What is the ULTIMATE TEST ?

[Patrick_Mucci]

TEPaul,

I don't know how much fun good players would have with # 18 as a par 4 ?

Slapper,

Have you played all of the courses you listed ??

[Gene Greco]

#18 NGLA is still one of the greatest holes in the world whether its 5 or 4. However, at 4 it would be ludicrous for all but a couple of dozen tour pros worldwide.

[TEPaul]

Pat and Gene:

When I see an amateur who can get it out there OK hit a drive and a 2 iron into #18 I really don't think it would be all that excrutiatingly difficult for any tour pro whose a competitive regular on the tour. The tour pro might be hitting a long to mid iron into that green but even if a fairway or utility wood, so what? Aren't we talking here about returning some original shot values to top caliber golf? And what did Donald Ross say about the real test of a good player? Didn't it have something to do with being able to hit a long iron well into par 4s? Where do Tour pros do that on par 4s any more? Well here's the opportunity!

Don't forget we're not recommending redesigning this hole or even touching a single blade of grass just calling it a par 4. If it's going to really be so difficult for them they can do it another way--make par with what some of us call "the old fashioned way!"

[TEPaul]

Dave Schmidt:

I'm surprised at you! Generally you're a pretty deep thinker into the true meaning of strategy in golf.

But here you are saying that if NGLA simply called their 18th hole, presently a par 5, a par 4 for the tour pros or very good players suddenly because of the perception of a number (a one stroke lower number) now the hole becomes a "bruiser" hole devoid of strategy!

How could that possibly be Dave? Seriously? The hole has not changed a wit!! It's the same damn hole!

Furthermore the basic idea in golf is to score the lowest you can on any hole despite whatever par number it may be called! The only thing that should possibly restrain a good golfer or give him pause, is risk--and we all know what risk means translated into strokes and numbers!!

So what could possibly be different about #18 NGLA if it's called a par 4 instead of a par 5, or par 5 instead of a par 4?

Are you trying to tell me that if it's called a par 5 very good golfers might play it more conservatively compared to if it was called a par 4?

You know as well as I do that makes no sense in reality!

The Road hole itself as a par 4 is really no different today than the logic of making NGLA's #18 a par 4. The Road hole used to be a par 5 and it has always had a ton of danger, particularly at the green-end as does NGLA's #18.

When the Road Hole went from a par 5 to a par 4 in modern times did it become considered a "no strategy bruiser" as you say some holes at Medinah are?

Of course it didn't! It actually became more respected and glorified as a great hole than it probably was when they called it a par 5! Did Tiger Woods complain about the par of the Road Hole when he played it in three fives and a four when he won the British Open by twelve shots? Not on your life, he didn't!

Logically this example of #18 NGLA can be no different.

The hole has strategy or it doesn't have strategy! Changing the par number has nothing to do with the hole's strategy which again is simply risk and reward involving numbers. If you, or any golfer thinks so I would suggest the alteration in strategy because of the change in a par number is nothing more than between you ears!

[Patrick_Mucci]

TEPaul,

How would the area to the right of the fairway be marked ?
Part of the golf course or lateral water hazard ?
How about the area behind the green ?

I don't know of many amateurs hitting 2-irons into the green, especially if the wind is up, but I'll concede that tour pros would hit long to mid-irons to a rather narrow green with disaster awaiting.

I still don't see that many tour pro's smiling and laughing after they walk off of # 18 as a par 4.

I still say, for discussion purposes only,
MOVE THE GATES NORTH, EXTEND THE TEE BACK, AND IT'S A WORLD CLASS PAR 5.

[TEPaul]

Pat:

If you suggest touching that gate which is a tribute to C.B.,  his ghost will probably give you night sweats.

If you want to do something like stretch #18 that much just put the back tee to the right (and slightly to the rear) of #17 green (leave the gates intact) and play the hole at about 550-560. It would just be a bit more green to next tee quirk not unlike #1 and #2 tee. If you stretch the hole that much though I would wager you a tour pro would make far less 6s and worse than they would if the hole was a 495yd par 4!!!

[Patrick_Mucci]

TEPaul,

Moving the 18th tee to the north side of the road, diminishes the angle of attack on the drive, takes the left side bunkers out of play to a good degree, and eliminates the risk/reward carry nature of that bunker complex.  It has you hitting away from the trouble on the right to a fairly large landing area, and if you and CBM don't mind, I'm just going to move the gates
50-100 feet to the north.  I promise that they will not be damaged in their brief journey to their proper and final resting place.

P.S.  CBM told me that he agrees with the move.
        He stated, " If you can drmolish the PRO shop and
        move the first tee south, to the location previously
        occupied by the Pro shop, then you can move the
        gates a few feet to the north and move the tee back.

Moving the tee back preserves all of the angles of attack and makes the hole the par 5 he intended.

[Tyler Kearns]

Patrick,
        I would say that the ultimate test of a golf course is that it is enjoyable to play, and fair. Whether a course is a pushover or the sternest of tests, I'll keep returning everyday if the course presents the golfer with interesting shots through variety, aesthetics, ambience and carefully thought out design components and features.

[Patrick_Mucci]

TKearns,

How would you define fair ?

Would you consider OLD MARSH fair ?

[TEPaul]

Pat:

Tour pros smiling and laughing walking off the green? What's that got to do with the price of strategy and eggs?

Mark the hole to the right of the fairway or green or behind it?

No way--part of the golf course--find it or it's lost!

The great strategic and architectural balancing asset of that extremely penal area to the right or behind is the very generous bailout area almost everywhere to the left of that green and short of it!

The more I think of this hole as a really great closer as a par 4 for the likes of a tour pro, the more I like it!

This wouldn't be half so normal as even the new enhanced #18 at ANGC which was a lofted iron for many or now a 6-7 iron for Tiger!

#18 NGLA would be a mid to long iron or even a utility to 3 wood for some. This would be decision making and pucker time for those brutish pros! If they don't like the presentation they can always lay up to the front or side just like they lay up on the Road Hole!

Does the Road Hole make them moody and glum? No way--it has their respect and how many of them even try to GIR that one? Very few!

Open your mind Pat, and think real honest to goodness risk reward, no different than the Road Hole!

[Tyler Kearns]

Tom,
       I totally agree with your sentiments regarding the par of #18 at NGLA. The hole is the same, and if that affects the mental state of some players, causing them to play the hole differently, that tough apples. The idea of golf is to play to one's own strengths in order to achieve the lowest score possible. I'm sure more 6's would be made on the hole as a par 4, due to many people's focus on the scorecard (par and yardages) rather than the hole that awaits them in reality. Golf is played on land, not paper!

[Tyler Kearns]

Patrick,
     Yes, you ask a difficult question, what is fair? I define fair as a golf course that through stategic options allows players to play a multitude of shots. A certain type of shot may be preferred, ie; a high draw, but let's face it, not everybody can play that shot (Bruce Lietzke comes to mind!!). Forced carries are another point of contention when evaluating a golf course as fair. As long as a player has selected the proper set of tees to play from, they should not be confronted with an impossible carry. Just because a player is short off the tee with a healthy fade doesn't mean he/she should not be able to get around the course comfortably. They will be penalized adequately by not having a full arsenal of shots at their disposal, but they won't be frustrated and angered by a lack of consideration by the architect.
       Perhaps, the level of joy experienced by a golf course, irrespective of score could be a good way of evaluating fairness. When faced with the impossible we often lose interest, but when we simply fail, there's still hope in tomorrow!
       In regards to Old Marsh, where if memory serves me correctly, each fairway is an island, how would the course play in a stiff breeze? I don't know how wide the fairways are, or if the second shots demand forced carries, but if Pete Dye did not create buffers to enable players to miss shots and attempt recoveries then I would concur that it borders on unfair. I can be no more conclusive because I have never played the course.

[Patrick_Mucci]

TEPaul,

Since the initial post stated that a course should be FUN and challenging, I thought the insertion of the words "smile" and "laugh" appropriate.

If you would only see the LIGHT in moving the gates, retaining all of CBM strategic values, you will have arrived.  

I'm not so sure I would define the area to the left of the green as a bail out area.  Hitting the ball to that general area leaves a player with a very difficult approach, especially with the pin back and a little wind in the air.  Bunkers, deep swales and heavy rough aren't the garden spots for me.

TKearns,

I don't know what fair is, though I think I can recognize what is unfair.

In your example, you cite a short fader/slicer, yet how would that golfer fare at NGLA, especially on holes # 3, 4, 6, 8, 10, 13, 15, 16, 17 and our beloved 18th ?

I find NGLA very FAIR, but problematic for the short slicer.
Actually, almost every course is problematic for the short slicer, perhaps he should take up bowling, and you should select another category of golfer for your example.  

[Tyler Kearns]

Patrick,
       I think your right, it's easier to recognize what's unfair than to try to define a fair test of golf.
       Secondly, in regards to the short/fader example I used, I did not intend to give the impression that players should be able to flail away and never be penalized. All I wanted to suggest was that an adequate breadth of room be allowed for this player to hit the only shot he/she has. On #3 at NGLA, the player certainly has room to aim at the left-hand side fairway bunkers, or even further left to enable his/her drive to stay in play. But, considering it's the only shot in his/her bag, they will mosty likely be routinely penalized by landing into the right fairway bunker. On #4, the famed Redan, C.B. Macdonald intended the preferred shot to be a lower trajectory running draw. For the aforementioned player (short/fader), the hole will pose a serious problem because they can't hit that shot. However, that does not mean in any way that the hole in unfair, the simply have to pay the consequences by reaching the green in two, thus sacrificing a stroke to par. If one doesn't have a good grasp on the many shots required to play golf, they can't expect par figures. If a pond were situated in front and to the right of #4 at NGLA and extended back to the tee, then we could cry "unfair", because the sole lay-up shot to the hole would be the deep bunker on the front left of the green. That's the kind of misery that should make golfers cry foul. However, #12 at Augusta Nat'l allows players to lay-up short of Rae's Creek and then flip their second shot on after a more reasonable carry has been negotiated.
              

[Slag_Bandoon]

The ultimate test of golf is to simultaneously keep your head down and your chin up.  The more it's practiced, the easier it becomes.  

[TEPaul]

Patrick:

Now you've gone too damn far! Your mouth and mind should be wasked out with coarse soap!

You're actually talking about redesigning NGLA and even your favorite #18!??

Furthermore, even the thought of you laying a finger on C.B's gate is too horrible to even imagine. The only person who was allowed to touch those gates was MacDonald himself when he dinged it and chipped it trying to negotiate it's narrowness in his car after occasionally seriously misjudging his wine!

Have you ever noticed the extremely odd but extremely cool juxtaposition of that gate behind the 17th green from the 17th tee and between the vast expanse of the Peconic Bay behind both? You want to mess with the placement of that? Outrageous, even in thought!

And further still, do you really want the tour pros to smile and laugh? More outrageous! Don't you know that any architect worthy of being called great has a particularly knack of making recreational golfers smile and laugh while at the same time making tour pros wince and frown--and all on the same course?!

Golf is a pastime to recreational players but it's a business to tour pros--and they shouldn't be smiling and laughing about it. Architects generally should strive to make tour pros miserable on the golf course. It's extremely important in the overall champion test of tour pro golf to see how they handle it all emotionally!

The type of golf course that makes tour pros smile and laugh is that ridiculously immaculate and artifical thing in Palm Springs where they play the Hope and all have a birdiefest! Courses like that one that do make tour pros smile and laugh belong on the bottom wrung of the architectural latter! Below the bottom wrung of the latter actually!

The only type of tour pro a great architect should have any empathy for is a true thinking tour pro who can understand that there's no difference at all in how he plays #18 NGLA from it's present tips despite what they call the hole par-wise.

While we're at it would you mind explaining to me how and why the strategy of that hole changes if they call it a par 4 instead of a 5?

I have an even better idea for NGLA if the tour pros come around to that golf course.

NGLA should have a score card ready for the tour pros that tells them the par on NGLA is a par 70 but does not bother to explain to them which holes are which par!!

Then they would be forced to play the course as intelligently as possible completely devoid of the ridiculous psychology of the relevance of any hole's par! When they finished they could just calculate whether they shot par, how much over par or under par.

What do you think of that idea as pure strategic golf Pat? Is that too far-out for you? Would that make you squirm and become confused if you had to play a golf course like that? Would that upset your sense of order and make you feel that anarchy reigned?

I'd love to know and in the meantime keep your mitts, mental or actual off C.B.'s gate! And stop imagining how to redesign the golf course.

That golf course does not need to be changed at all except for the par perception of it to the tour pro and of course the second shot area on #9! That desperately needs a rather narrow and slightly random and wiggling diagonal bunker scheme across the fairway starting about 140 out on the right and coming in on the left at about 75 and attaching to that bunker guarding the 10th tee.

[Tyler Kearns]

Dave,
       Isn't par somewhat irrelevant? The goal is to get the ball into the hole in the fewest possible strokes, and par doesn't need to dictate how it's done. I remember hearing about Sam Snead playing in the 1961 Canadian Open at Niakwa, and he routinely played the 235 yard 15th hole by laying up short of the green, preferring to chip and putt to make his 3 or 4, rather than play past the pin on this severly sloping green and risk making 5. Here, Snead disregarded par in order to obtain a lower score by taking a little of the risk out of the game.

[TEPaul]

Dave Schmidt:

It seems to me in your mention of a "slippery slope argument" you're using a series of points that don't need to used to reach a conclusion that doesn't need to be reached.

Admission or no admission of these things is of no real consequence. Nothing has to be admitted exactly except what the reality is for various players. It's no secret that almost all tour players could reach #18 in two shots from the present back tees and likely many of them with not much more than long to mid-iron ease.

So the simplest thing to do on that hole and that course is if the tour pros happened to come around you have a card that calls that hole a par 4 and for the others--the members, guests, whatever you have a card that calls it the par 5 it is for them.

That way you don't have to go down any slippery slope of thinking about admissions of length and lengthening and redesigning the golf hole or the golf course.

And if it doesn't work out for some reason, just throw one set of cards in the trash can and it hasn't cost you a thing and the course hasn't been altered. All your out is the printing of some cards you might not need.

That seems to be the way TOC handled the Road Hole a while ago! Are you suggesting they should now lengthen that hole by a ton of yards and call it a par 5 again?

[Patrick_Mucci]

TEPaul,

I'm sure that you are already aware that other holes have had their tees extended back over the years, and that doing so at # 18 would not adversely affect the architecture and play of that hole.

Par does make a difference to the  golfer, mentally.  
It either takes the golfer out of their comfort zone, or puts them in a comfort zone.  Making # 18 a par 4 would add STRESS to any golfer who has played it as a par 5, and probably to those playing it for the first time.

As for the gates, they are narrow, and there are some great stories about them, and about more than a few members and guests who motored through them and failed to negotiate the sharp right turn.  Tow truck services and/or car dealers benefited in many instances.

Moving the gates and the road and moving the tee directly back will produce far better results, and preserve the design integrity of the hole, versus moving a new tee to the north side of the existing road.

It's such an obvious move architectually, the club can afford the relocation project easily, and next spring, noone would notice the difference.  

I expect you to champion what you must perceive as in the best interest of the golf course while preserving CBM's design integrity.

My sources tell me that you putted sideways, away from the hole, from the very back of the second green at PV, to a pin location in the valley front right, and that your ball went back and forth up the sides of the contours in the green, hitting the hole, severely damaging the cup, before miraculously falling in to the hole for a sudden death victory on the 20th hole of your match.  And, that your opponents are still standing there, several weeks later, in total disbelief.  And, that the club sent you a bill for the repair of the cup.  
Is this true ?

[TEPaul]

Pat:

Since this additonal yardage on #18 NGLA you're calling for is not even necessary and if done should only be for touring pros (if they ever come there). So a tee box could be created directly to the right of #17 green and as far back as possible creating whatever additional distance you think necessary to truly make the hole a legitimate par 5 for the pros. The little patch tee box in that area would make the tee to the north of the road unnecessary.

If this were done there would be no need at all to move MacDonald's gate and the road.

When the pros came to the course they could simply tee off directly over the 17th green and actually the angle from there would be slightly improved! This would also add additional quirk to the course (although this tee would be very infrequently used).

I thought you were an efficiency expert! Look at all the expense and trouble you're going to when you could make this simple with a very small tee in the area I mentioned. Teeing off directly over #17 green would be thorougly unique.

[Patrick_Mucci]

TEPaul,

It would encourage SLOW play and therefore must be discarded as a design concept.

Is the 20th hole at PV story true ?

[TEPaul]

Pat:

Why would it encourage slow play and must be discarded? You would just go tee off, walk back around the back of the green and down #18? What's the big deal?

I did sink probably the most extraordinary putt in my memory on #2--the 20th hole. I call it the modified Zorro putt because I wasn't in the same swale as the pin was (from which you can try the regular Zorro putt--if the green is fast enough). I almost always read my own putts but this one was unreadable--completely all experience and I didn't have it on that green with that putt. Our caddie told me where to hit it, I said; "You must be joking?" but did hit it there and after a break of about 35 feet it went rocketing down the side of the right shoulder of the green and into the hole like the ground dropped out from under the ball. Didn't even touch the other side of the cup--no damage at all.

It was a birdie and won the match but if it had missed the hole and inevitably gone off the front, the  Mayor had a stroke on the hole and he was about 4ft directly under the hole for par so we had it in the bag anyway!

[Patrick_Mucci]

TEPaul,

Many golfers almost drive # 17 green, leaving a little pitch shot, which they execute as soon as the pin is in and the previous group leaves the green.  By the time your group reached the 18th tee and prepared for their tee shots,, and possibly waiting for a car to pass, the group behind you would be on the putting green, in the line of fire.

Some golfers drive it up the left side of # 17, green high, and right in the line of fire from your new tee on # 18.

Your tee would cause every group to slow down as they approached # 17 green, unless you hand out helmets and flak jackets, which could be retrieved and given out to the following group.

If they moved the clubhouse, they can move the gates.

Nice Putt.  Your opponents are still in shock.
They think your caddy palmed the ball  

[TEPaul]

Pat:

That's what some people would think about potential congestion if a tee was to the right of #18 but in reality the example you cited would probably happen about once in two blue moons--and if it did they could stand aside for 45 seconds max. It would be far less congested than #1 green and #2 tee and that's been handled just fine all these years. It may not even be necessary to put the tee directly to the right of #17 necessitating going over it, it may fit next to the gate making moving things again unnecessary.

This is only for select golfers like Tour pros and for the rest like even the Singles, C.B.'s original tees would do just fine. If you're thinking of putting members and others off that 50-60 yd additional tee you're unnecessarily redesigning NGLA in my opinion--it doesn't need that!

Did you run into the two fellows from Georgia that we played in the finals and tripped up on #20? Very nice guys and they didn't seem to be in shock to me when we had lunch with them afterwards. They'd apparently been marching through our flight like Sherman through Georgia but we hung on to them and managed to trip them up when they were least expecting it, I guess!

I must have been on a bit of a putting streak that extended weekend as in four days at one time or another I birdied #1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 11 and maybe 14 (can't remember that one now but I think so). Missed a very short makeable one on #15 which hurt because I think I've only birdied that hole once in my life.

[Patrick_Mucci]

TEPaul,

I don't think you have 50 yards to play with at # 18 tee, probably 25-35 max.

I do love tees that are an extension of the previous green, like those found at NGLA and Applebrook.

Those two fellows probably confused you with their heavy accents, they are from Newton and Far Hills, New Jersey,

Now that I see you've confused Georgia accents for New Jersey accents, it's easy to see how you've been so misguided on your architectual principals    
With the exception of the "Maintainance Meld", which is a perfect term used to describe/create architectural harmony.

It's nice when the blade works so well, especially at greens as challenging as Pine Valleys, and when it really counts, during competition, with Mayor Ott as your partner.  Nice going !