Is Augusta National Golf Club a PENAL Course?

[Mike Hendren]

Is it possible that Augusta National Golf Club is actually a "penal" course for the Masters participants? Not necessarily in the traditional sense of that characterization.  I am leaning toward the opinion that the course is an unrelenting test of a player's ability to leave the approach in the right spot when struck from a uneven lie.  The player who cannot do so is penalized a half-stroke. 

Approaches from uneven lies: 1(most players are left with an uphill lie), 2 (if trying to reach in two), 3, 5, 8 (again if trying to reach in two), 9, 10, 11, 13, 14, 15, 17, 18. 

Or is it a strategic design that is now penal because of excessive green speeds?

Bogey

[Patrick_Mucci]

Mike,

The general flavor, configuration and slope of the greens hasn't changed much in 84 years, and neither have the fairway contours, hence, I don't think it was ever penal.

All of the par 5's play relatively short.

The Par 3's certainly aren't excessively long, especially for PGA Tour Pros.

As to being in the right position for your first putt, below the hole is almost a universal adage, anywhere.

Excessive green speeds make almost any course penal, from Pine Valley to Merion to Seminole to ANGC.

When Tiger won his first Masters I don't think he hit anything lower than a 7-iron into ANY par 4, and, I believe he was hitting 8-irons and wedges into some of the par 5's for his second shot (13 & 15)

With Sand Wedge to 7-iron the irons of choice on par 4's, IS THERE a difficult hole location for a PGA Tour Pro at ANGC ?

[Jim_Kennedy]

Holes number 1 (4.474), 11 (4.510), & 18 (4.423) ranked 10th, 8th & 18th, respectively, on the Tour's top 20  toughest holes in 2007.

[Doug Siebert]

Well I think first of all we need to agree on what's meant by penal.

Jim is using the definition penal = "difficult" which I'd argue against until my dying breath.  To me, a penal course is one that leaves you no recovery from a misplayed shot (i.e., OB, lost balls, water hazards esp. the non-lateral variety, bunkers that you have to come out from backwards, trees so thick you have to come out sideways and even that can be dicey, rough so thick you may not even be able to get the ball out to the fairway, etc.)

For the pros, ANGC for all practical purposes has no OB and no lost balls.  There is water but you can avoid it by playing safe (laying up, playing further back and to the right on 11 & 16)  The trees, while they take a lot of flak for being more numerous these days, certainly do not generally prevent the golfer from having a play at the green or at least getting ball in the area of the green where there's a chance at an up and down.  The bunkers are quite playable and the rough not even worthy of the name.

So no, ANGC is definitely not penal.  Its longer and more difficult than it was 10 years ago, but no more penal by any measure that matters.  Your average California course routed through a housing development with the goal of maximing fairway frontage and with various wetland set-asides is far more penal than ANGC.

[Jim_Kennedy]

Doug,
Pat questioned whether there were any difficult hole locations left at ANGC, my reply had to do with that.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Holes number 1 (4.474), 11 (4.510), & 18 (4.423) ranked 10th, 8th & 18th, respectively, on the Tour's top 20  toughest holes in 2007.

Jim,

It's important to note that those holes were all lengthened.... considerably.

Holes # 1, # 11 and # 18 probably have the most benign greens on the golf course, so hole location on those holes, in terms of putting, is a non-factor.

[Mark_Fine]

Everyone has a different definition of what is penal but in my opinion it is very penal (far more than what I would call strategic).  Obviously, most of this has to do with the greens but add in the shaved banks, the water hazards and of course all the new trees and the current Masters set up is very penal. 

[Patrick_Mucci]

Mark,

Have you played the golf course, or are you just surmising it's penal from observation ?

[Ross Tuddenham]

"I don't think it was ever penal."

Not sure greg Norman would agree?

[Matt_Ward]

Michael H:

ANGC is more one dimensional than it ever has been.

The strategic dimensions are now limited and I do agree w Doug S that the word "penal" by conventional definition doesn't apply.

[Mike Hendren]

I cannot disagree that the traditional definition of penal doesn't apply.  That said, indifferent approaches are indeed "penalized" by feeding the ball away from the hole.  I cannot think of another course that does this as effectively.

Bogey

[JESII]

Anybody care to take a stab at a formal definition of PENAL?

[Jim_Kennedy]

Jim,
Simply put, a hole where the player is forced to carry or cross a hazard somewhere between the tee and the green.

[George Pazin]

Anybody care to take a stab at a formal definition of PENAL?

I've always thought of penal as "Hit it here or else", with no real reward for things like angles, aggressive decisions, etc.

[Phil Benedict]

The back 9 has 5 holes where a player can incur a PENALty (11, 12, 13, 15 and 16).  Don't know if that makes it PENAL.

All the water is what makes the back 9 so exciting.  Chance of a two-stroke swing on more than half the holes.  Make those hazards  bunkers and it wouldn't be the same.

[Tony Ristola]

Jim,
Simply put, a hole where the player is forced to carry or cross a hazard somewhere between the tee and the green.

I'll second that definition.

[Doug Siebert]

Tony,

I don't buy that definition.  What if Rae's creek crossed the 13th and 15th fairways at the 125 marker?  Every player would have to cross the hazard, but not a single pro would find the water.  The only thing that makes me consider those holes a bit penal is that when you lay up you still have a pitch off a pretty severe downhill line to a firm green where going long isn't a good idea.  But pros ought to be able to handle that shot...


Instead of how to tell if a hole/course is penal, how about how to tell if its not penal?

1) You can generally play the same ball for all 18 holes

2) You can almost always advance the ball towards the hole

3) When inside mid iron range after any drive that wasn't really wild, a well played shot generally allows you to reach a spot around the green.  From there you will have a chance at getting up and down with another well played shot (note that this doesn't preclude the hole being hard and your shot at par turning into a trip if you continue to mess up or that this par is going to be easy to obtain or even common)

[Jim_Kennedy]

Doug,
It wouldn't matter who was impacted, the hazard still crosses the line of play and must be challenged, therefore it's penal in nature.  Some people have bigger penals than others. 

I didn't come up with the idea, I remembered C&W and made an effort to distill from them:

"An accidental but far-reaching result of the course widening (OC) was the introduction of the element of strategy into the game of golf. A player was no longer compelled to carry every hazard. He could, if he preferred, play a longer but safer route around at some sacrifice but without suffering an undue penalty. Previously, St. andrews, like most links, not only required compulsory carries over most hazards but also penalized with whins, heather, sandy lies or lost balls, any shot that strayed off line."

In deference to the second half of C&W's last sentence:  "In golf, any situation where a player is forced to avoid, carry, or cross a 'hazard' while playing the game"....

......and a definition of what isn't penal is also found in the above paragraph, sentence three.

[Jim_Coleman]

     I would call the forced carry course "heroic," not penal.  I prefer this definition: penalizing a missed shot by requiring a recovery shot.  Hence, penal.

[Jim_Kennedy]

Jim,
You might call the forced carry course (or hole) heroic, but that's not what RTJ Sr. had in mind when he created the term. His was a 'blending' of the penal and strategic that placed the hazard on the diagonal, giving the player the option of biting off as much of as he thought he could chew, the 'heroic' option, or avoiding it altogether by playing away from it.

You don't have the 'heroic' option with forced carries. 

[Doug Siebert]

For a carry to be heroic it can't be forced, and must have some element of risk involved.  A shortcut requiring a 200 yard carry isn't heroic for me, but it sure as hell would be for my 75 year old dad.

I think the "element of risk" thing goes along with penalness as well.  A course with a bunch of 200 yard forced carries off the tee isn't penal for me, but for a guy who drives it 225 it would be.  Presumably this is compensated for by players playing the appropriate tees so such carries are commensurate with their strength/ability (before anyone says "what about hackers who might top it into a pond requiring only a 30 yard carry", it isn't the course that's penal for them its their lack of golfing skill )

[Patrick_Mucci_Jr]

Jim Kennedy,

Just because a hazard must be carried, doesn't mean it's a heroic carry or a penal hole.

# 13 and # 15 are good examples of holes where the golfer can choose to PITCH over the hazard with a Lob Wedge.

# 12 and # 16 however require a carry of predetermined length.

Other than those two holes, # 12 and # 16, I don't see where there's any pressure to force a carry, especially for PGA Tour Pros, and especially since NO ONE is rolling the ball along the ground to get to the green.

[Jeremy_Glenn.]

On a penal course, you have no choices.
On a strategic course, you do.

 

[Tiger_Bernhardt]

I do not see it as a penal course. I see it as an incredibly great course even if it is not as great as 10 to 15 years ago. The pen placement on 11 today was beautiful on a hole that changes have really hurt.

[Jim_Kennedy]

Pat,
When Jim Sullivan asked for a definition of penal I answered, and no, I wasn't drunk when I jumped into this swamp.   He didn't specify Tour pros nor did he ask if Augusta was penal for them, as Mike Hendren did.
My reply was framed as an uncomplicated definition, one that I might use when trying to explain to a new golfer what penal meant. I'm not saying my definition can't be improved on, only that it would convey the basic idea, and by definition a definiton is meant to convey the fundamental character or meaning of a word or a concept. There's no room for a lot of nuance or subtlety in a definiton, they're meant to follow Jack Webb's credo, "just the facts, ma'am".  Your last three sentences are a good example of this, they are all about the nuances and subtleties of playing the game, they are not definitons.  

Jeff Brauer once said (hope you don't mind me quoting you Jeff) that a forced carry without any options is penal. Earlier in this thread I quoted from C&W, they say much the same thing. Tom Doak(same disclaimer) once likened strategic design to '1000 shades of gray', which leads me to believe that penal would be more black and white, like forcing a carry.    The list of architects, and informed others, who have suggested that a forced carry is penal would be rather long.

So I don't agree with your first sentence either.