Bayonet Blurb From Monterey Herald

[Lou_Duran]

Function over form?  Making it more "playable" for more players?  How nauseatingly democratic!  What do the little people, the "unforgotten" golfer, know about the soul of the game anyways.  Like another thread pondered, what should those of us with a superior conciousness do to change matters and educate the masses?

By the way, what green in Bayonet's front side is more contrived than Pasa's #16?  Is it possible that man's hand, even with the assistance of a good CAD program, can modify what nature has provided to achieve a superior result?     

[Tom Huckaby]

You lost me with that, Lou.

All I meant is that I agree with you that most will like it better now.  I don't, because I found the old course to be extremely unique.  I don't see it as much more complex than that.

BTW I am very much on record as saying 16 Pasa's green is genius at 8 or less stimp, absurd at more than that.  Mackenzie intended the former.

TH

ps - I was KIDDING about the soul!

[Lou_Duran]

"ps - I was KIDDING about the soul!"

And so am I with my post.  Though when it comes to penal for the sake of being penal, I don't share your sense of humor (hence my dislike for OB, lost balls, gorse, gunch, high and thick native vegetation, etc.).  I am more comfortable in the "golf is a big world" camp.  I think Dr. MacKenzie's dozen or so fundamentals or principles are right on, though I find his actual work on the ground sometimes departed from them.       

[Tom Huckaby]

But you see Lou, I agree with you.  In general I hate penal courses, especially the overly penal.  I too think the Good Doctor got it right.

Just this... isn't there room in one's heart for a course that is so uniquely, comically penal, that it becomes the ultimate masochistic test?

There is in my heart.  I doubt there's room for MORE than one, but there is room for one.

And Bayone was it... and its place has never been taken.

TH

[Kalen Braley]

Tom can't The Ranch now take that coveted spot in you heart?  I mean c'mon lets go thru the checklist..

1)  Narrow fairways?  Check
2)  Tight greens?  Check
3)  Lots of lost ball/OB opportunities?  Check
4)  Tough walk?  Check
5)  Penal, with no let up?  Check

[Tom Huckaby]

Tom can't The Ranch now take that coveted spot in you heart?  I mean c'mon lets go thru the checklist..

1)  Narrow fairways?  Check
2)  Tight greens?  Check
3)  Lots of lost ball/OB opportunities?  Check
4)  Tough walk?  Check
5)  Penal, with no let up?  Check

You know what, Kalen?

That is one hell of a great point, on the face of things.

The problems are this:  I used to get to play Bayonet for dirt cheap... thus I had no problem praising it and loving it's stupidity.  The Ranch charges an arm and a leg. Additionally, they created a fictitious scorecard in some weird attempt to lure masochistic players.  That is, the scorecard lists several tees that cannot occur under the present laws of physics, it being impossible to tee off in mid air.

So these extraneous things will make it tough for me to love THE RANCH.  But it does meet those other requirements without a doubt.

I shall have to mull it over.

TH

[Lou_Duran]

TH,

Go play Ram Rock at Horseshoe Bay Resort or Waterwood National at 6,900 yards in a 10+ mph Texas wind.  There is another north Atlanta, Lake Acton or something, that will eat your lunch.  Or P.B. Dye's Heritage (or something like that) west of Columbus, OH, or von Hagge's course at Playacar near Cancun.  I could go on for quite sometime with hard for hard's sake courses; they're "ubiquitous".  So, no, I don't mourn the death of "old" Bayonet, though I can without empathy understand how it held a soft spot in your heart (one which I've maintained is not quite as white as driven snow   ).

[Tom Huckaby]

We're almost there, Lou.

See, I've played a lot of courses where water, deep bunkers, other hazards make for a very tough round, and it doesn't take much to get my lunch eaten.  Those to me are not unique.

Bayonet was unique because it was stupidly tough, but more for WHY this was so:  crazily stupid doglegs, as well as trees everywhere with underbrush to the ground - as we've discussed before.

So that's more why I miss the old Bayonet - it was uniquely penal, stupidly so.  It was the ultimate test, but for such a stupid reason that it was genius in its own way.

Thus Kalen's post giving me pause... THE RANCH is stupidly uniquely penal as well - different reasons there (terraced into hillsides with less than 20 yard wide fairways with death on both sides), but unique nonetheless.

TH

[Tim Leahy]

As a big fan and frequent player of both the old old Bayonet and the new old Bayonet. I feel that the current incarnation takes away alot of the charm and game of the old layout. The object used to be to stay out of the trees and if you did you were rewarded with a clear shot to the green. Much the same as the Olympic club, there were very few fairway bunkers and none were needed, the course carried one of the highest ratings in the state. Breaks in the greens were difficult to read and you needed local knowledge, no matter how it looked almost every putt broke towards Cannery Row. Two foot drops and tiers on the greens were not needed. Take a look at the Nationwide tour stop scores when they played there, not a whole lot broke 70.
From the pictures I have seen and write ups the fairways seem anything but fair anymore and greens don't sound too subtle.
Much like an accident on the highway, I will still have to look at it in person at the end of this month and maybe my opinion will change, but I doubt it.

[Nick Church]

Again,Huck, et al, thanks for conjuring my memories with details of yours.

Just imagine.....Bayonet & Blackhorse were my first exposure to golf.

How warped must my since of "fair" be!?!?!

Of course, from there, DOD moved us to Hawaii... so it was Kalakaua and Leilehua educations for me.

[Tom Huckaby]

Nick - that's a hell of a great thought!  Growing up on those, you must have freaked when you first saw an open, or less treed course....

You also had to have learned to hit the ball right to left.
 

[Kyle Henderson]

 From a promotional email:


Construction Update

The renovations on the front nine of Black Horse and the back nine of Bayonet are quickly moving and are looking great. If you haven’t been to the course lately, we have even torn out the putting green in front of the clubhouse and have started on a new one that will be 10,000 Sq.Ft..  Currently, holes 2, 3, 7, 8, & 9 of Black Horse, along with #17 of Bayonet, have all new irrigation and the greens, tees, and bunkers have been shaped. The new white sand has already been installed along with the grass sod border. 

     

[JohnV]

They are planning on opening around January 1.

For those of you in Northern Cal, the Zone Qualifiers will be held at a combination of Bayonet and Poppy Hills next year instead of Spyglass and Poppy.

We renegotiated our contract with Spyglass and gave up 10 days through 2015 so that we can have 10 days per year through 2024.  This meant something had to move and the Zones were the obvious choice.  The championship will still be held at Spyglass and Poppy.

The best thing about this is that we are moving them to May through July instead of April through June.

[Tom Huckaby]

JVB - thanks for the report - I was wondering how this was going to go down.

Sounds like the beloved NCGA made the best out of things.  But a switch from Spyglass to Bayonet is obviously not happy news.
Hopefully people focus on it could have been NO Spyglass in a few short years absent this switch.

TH

[Tim Leahy]

I played the front of the Bayonet and back of the Blackhorse last week and I was very impressed with the Blackhorse side. I didn't like the rough on the Bayonet, makes it too tough with the additional bunkers and existing trees. I always enjoyed the old subtle greens and the new ones are sometimes extreme. The new greens play very tough because they are young and don't hold and are still fuzzy for putting, but will be good when they grow in. Opening all holes in January seems optomistic from what I saw, no sod on the fairways yet on either the BH or Bayonet nines being worked on.