[Mike Hendren]

Not the best course period (Sand Hills in my book) but the best DESIGN?  It's pure genius in my book and surprisingly I found it a delight to play.  It is underrated.

Mike

[Marty Bonnar]

Mike,
this is the single most baffling question I've ever encountered on GCA.

What do you mean by 'course DESIGN'?

Are you implying something which you are excluding from the mix?

Are you over-emphasising DESIGN to indicate quality of detailing (shaping, edgings, boundaries?) at the expense of say, playability, routing or the more 'golfy' elements of course, ehm, 'creation'?

head-scratchingly yours,
FBD.

[Mike Hendren]

Marty,

Architecture is but a piece of the puzzle in creating a great golf course.  For example, in terms of site selection, Coore & Crenshaw had a helluva head start at Sand Hills when compared with Dye at Sawgrass. 

Now that I think of it, TPC Sawgrass is the greatest potential template course in the world.  It might work anywhere.

Mike

[Marty Bonnar]

You've got me thinking now too. Eek!

Would it be fair to say that the 'best course design' could potentially be the one or any one which has made a great golf course/experience from what was a poor or less than average site to begin with?

So, could we say for example that Cypress isn't a great piece of course design (go with me here!) BECAUSE the original site was so promising that even an eedjit like me could have made a GREAT golf course there,
but
The new Castle Course (or Muirfield) are GREAT pieces of DESIGN because they have made GREAT golf experiences out of (respectively) an old tattie field and 'an auld watter meadie'.

If that indeed is what you're saying, then I think I probably wholeheartedly AGREE!!!

FBD.

[Tom_Doak]

I don't agree with the convention of some here to label only "constructed works" as "architecture".

However, I would say that the TPC at Sawgrass is possibly the best course ever created from a complete swamp.  The property they started with was so wet they couldn't even get a piece of equipment ONTO the site until they dug their way in with drainage ditches.

I think Kingsbarns is a better course but of course they started with a lot more in terms of raw coastline and some elevation change, even if it IS all regraded.

[paul cowley]

Tom....I'm in total agreement with regards to Kingsbarns.

I played there a month ago and was very impressed. It is a really well done and detailed course in a great setting.....it just felt right.

....until I came to #18, which I felt was unfair for most players above a single digit handicap.

I'd probably pipe it or move the creek out a bit from the front of the green to allow for a miss to collect at the base....which would still leave a daunting pitch up the slope.

[Mike Hendren]

I don't agree with the convention of some here to label only "constructed works" as "architecture".

Tom, are you saying that often we don't distinguish between construction and architecture?

Interesting, because I almost asked if TPC was the best CONSTRUCTION job in the past sixty years. 

Knowing Dye as you do, was he that detailed in his design or does much of the credit go to his shapers?  If so, who were they?  I have always found that the shaping of his courses, particularly around the greens, while clearly manufactured was the hallmark of his courses.

Mike

[Peter Pallotta]

Michael -

I got a chance to watch the Players for quite a while today. I thought two things: what a very cleverly DESIGNED golf course, and what a uniquely AMERICAN golf course; in fact, maybe the FIRST uniquely American golf course ever built. 

It seems to me that at TPC Mr. Dye did in the modern era, and through construction,  and by choice, what the designers of the great British links courses did in the days of old through routing and by necessity.

Peter 

And to bring some Merion spill-over into this thread, I don't think CB Macdonald was "the Father of American Golf Architecture", I'm starting to think it was Pete Dye.

"Come and show me another city with lifted head singing so proud to be alive and coarse and strong and cunning. Flinging magnetic curses amid the toil of piling job on job, here is a tall bold slugger set vivid against the little soft cities; Fierce as a dog with tongue lapping for action, cunning as a savage pitted against the wilderness..."     
 

[John Moore II]

Michael--If Sand Hills was not a 'design' than what was it? While it was very minimal in design, I don't think it was quite as minimal as Coore just walking around and throwing down seed or sprigs or whatever and saying here is the tee, here is the fairway, here is the green. Some amount of grading had to be done. By my definition of design, which would include all types of course building, no, TPC is not the best. But it may be, along with Shadow Creek (from what I hear) the best fabricated/unnatural course.

[Paul Saathoff]

Michael,

Mr. Dye has a great "finish shaper" in Keith Sparkman that is at most of his top jobs.  I say "finish shaper" with quotes as he has a lot of input in the "look" and to some extent the design of the course.  I would refer to him more as a design coordinator.  The man can work wonders with a sand pro.

[Tom_Doak]

Hey, that may be Keith Sparkman's first mention on this board.  I worked with him 23 years ago at Piping Rock and he is still going strong ... however, he didn't work at the TPC at Sawgrass the first time around, because he started with the Dyes about the same time I did, at Austin Country Club.  (Keith DID do a lot of the finish work during the renovation last year, though.)

As to Michael's question, you may not be prepared for the answer. 

Most of Pete's work back then was shaped by guys with little or no prior experience in golf course shaping!  He would only bring a construction foreman to the job (in the case of the TPC, it was David Postlethwait), hire local construction companies, and try to explain to their equipment operators in very rough terms what he wanted ... i.e. "build me a house pad over there" or "go f up that side of the green" [seriously], and then Pete would come back and work with them some more to add golfing features and green contours and the rest.  So, the shapers contributed some things, but pretty much randomly ... the design is all Pete's, with a fair amount of input from Deane Beman and of course from Alice.

[Mitchell Schneringer]

I think it's important to realize that Sand Hills is a design because there were over 100 potential golf holes that the Coore and Crenshaw had available to utilize.  Design incorporates: hole routing, pace of play issues, psychological player strategy, wind, drainage and other such elements.  While the site was surely an incredible asset at Sand Hills C&C designed the course in that moving it from potential holes to a 18 hole experience.

After reading the Castle Course book recently one realizes that there are many more elements than hole architecture that goes into a great course, and I feel that C&C deserve much credit with their work at Sand Hills.  In fact I've also been told that for many months that Sand Hills was a 21 hole course, as it was very difficult to decide which 3 great holes must be eliminated in order to get it to 18.  In the pro shop there is a map of all of the potential holes drawn out, absolutely a great drawing to look at!

[Eric_Terhorst]

what a uniquely AMERICAN golf course; in fact, maybe the FIRST uniquely American golf course ever built. 

Peter,  perhaps I am taking this comment too literally, but I guess you are saying that all the ODGs admired around here, e.g., Macdonald, Raynor, Mackenzie, Ross, Tillinghast, are not "uniquely American" but owe much in their designs to what they learned in--or from--Scotland.

But there are many that preceded Dye who could be called "uniquely American." William Langford was born in Illinois.  Tom Bendelow was the Johnny Appleseed of the Midwest, sprinkling golf courses everywhere.  What about RT Jones--his work was an inspiration to Dye to do something completely different.  Perry Maxwell? 

Interesting comment, but please elaborate!

[Kalen Braley]

I'm not sure I understand this question.

Isn't SandPines the poster child for those who think all it takes is a great piece of property and your set?  Or is Sandpines the exception to the rule with the courses at the Bandon Resort and Sand Hills being the rule?

Either way, if we're going to talk best deisgn from nothing, shouldn't Shadow Creek also be in this discussion?

[Tom_Doak]

Kalen:

Yes, Shadow Creek should be in the discussion, too, I've just been trying to avoid dragging Matt Ward into this ...

Sand Pines WAS all sand, but that doesn't make it as good a site as Sand Hills or Pacific Dunes.  I doubt the contour was anywhere near as good for golf.  I would be the first to jump in and delcare the entire course a piece of malpractice, if I thought they had actually reshaped good natural contours to build those holes ... but I've always assumed it was mostly just a giant pile of sand like its immediate surrounds.

Mitchell:

I share your sentiments, however Sand Hills is certainly NOT the only "found" course which deserves mention. 

Nevertheless, the vast majority of golf courses are a combination of the two [part "found" and part "made"], which is why I think it's wrong for people to try to make the distinction between the two.

Peter:

The "uniquely American" thing deserves its own thread, even though I'm not sure where you are going with it.

[Ran Morrissett]

The most impressive thing to me about TPC is how good its bad holes are – there really are no weak ones with a hole like the third made/saved by its interesting green. There is an impressive overall sustained quality hole after hole, which is quite an accomplishment given with what Dye had to work.

Unfortunately, I also don’t think it has any great holes with the possible exception of the eleventh. I say this in stark contrast to Dye’s work at The Ocean Course at Kiawah, Harbour Town and The Golf Club which are replete with great holes. TPC’s 16-17-18 is way over-hyped as its total reliance on water is a design weakness, not a strength. Unfortunately, courses that create such made for TV drama may not be too fun to play on a regular/weekly basis, a trait that doesn’t exactly smack of design greatness.

Cheers,

[Tim Liddy]

The most impressive thing to me about TPC is the new architectural vocabulary it introduced to the masses. Pot bunkers combine with fairway angles, clean straight grassing lines, bulkheads, waste bunkers as big as fairways, quirky island green, etc.

It equals, in my slightly prejudice opinion, the work of Picasso and Frank Lloyd Wright and their way of developing a new approach to an established art form.

[Mark Bourgeois]

Ran re water why aren't 16 and 18 good examples of heroic application?

18 for example the pros have a decision to make about how much to challenge the water off both the tee and on the approach.  It's not do or die, it's a choice.

I'm thinking here about Jones's comment that the secret to the excitement on the back nine at The Masters (distinguishing here from everyday play) was the role water played in creating heroic design.

As to originality of design or overratedness, that's a valid point. It's not exactly hard to come up with or execute the idea of 18 -- otherwise we wouldn't be subjected to it at least once on seemingly every course in the state of Florida!

Nice first post, Mitchell!  Design is the meaning or function man gives to forms.  At the end of the day there's no functional difference between a mound beside a green that predated the green or the course and an entirely manmade mound.

Mark

PS Can't resist noting this discussion is essentially about VORD: "Value Over Replacement Design."  BTW I am inching closer to a quantitative measure of VORD!  Who cares, I know...

[Jeff_Mingay]

The most impressive thing to me about TPC is the new architectural vocabulary it introduced to the masses. Pot bunkers combine with fairway angles, clean straight grassing lines, bulkheads, waste bunkers as big as fairways, quirky island green, etc.

It equals, in my slightly prejudice opinion, the work of Picasso and Frank Lloyd Wright and their way of developing a new approach to an established art form.

Well put, Tim. For whatever it's worth, I completely agree.

[Peter Pallotta]

Eric, Tom D –

I can’t think of an architect who filtered and transmuted the fundamental principles of golf course design through the medium of his own modern (American) soul more completely and more successfully than Pete Dye.

Peter

[Kalen Braley]

Tom,

Good call, I forgot about the Matt Ward factor for SC!!

As for Sandpines, and perhaps this is after the fact, but there are two other good examples of how IMO working with a big pile of sand can be done right.  And that is Whistling Straights and Chambers Bay, which were also created from nothing.  Understood, I haven't the first clue what was there before, but given the other excellent lineup of courses built out of the sand, SH, WS, CB, PD, KingsBarn it would seem something decent could have been made there as well.

Any chance the owners have looked down the Hwy and become envious of the works in Bandon and wondering what could have been there?

[Mark Bourgeois]

The most impressive thing to me about TPC is the new architectural vocabulary it introduced to the masses. Pot bunkers combine with fairway angles, clean straight grassing lines, bulkheads, waste bunkers as big as fairways, quirky island green, etc.

It equals, in my slightly prejudice opinion, the work of Picasso and Frank Lloyd Wright and their way of developing a new approach to an established art form.

Well put, Tim. For whatever it's worth, I completely agree.

Tim and Jeff

How bout: "target golf" and "stadium golf"?

Another thing about the course is it had something like only 40 acres for fairways, greens, and tees when it opened. Ironic an environmentally sensitive design came from a course that wrecked the original environment!

Mark

[Jeff_Brauer]

Tim,

Design vocabulary. Well put. I always said if you could give it a name it would be much more memorable, or becomes much more memorable when you give it a name.  Think Churchpews. I think a thread devoted to design feature names that have stuck through history would be a good one!  But they stick for good courses, which TPC is.

I don't care too much for the distinction between design and construction some have discussed here.  The design is only designed so something can be built.

On a lower plane of discussion, and admitting I haven't been there for a few years, and am basing this on the GD aerials of every hole I just looked at, I would throw out this:

Its a great design, but I think its a little too repetitious to be a top ten.  Anyone else think this?

[Tom_Doak]

Jeff:

Top ten what?  (Modern?)  Personally, I think a course requires more aesthetic interest to be one of the top ten in America.

As for repetitve, the design is basically as simple as you get:

Hole 1:  Waste bunker R on tee shot; waste bunker L on second shot.
Hole 2:  Trees L tee shot; waste bunker R approach.
Hole 4:  Waste bunker R, then water L.
Hole 5:  Waste bunker R, then waste bunker L.
Hole 6:  Waste bunker L, then pot bunkers around green.
Hole 7:  Waste bunker L, then waste bunker R.

And so forth.  With that "design vocabulary" there were only a few different combinations and he used some of them 2-3 times.  As Jim Urbina would phrase it, nearly every par-4 or par-5 is an "S" hole.

[Jeff_Brauer]

TD,

Agree. A great design on a flat site never equals a great design on a great site, and there are a few of those around. I wasn't really trying to be as specific as  top ten.

Also agree. While I love S shaped holes and that does make the challenge there to a large degree, I don't think any design concept needs to be repeated over and over.

As I recall some tour pros telling it, a lot of greens originally had a huge center hump, in too repetitive a fashion, too.

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