[Mike_Young]

I know I have my own ideas of how I determine depth based on strategy of the approach, slope of the green from the bunker edge and whether the top edge of bunker is below or above the green surface.....what else??  

[Joe Hancock]

...keep digging until you hit some high percolating materiels....

Joe

[John Kavanaugh]

Mike,

I get the impression from the Long Shadow thread that you like the player to be able to see the sand surface.

[Mike_Young]

Mike,

I get the impression from the Long Shadow thread that you like the player to be able to see the sand surface.

haven't given it much thought really.....

[Patrick_Mucci]

Mike,

It's hard to ignore the development of clubs like lob wedges and clubs specifically designed for bunker play.

One has to ask, what type of challenge should be presented to an unsuccessful approach ?

How challenging should the recovery be ?

In general, I would think that the trend SHOULD be toward deeper bunkers.

But, the slope and contouring of the targeted green should be considered in concert with bunker depth and the nature of the approach.

[Jeff_Brauer]

Mike,

Nice Topic.  I had this discussion the other day with a client, who felt no greenside bunker should be so deep you can't see the pin.  I've heard well known pros say the same thing - if you can't see the pin the shot is as much luck as skill.

I'm not so sure I agree but that idea is usually beat into me.  Golfers use the old "what if I miss it here?" argument, claiming that making bogey from any particular spot is a problem on the order of magnitude proximate to terrorism and world hunger.

I have long thought that generally, bunkers ought to be proportionally deeper for short iron approaches.  Isn't a green side miss with an 8 iron a bigger mistake than a miss with a 4 iron?  If so, does that warrant more difficult punishment?  On public courses, owners want speed of play and deep bunkers are thought to slow it down, so I rarely do this.

My other thought is that generally, if there is a bunker one side but the other is open you could have a deeper bunker than if you bunker all or both sides to give more room to play away from it if you choose.

I tend to bunker deeper on a long par 4 if the tee shot is relatively easy, and do fewer or shallower hazards if it is more difficult.  Or, I make both shots hard and make the green flatter.

As to green slopes, I have heard good players say they always want the green to slope towards the bunker, with one even saying water should drain into the bunkers, in case he is playing to a tight pin near the bunker, and he doesn't want to have the ball roll away from the pin.  

I think that is overdoing it to make it easier on those players, while making it harder for the superintendent.  

I may make the collar higher and more steeply sloped toward the green surface on longer approaches to help hold a skittering approach shot on the green (esp in cross winds) but this has the effect of making the recovery shot harder when you short side it.  So, which is more important?  I think the former, but there is holy hell to pay when someone misses and makes bogey from that bunker.

As Pat alludes, with lob wedges, I'm not sure extra bunker depth is a bad thing in a "pure design" and a green sloping away from you is lnot impossible, but still harder than hitting into the slope. If a course has some of each, its just something the golfer needs to know and learns over time.

I will be interested in hearing other thoughts.

[Mike_Young]

Jeff,
I think the one thing that is rarely discussed on here is the internal strategy of bunkers.....
I have a friend , Richard Crawford from out your way....All american golfer at Houston and won the NCAA twice...very good player..grew up with DL2 and worked with Harvey Pennick......
Anyway he was describing how Plummer had explained bunkers to him one time.....
For EX:  a bunker running parallel to the right side of a green the floor of the bunker should be built so that on the wall next to green there is a slight upslope to the shot onto the green and on the outside edge there would be a longer slope to the floor of the bunker sloping toward the green surface.....thus if a ball barely missed a green or rolled into the bunker from greenside, it was a much easier bunker shot than a shot that missed wide where one would have a downhill shot toward a green.
I also think that making a bunker shallower when the required recovery shot is to an area sloping away or the bunker is above the surface is more difficult than a deeper bunker.  My theory is that because the player does not worry about height as in clearing a lip he will likely hit a shot that will run much further with the slope......JMO

[Patrick_Mucci]

I also think that making a bunker shallower when the required recovery shot is to an area sloping away or the bunker is above the surface is more difficult than a deeper bunker.  

My theory is that because the player does not worry about height as in clearing a lip he will likely hit a shot that will run much further with the slope......JMO

That also allows putting and chipping as viable alternatives to recovery, which would seem to lessen the challenge.[/color]
 

[Mike_Young]

I also think that making a bunker shallower when the required recovery shot is to an area sloping away or the bunker is above the surface is more difficult than a deeper bunker.  

My theory is that because the player does not worry about height as in clearing a lip he will likely hit a shot that will run much further with the slope......JMO

That also allows putting and chipping as viable alternatives to recovery, which would seem to lessen the challenge.[/color]
 

Pat,
I think that would be possible if there was no lip and then when I think about it...I bet tempting a guy with the putter toward a downhill slope could be interesting.....and then again I could be thinking to much...

[Jeff_Brauer]

Mike,

I have heard better players argue for steep grass bank and flat bottom bunkers similarly.

The theory is that a shot that misses the green by five feet ought to be punished less than one that misses by ten.  In a cape and bay style bunker, the five foot miss often plugs, since there is more of a tendency towards that on sloping sand, while the ten foot miss finds flat sand, and usually, a better lie.  

In a flat bottom bunker, the five foot miss deflects off the grass bank and lands lightly in the flat bottom, while an aerial shot hitting the flat bottom does have a little chance of a fried egg or plugged lie – and proportionally more punishment.

I hear very few argue in favor of any downhill lie in the bunker.  I suspect if you were thinking too much you would say that a bunker with a downhill lie should be shallower since the ball will come out lower, and the green should slope up, since it will roll longer.  If a bunker sloped up somehow all the way from back of bunker to green, allowing a clean pick and higher ball flight, a run away green might be in order.

Of course, all these ideas are based on the idea that a golfer "should" have a shot at the pin no matter where he/she is on the golf course.  As Patrick alludes, one way to create some scoring differentials is to make the course so that isn't always true.

Personally, for all the theory, when I get to building stuff like bunkers, its usually the land that dictates and the slopes kinda come out like the slopes come out.

BTW, I saw nothing in your post that should lead anyone to believe that you were advocating bunkers shallow enough to putt out of.

[Jim Sweeney]

Jeff:

Of course Pros and good players want to see the flagsticks and hit into slopes. That's the best argument for building just the opposite.

Which comes first:

designing using risk/reward type thinking, or blending bunkers into the terrain and taking what you get?

What about situations like the second at Yale? The bunker to the left of the green isn't deep, it's just twenty or so feet below the green. I'm under the impression it is just there to keep a ball from going farther down the hill. A difficult recovery. to be sure, but also a benefit to the golfer.

[paul cowley]

I feel that this topic is like many broad brushed and non specific topics that come up here often....and I find that exceptions pop up as fast as a rule or theory is promoted.......and as such, I think generalities usually have to rule.

It could almost be described in science law form, as in 'for every design theory promoted, there is an equal and opposite design theory'.

I will say that when designing bunkers I refer to them in an order of magnitude from 1 thru 10.

...a 1 you can putt out of.

...a 10 is the deepest imaginable for Raynor or Banks, with the green surface 15 horizontal ft away but still 12 plus ft over your head...or like playing off Carmel beach up to 10 green.

I use these strengths to convey design and strategic intent to others as in;
The left side rear bunker should be a 7-8 to challenge the rear pin, while the front right carry bunker should be a strong 4 at the most.

......and then we decide what kind of frosting we want to add.......two popular choices are solid or lacy [but sometimes we combine the two like a double dipper].

[Mark_Fine]

There is no right or wrong of course, but I'm not much on "formulas" when it comes to building bunkers.  Doesn't that concept play right into making sure every bunker is "fair"    

"Fair" was one word Forrest and I tried to eliminate when speaking about the topic of bunkers or hazards in general.  That word has caused more problems for golf course design and for superintendents, etc. as any other word in golf.  

[wsmorrison]

"I had this discussion the other day with a client, who felt no greenside bunker should be so deep you can't see the pin.  I've heard well known pros say the same thing - if you can't see the pin the shot is as much luck as skill."

Jeff,

I know you question this sort of remark, but I don't get it at all.  Before the player descends into a deep bunker, they surely check the position of the pin and slopes relative to their location in the bunker.  This should take luck out of any equation even if the pin is not seen when the player takes his/her stance.

[paul cowley]

Mark ... some might argue that your efforts to eliminate 'fair' from your book is in itself not fair.

[paul cowley]

I think any time you can't see the pin while playing from a bunker creates a demand for more skill.... and decreases the luck factor as well.

Hardly "as much luck as skill".

[Mike_Young]

......and then we decide what kind of frosting we want to add.......two popular choices are solid or lacy [but sometimes we combine the two like a double dipper].

Paul,
You talk about screwing up your day......now you have me sitting here eating Briars Vanilla with chocolate syrup for breakfast......of course I rate it only about a 7 since I did not put pecans on it....

[BCrosby]

I'm with Mark Fine. Too many rules about proportionality and fairness can quickly get loopy. A miss is a miss and you takes your chances.

For example, a shot that just barely misses a green is more likely to plug in a flashed face bunker than one that misses by 5 yards or so, which will settle nicely in the bunker bottom.

Is that fair? I have no idea. But if you take that question seriously, you end up making so many fine grained distinctions the question starts to lose its meaning. I think it is an unhelpful way to approach the issue.

Bob

[Tom_Doak]

I have to say I've never really thought about this topic much in the abstract to come up with any sort of formula ... I have always just made the determination by standing inside the bunker and getting a feel for what I wanted to do.

Because our greens often have a lot of slope to them, I don't worry too much about the depth of the bunker as the key factor in how difficult it will be to get up and down -- in many cases, the contour of the green is making it plenty difficult even if you could putt out of the bunker.

I have, on occasion, designed a bunker deliberately so you could try to putt out of it, but if you have other bunkers on the same course with lips it is hard to get the superintendent not to put a lip on all of them in the interest of consistency.

[jeffwarne]

Is a ball hit one yard out of bounds penalized less than one 50 yards out?
or one that's a foot short of clearling a lake penalized less than one 50 yards short of clearing?
a big miss into a bunker is it's own penalty typically because of length and possibly because of a higher likeliehood of a downhill lie-we don't need to slope the bunkers up near the green solely to aid the slightly missed shot (although that could be what happens due to other factors in design and construction)

Secondly, a shot where you can't see the pin is much more difficult and requires a different kind of SKILL.
Meaning someone who has good visualization,judgement,and memory and focus will hit more good shots to a blind pin than
someone who doesn't have these skills.Thus it's not a matter of LUCK but acquired or inate skill. In fact it's one of the few bunker shots that's not virtually automatic for the better player these days

Also,I think a green with a single nasty bunker(or one where the green runs away from it) leads to more missed greens (and shots)and requires far more committment and focus. At least for better players.
Most better players have a hard time aiming away and committing to a target away from a pin.

To me there's nothing more boring or easy than a green surrounded by light ,shallow bunkering-I'm going to aim dead at the pin with no fear of consequences or second guessing.
There's no point in aiming anywhere other than the pin and shallow bunkers provide far less penalty than rough or chipping areas.

Fortuneately the sheep that designed the original bunkers weren't good players with a sense of fairness


I guess I'd just like to see less bunkers(which of course is better for higher handicappers and maintenance) and the ones that are there actually mean something.

[Jeff_Brauer]

"I guess I'd just like to see less bunkers(which of course is better for higher handicappers and maintenance) and the ones that are there actually mean something."

Jeff,

I once opined that philosophy, but all gca's seem to have gotten into the more and splashier bunkers as visual design elements.  Hard to argue the logic in your post, though, other than more bunkers look, as Billy Crystal would say, "Marvelous."

I also agree on your OB and Water theories, but have never heard a golfer complain about those.  Apparently they see an area of the course where they can't play as okay, but if they can play a shot, they think they deserve a shot right at the pin, and in most cases, some help from the design getting there.

Jack Nicklaus has said he doesn't think a course should ever hurt a golfer, or at least a good shot.  Most agree, which leaves the question of do you design for risk reward strategy that seemed to be popular in the golden age, or do you design for current tastes?

For that matter, do we know that risk/reward was popular in that day and age with golfers, or was it just the deep thoughts of the architects of the day, with no real market testing.  Now, that sounds like a John Kavanaugh question!

[Scott Witter]

How many of you who are designers/architects, Mike, Tom, Jeff, Mark, Paul, me and others, normally use formulas for anything we do...except for drainage perhaps, but I know Tom doesn't worry too much about that silly thing? Doesn't that go against the philosophy of being designers/artists and being able to simply do what feels right at the moment, whether or not you are in the office looking at plans, maps, or out in the field as Tom says, standing in a bunker and then making the decision, albeit intuitively, based on the conditions before you, or those that you wish to create.

I know the last thing on my mind is any type of set formula...I do use familiar techniques, characteristics for say a fairway, or a green side bunker, but these are more or less based on personal preferences...but even those will often get thrown out once on site and the actual conditions assessed for the best approach at that time.

Fair...let's be serious!

[Lou_Duran]

Scott,

I am not a pro, but I would say all do operate or are guided by rules and conventions, some, perhaps, more specific than others.  Most courses have 18 holes; three or more sets of tees usually elevated and differnetiated from the surroundings; turns and ground movement in the fairways; sand and grass bunkers; water hazards, trees and vegetation; rough and closely cut turf; four or more par 3s, two or more par 4s, and a larger number of par 4s.  In fact, with the exception of Desmond Muirhead and perhaps Pete Dye, I think that most architects work from a very similar set of templates with variations more the result of budgets and site characteristics than originality or creativity.

Some architects like MacKenzie and Ralph Plummer had very well developed rules for what they wanted to accomplish.  Most today work from well devleoped surveys, drawings, and plans.  Few "design on the land", though some adpat or modify considerably in the field.

BTW, I see nothing wrong with any of this.

Mike Young,

Greenside bunkers so deep where one can't see the pin disproportionately punishes the weaker, less skilled player.  It seems to me that more can be accomplished with positioning the bunkers, designing the greens, and setting up the course where the pro is hitting bunker shots to difficult pin positions landing on side or down slopes.  Also, I would tend to be more lenient on bunkers guarding the right side of the green.  Of course, the length of the approach should be well considered.      

[Joe Hancock]

My first response was carelessly cavalier....but after reading all the responses as it pertains to strategy, fairness, visibility, etc., I wonder if there isn't some truth in my first response. Sometimes, good logic can lead to sensibility, randomness and can be averse to formulaic tendencies.

Obviously, the drainage dictation method doesn't work in clay or other non-draining medium, but there always is a sensible solution, and sensible shouldn't be ignored.

Joe

[Scott Witter]

Lou:

Thank you for the lesson plan in GCA

I don't believe Mackenzie, not as familiar with Plummer, actually considered them rules, at least not in the sense that you may be suggesting, beliefs or conventions, or a philosophical approach to his work, probably.

Nevertheless, I think you may not have fully appreciated my point...as an architect, designer, and yes artist at times, maybe this is just me and MHO, but I don't get too hung up on formulas.  Now as you say, there are templates that many architects use, but even then, just my opinion, I think they are simply guidelines, a thoughtful set of characteristics if you want, that they use to get to a place where they can use their creative skills to their advantage and bring out the best in themselves an in the product.  Hey, we could both be thinking the same thing and it is just the choice of words "formula" that makes it fuzzy

I do think that with the technology of better surveys, GPS, surveying euipment, smart levels, construction euipment, etc...that some of this could be seen by some as being somewhat formulary.

[Tags:]

Tags:

[Tags:]

Tags:

Call to undefined function theme_linktree()