asked how many shots were taken.  The reply was:  "Well, I entered at a quarter to one.  It is now twenty past.  You are at liberty to make your own estimate."

[Ran Morrissett]

Ken, good point - The Old Course bunkers were far more appealing when there was a greater variety to their appearance and depth. Now each revetted bunker is a similiar mugging.

Same with having the creek at #13 at ANGC as all water - the chance for a miraculous recovery has been removed at both 13 and at TOC - and I see no benefit in that  

[YTTseng]

KenC:  I agree with you.  The Old Course's bunkers are repetitive, too penal and make the course less interesting than it could be.  If the Old Course were not so famous, it would not be ranked in the top 20 in Scotland!

[T_MacWood]

YTT
Are the bunkers the most interesting aspect of St.Andrews?

[YTTseng]

TMacWood:  The bunkers are the most annoying aspect of St. Andrews.  Too much of the course is based on chance and funny bounces, in my opinion.  I would much rather play Cruden Bay or Royal Dornoch.  

[jglenn]

YYT,

What you call "chance" and "lucky bounces" most would call "local knowledge" and "course management".

To paraphrase Hogan's famous words, the more you study the Old Course, the luckier you get.
____

Gosh, here I am defending the Old Course... Tommy Naccarrato, where are you?  

[YTTseng]

JGlenn:  Hogan never saw the Old Course.  He knew it was a waste of time.

[T_MacWood]

YTT
Your in very good company Hogan, Vardon and Sneed -- all intellectual giants.

[R.S._Barker]

Knowing I'll be corrected here if I'm wrong...but wasn't it Bobby Jones whom detested TOC at first..and even stormed off after trying to play a shot from one of these aforementioned " non-strategic " bunkers ?.

Was it not the same Bobby Jones whom came to love the Old Course, and whom became as beloved by the citizens of the region because of his " understanding " of the course, and his final realization of just how special the setting was ?.

To me, TOC remains a testament to what is good about the game of golf; and IF those bunkers were plain run of the mill types that are so effluent everywhere else on the planet, they would certainly render TOC as just another British course.

They stand as what makes golf so special there, and surely, one IS penalized heavily for dropping one in there...but then again, isn't that what a bunker is supposed to be ?.

Penal, disruptive and all those wonderful things that make a round of golf worthwhile.

Look at the bunkers that reside on MOST of the normal courses that make up the PGA's regular tour stops. For most pros, they would gladly drop one in a bunker, because MOST of these same bunkers are less penal than the rough ( U.S. Open, PGA and British Open non-withstanding ) at these courses.

But suddenly, when faced with a TOC course, or most of the true courses overseas that make up the British Open rotation ( and other great top-notch courses throughout that region )...suddenly these same Pros are reduced to average human beings...well not totally average...but the point remains.

Does everyone forget so quickly David Duval's struggles in the Road Hole at the 2000 Open championship ?.

That says it all...and is why TOC AND it's bunkers remain a near perfect test for real golf.

Just a thought,

R.S. Barker

[TEPaul]

Firstly, I've never seen TOC so I can only remark on what others are saying but reading this thread I sure do buy what Jeremy Glenn is saying--theoretically.

However, Ran seems to indicate that the bunkers at TOC have been changed recently to a large degree and made far more penal than they were. Is that true and if so why did they do that?

The analogy to #13 ANGC is an excellent one! That analogy is intended to show what even minor changes to a golf course's important features can have on strategic ramifications and what a delicate balance there is to how features are treated and maintained.

ANGC probably thought that raising Rae's Creek's water level and prettying it up was just a cosmetic measure. They quickly came to realize in the following Masters the huge strategic consequences it was having and so they put it back to the way it was.

I would assume that fooling with the bunkers at TOC would basically be some of the same. The delicate balance of how such primary features work on the mind and choices of players is so important. The degrees of temptation are sort of the bottom line of the interest and effectivenss of how any feature works into the basic strategies of golf holes. If something is done to distort or shut down the degrees of temptation you're going to start to distort and possibly corrupt those features and the strategies they create and mess up the basic meaning and effectiveness of the golf hole--as ANGC did by a mistake with seemngly inconsequential cosmetic changes to Rae's Creek.

So what Jeremy is saying makes perfect sense, theoretically, that the bunkers of TOC today exude a strategic influence that is probably far greater than their actual size and placement simply because they are so penal.

But Ran seems to indicate that it very well may be that their increased penality has been changed recently to such a degree that the bunkers may be shutting down temptations which shuts down strategic choices and consequently shuts down the strategies of TOC and maybe messes with TOC's design intent bigtime! And ultimately, although the features are different (creek vs bunkering) the overall result might be no different than what ANGC did wrong.

If they did change the bunkers recently why did they and how much of a change was it from the way they used to be? I hope it wasn't some other form of "Tiger-proofing". But if it was it didn't work either!

And as an aside to that, Wood's victory at TOC (that relies so heavily on its famous bunkering for it strategies) should be recognized as one of the most significant performances in Major tournament history (actually it is) since he did not get in a single bunker at TOC in 72 holes.

Of course that's all in the context of one Major tournament--what about the strategic ramifications of everyday play? How much has that changed due to fooling with the bunkering recently?

And Ken, do you really think your post was long? It's a pipsqueak compared to some of mine.

[ForkaB]

Tom P

If you ever do visit TOC or AGNC, please give Ran advance notice so he can order up some more bandwidth before you post!

Tiger proved that TOC is not a course that particularly rewards strategy, but rather one that rewards the solid tactical plodder who has the patience to get and study a good map and then the skill and persistence to follow that map to the letter (viz. Nicklaus, Faldo).  Quite frankly, if Scott Hoch ever deigned to play there he'd have a very good chance of winning!  How Seve won there in 1984 can only be explained by a visitation from those same space aliens that recently kidnapped Jack and made him build Mayacama.

[Ken_Cotner]

Ran,

Are you saying many of the fairway bunkers (and my original point is STRICTLY limited to the fairway bunkers) used to tempt the player to pull off a shot to the green, prior to the work for the 2000 Open?  I was there in 98 or 99, before the bunker work was done.  It may be that my perception is simply incorrect (not having visited any of those bunkers   ).

IF most of the fairway bunkers are purely penal, would anyone recommend slight alterations to a few bunkers to bring temptation into play?  In one sense, that would be analagous to the USGA lowering the rough at Pinehurst to encourage a risky shot at the green (i.e. a good thing).  Is it worth messing with the Holy Mother?

KC

[BillV]

The very penal nature of the bunkers at TOC make them strategic.  Avoid them!

They determine strategy and are in fact the progenitors of strategic golf by their very nature.  

Donald Ross and Mackenzie both suggested that there was no such thing as an ill-placed bunker.  Avoid the damn thing. The random non-caring nature of them make them equally "unfair" to all except the most skilled precise golfer.  The very nature of no two holes having a similar bunkering strategy is their beauty.

This concept of "fairness" in modern golf design theory makes me want to have GI tract reverse flow if you get what I mean.  This is the heart of the disagreements about modern architecture.  So many "great" modern designs are very formulaic, the antithetic anathema to TOC.  

So Ken, I guess I disagree with your premise old buddy.  If you go way way left most of the time you avoid all the bunkers, if you challenge certain ones, you will get various degrees of length and angle reward for your effort with the occasional screw job when you get into one.

[ForkaB]

BillV

What "strategy", pray tell, do you use to avoid or challenge bunkers whose location you cannot ascertain?

[Tags:]

Tags: