Your Favorite Bunker

[Adam_F_Collins]

What is your favorite bunker? Where is it? Why do you like it - or love to hate it?

Or - tell us what makes a great bunker in your opinion...

[TEPaul]

One of my favorite bunkers (complex) is to the left and before the 13th green at PVGC in the springtime. The naturalness of it is suberb but in the springtime the color of the vegetation in and around it is truly beautiful and quite unique. Strategically it's always been so well placed too.

[Sean Walsh]

The three most dominating bunkers I have come across would have to be my favourites.  

4th at Royal St Georges "Can I get over"
3rd at Barnbougle Dunes"How far away is it and can I reach it"
4th at Barnbougle Dunes "Why am I even thinking of taking that on (but I do anyway)"

[wsmorrison]

One of my favorite bunkers isn't always a bunker, sometimes it is a water hazard!  This would be the large sandy waste in front of the third green at Kittansett.  During high tide, the bay area is nearly covered in water.  It is a great hole on a phenomenal course that is often overlooked.

Here is a photo from Ran's course write-up showing low tide:

[BCrosby]

The old Mack bunker on the 10th at ANGC.

It's splendid isolation today is a reminder of both MacK's genius and the lack of same among the architects who followed him there.

Bob

[Chris_Clouser]

The big gaping bunker short/right of the 10th green at Prairie Dunes.  The hole is long enough that if you don't get your tee ball solidly you will probably end up in there and it is just really imposing barely seeing the face of that bunker just beyond the "gunsch."  Any pin placements on that side of the green are just treacherous solely because of tightly placed bunker.  Just brilliant.  Easy to see why this was Perry Maxwell's favorite par three.

[JESII]

The Devils A-hole on #10 at PVGC

I actually hated it because every group I caddied for had one or two guys wanting to go down there and try to get a ball out. Slowed us up by 10 minutes every round .

[Adam_F_Collins]

The old Mack bunker on the 10th at ANGC.

It's splendid isolation today is a reminder of both MacK's genius and the lack of same among the architects who followed him there.

Bob

Interesting, Bob. That's mine too. It stands out so clearly in my mind above all others - yet I've never actually seen it, and according to the opinions on a thread I started a while back - it is of little importance to the hole in its present arrangement.

But it's such a uniquely shaped, impressive form...

I love that bunker.

What is perhaps even more intriguing to me is that it is not 'natural' in appearance at all. It is - to me - a great example of the bunker as its own abstract art form. (Now don't get weirded out here, boys)

It's just that most bunkers are not 'natural' in their appearance at all. The works of Doak, Coore and Crenshaw and some others are creating bunkers that ARE natural in appearance - so in some sense, I'd say they are practicing a 'realism' when it comes to the art form of bunker creation.

But most others are downright "Picasso" in appearance. Strange, blob-like amoebas. And I think that's fine - but that bunker of Mackenzie's at ANGC is not "Bunker Realism", it's Abstract.

...yet it is immensely pleasing. EVEN to the devotees of "Naturalism" here on this site...

[Gene Greco]

No question, the LARGE greenside bunker to the left of #4 at Sand Hills.

Unlike the tenth at PV mentioned by JES 11, very few players wander down to the bottom to try a shot because its so hard to physically get out of!

One player I was with who had the misfortune of playing from the very bottom of it needed the flagstick held high and he still couldn't see it. So our other playing partner stood at the top of the dune to give him the line and he proceeded to hit it right over his head, two bounces and in the hole!

To this day he still doesn't believe he holed it. Rather he believes I stuck it in the hole to give him a thrill.

[Kenny Lee Puckett]

The left greenside bunker at #10 at PVGC.  A fiendish counterpoint to the front right bunker...

JWK

[JESII]

The left greenside bunker at #10 at PVGC.  A fiendish counterpoint to the front right bunker...

JWK

Ahh, the witches.....well you know what I mean if you've ever experienced it.

[Bill Gayne]

After attending The Open this year it has to be the Road Hole bunker.

[Robert Kimball]

The Devils A-hole on #10 at PVGC

I actually hated it because every group I caddied for had one or two guys wanting to go down there and try to get a ball out. Slowed us up by 10 minutes every round .

Ever had a player ask you for the exact yardage to get into the bunker?  I bet a poster or two here are guilty of that!!  

[JESII]

No, never did. But I bet you're right.

The evolution of that bunker is interesting if my memory froma converstion with Tom Paul and Wayne Morrison serves me. Might be good for another thread.

[ForkaB]

I love the little pot bunker that is cut into a side of a dune on the walk from green to tee on one of the early holes at Pacific Dunes.  Completely out of play and unnatural, but beautifully crafted and artfully placed.  It's like an art gallery out in the middle of nowhere.

[TEPaul]

Adam Foster Collins said;

"What is perhaps even more intriguing to me is that it is not 'natural' in appearance at all. It is - to me - a great example of the bunker as its own abstract art form. (Now don't get weirded out here, boys)
It's just that most bunkers are not 'natural' in their appearance at all. The works of Doak, Coore and Crenshaw and some others are creating bunkers that ARE natural in appearance - so in some sense, I'd say they are practicing a 'realism' when it comes to the art form of bunker creation.
But most others are downright "Picasso" in appearance. Strange, blob-like amoebas. And I think that's fine - but that bunker of Mackenzie's at ANGC is not "Bunker Realism", it's Abstract."

Adam:

I hope no one thinks I'm trying to take this thread off topic. If they do just tell them you asked me to.

In my opinion, of course the general bunker feature in golf architecture has essentially become it's own abstract art form. By that I mean an abstract art form apart from trying to make it look natural. Or more definitively, not naturally occuring or not natural looking on particular sites. By that I obviously mean sites that essentially have no natural sand such as the linksland does and an area like the Sand Hills does.

Sometimes I call the sand bunker feature that odd vestige of golf architecture that is not completely necessary to golf that hung onto golf architecture completely when golf first migrated out of the linksland over 150 years ago.

Why was that? Why was it that one architectural feature that was not completely necessary to golf that completely hung on to golf and golf architecture in sites that had no naturally occuring sand and sandy blow-outs lke the linksland always did and the Sand Hills does?

That's a good question and clearly there're a number of legitimate answers. However, hang on it did and almost completely. Matter of fact it hung on so completely that most golfers and architects too think it has become a completely essential and necessary feature in both golf and architecture. One cannot really deny that the sand bunker in architecture has most definitely become one of any architect's primary expressions of his own unique artistic style as well as his primary tool to create and set golf strategies. (Bill Coore told me not long ago he considers the sand bunker feature one of the three most important facet of all golf architecture).

Personally, I do not share that feeling and I never have. I love sand bunkering and I admire those who make it so well and thoughtfully as some of the modern architects do and some of the old guys did. However, I would like to see architects try to go without sand bunkering sometimes in areas where there is no natural sand and in places where no matter how much of a natural mimic sand bunkering may be it just does not look like it naturally belongs (on various sites).

Why do I feel that some architects should try to go without it in areas where even the most natural looking mimic doesn't look to be part of the natural landscape? It's only because I often dream of the time and place where architects can and will create golf courses that look more naturally occuring than ever before.

[Adam_F_Collins]

Why do I feel that some architects should try to go without it in areas where even the most natural looking mimic doesn't look to be part of the natural landscape? It's only because I often dream of the time and place where architects can and will create golf courses that look more naturally occuring than ever before.

This is a very interesting, loaded little paragraph... and I feel there are a lot of great possibilities there. But what are the chances that golfers and architects will ever let go of the bunker enough to allow for those possibilities?

Any thoughts from the gallery?

[Jason Blasberg]

One of my favorite bunkers is the fairway bunker on the drivable 5th at Cuscowilla.

Not only is it a menace to be in, it obscures the long hitters view of the green and it also splits the fairway into two options, a more heroic carry over the left half of it to a narrow offset fairway that is relatively blind from the tee but leaves the player a second shot playing into the angle of the green or a bail out to the right of it with a reasonably wide and visible landing area leaving the player a second shot with the green angled away from them from front left to back right.  With even a wedge it's very difficult to hold the green at that angle and a bump and run is often more successful.  

[Mark_Fine]

Adam,
Unless you are blessed with natural sand dunes on your site or located right along the sea, can someone explain where a bunker would ever look "naturally occuring"  

[peter_p]

Mssr Goodale,
That is named the velodrome.

My nomination is the bunker in the green at Riviera's 6th.

For courses played, the Himalaya bunker at the 6th at St Enedoc.

[TEPaul]

"But what are the chances that golfers and architects will ever let go of the bunker enough to allow for those possibilities?"

Probably not good at all. For something like that to happen as something other than just a novelty someone will have to build a bunkerless golf course that really gets the attention of golfers for some reason. Do I think that's possible? Of course I do.

Bill Coore once said to me that good architecture is like a good symphony and creating it is like arranging various notes that would be akin to arranging the possible array of golf architectural features. There are quite a few golf architectural features in that array, and I have to think given some fascinating ground of one kind or another sand bunkers do not always have to be one of those notes (features) in an arrangement that can be great.

My personal feeling is that a golf course that ever does go bunkerless and is considered great will have a good deal of what we sometimes refer to as "gravity" golf.

[Paul Perrella]

     Even though I've never been in it, my favorite bunker is the fairway bunker on #17 at Royal Portrush. The scale of this bunker is impressive. I will have this bunker squarely in my gunsights on Sept. 25th and I can't wait.

[Ben Voelker]

However, I would like to see architects try to go without sand bunkering sometimes in areas where there is no natural sand and in places where no matter how much of a natural mimic sand bunkering may be it just does not look like it naturally belongs (on various sites).

Tom, there's one course I grew up playing that fits what you're talking about almost exactly.  It's certainly not an architecturally exciting course, simply a public muni that was constructed back in the 1920's.  So I'm sure it's due to a tight budget rather than the architectural merit, or the thought that sand wouldn't fit at the site, but that being said, Pioneeers Golf Course in Lincoln, Nebraska is an entirely bunkerless golf course on the Southwest edge of town.  It's not a par 3 course, or a 9-hole, but a full 18-hole, par 71 layout.  It's the only one that I've come across and it's always fun to play there for that reason.  Instead of sand, every green has grass bunkers, which create some very interesting  stances/swings, etc.  around the greens.  Besides that feature (or lack thereof), there's not anything to write home about from an architectural standpoint.  Does anyone else know of any other "sandless" golf courses out there?

As for my favorite bunker, considering only courses I've played, I'd have to say the left fairway bunker on 16 at Sand Hills.  I had the great fortune of having to take 3 shots to extract myself from that one on my visit there.  IMO, that was probably the most intimidating bunker I've ever seen on a golf course.  And it's even more intimidating from the bottom looking out!

[Bill_McBride]

Hell is still my favorite although it wasn't a factor downwind at the Open with the hole playing 618 yds.  What's that about a problem with the ball??

Hell is such a great bunker to mere mortals because it dominates your thoughts about play on that hole long before you reach the tee!  MacKenzie's diagram of players ABC and D is still relevant except for the long-hitting pros playing downwind.

With reference to conversations last summer, the Hell Bunker did look great at the Open, very gnarly and wild looking.  Much better than May 2005's manicured look, which resembled a recruit's buzz more than today's Beatle cut.

[TEPaul]

Ben Voelker:

Not to sound in any way critical of that course you described and others like it (and there are a number of them and always have been) but it's precisely because of those types of courses that architects probably have gotten into thinking sand bunkers everywhere are a virtual architectural necessity.

What I'm talking about would be entirely different than the type of course you describe which is probably bunkerless due to economics. What I'm talking about is basically an architectural experiment in excellence that's outside the box simply because of going sand bunkerless.