[Bill_McBride]

 the conclusion I came up with is that you want wide fairways because you want, on average, consistent level of difficulty from tee to green.

Richard,

I think the flaw in your premise is your assumption that driving in the fairway leaves the golfer with a universally equal, and prefereed approach angle to the green.

An examination of the 1st fairway and green at GCGC illustrates the flaw in your premise.

Drives hit left of middle are faced with a dicey approach over a large, deep fronting bunker with bunkers directly behind the line of approach.
Drives hit right of middle are faced with a wide open approach with no such impediments.
Approaches can be putted (Neil Regan style) or Wedged since nothing but fairway exists between the golfer and the green.

There are holes where being in a particular sector of the fairway offers a but a single advantage, the lie.
Golfers may be far better off in the rough in one location as opposed to being in another sector of the fairway.

What does that mean?

Let's say I can hit my 7 iron 150 yards and my driver 250 yards (I think that is pretty typical for a "decent" player). An average green size is about 5000 square feet (although the modern courses tend to be substantially larger), which means they are about 24 yards by 24 yards in dimensions.

From the middle of the fairway 150 yards away with my 7 iron, I have about +/- 4.6 degrees of room for error on my trajectory (left or right) and still hit the green. Obviously, there are many other factors like wind, shape of the shot, etc. but for this discussion I think this simple calculation will suffice.

But, the other factors are some of, if not THE critical factors.

The configuration of the green/surrounds as it relates to the DZ is paramount.
The contour of the green/surrounds as it relates to the DZ is paramount
The slope of the green/surrounds as it relates to the DZ is paramount.

To illustrate the above, let's pretend that a drive is hit to a DZ and that the DZ is 50 yards wide.
And that DZ now leaves the golfer with an approach that mirrors that on of the approach from the 4th tee at NGLA, the Redan hole.
The tee is probably 10 yards wide.
Try hitting into that green from 40 yards left or 40 yards right of that tee.
Then factor in the winds that typically blow on that hole.

Another perfect example, found at NGLA, is the 1st hole.
Hit your drive in the fairway to the far right and you have a blind shot over a large gaping bunker from an awkward lie to a green that's not necessarily receptive to approaches from that angle.

Hit your drive in the left/left center of the fairway and you have a perfect view of the green and an unimpeded approach that is just fairway.
On your approach you can hit clubs from driver to putter to a green that's far more receptive from that angle.


If I transfer the same room for error (+/- 4.6 degrees) to the driver length of 250 yards, you get equivalent fairway width of 40 yards.

I think that's the second flaw.
I don't think you can equate margins of error on the 7 iron and driver, and, you can't equate the targets because DZ's tend to be receptive to all drives hit from the designated tees, whereas all approaches from the DZ aren't equal..

That means that (at least for left/right accuracy) hitting a 40 yard wide fairway is about equally difficult as hitting a 7 iron into a 24 yard wide green.



See my comment above.

Once could argue that you have much more vertical (short long) room for errors with the driver since fairways tend to be much longer than greens, however, since the driver is much longer (magnifying small faults) and you swing at a much higher speed, I believe the difficulty level is still very similar.

What about putts? If a typical putt is from about 30 feet away, +/- 4.6 degrees means you can miss by up to about 2½ feet. Which seems very similar in difficulty with the 7 iron as you are expected to hit 2 putts, and 2½ feet putt should be quite makeable.

I think another flaw surfaces here.
The 7 iron is usually hit a very finite distance.  In your example, 150 yards.
With a putt, you're JUST factoring in left/right margins of error, ignoring vertical errors.

So, to me, wide fairways are not just a question about angles and strategy, it is about fairness and consistency. If you make the fairways too narrow, you are asking more out of driver accuracy than iron accuracy or putting accuracy.

That would depend upon what the golfer is faced from the DZ to, and on the green.

Oakmont, Winged Foot and other courses are testimony that just because you're on the green doesn't mean that the challenge has been diminished.

I prefer courses that test your skills in even fashion, and that means wider fairways. With bigger greens that are popular, the fairways should be easily 40 to 60 yards wide to offer equivalent challenge to the user.

Could you name five (5) courses with 40-60 yard wide fairways with big greens ?

Don't wider fairways accomodate a broader spectrum of golfers ?

Good golfers, mediocre golfers, poor golfers, hookers, slicers, short drivers, long drivers, low ball hitters, high ball hitters ?

Without difficult rough, what, meaningfully, seperates wide fairways from modest to narrow fairways ?

It is all about the fairness.

Are you sure it's not about offering a reasonable and enjoyable challenge, on the same field of play, to all level of golfers ?

Good points, Patrick.  They support my premise that the widest of fairways still has an ideal area for the tee shot that yields the best angle of approach.  A sixty yard fairway could effectively play only 20 yards wide, as illustrated by your example of #1 at GCGC.  It makes me laugh when some "experts" complain that wide fairways make the game too easy. 

[Sean_A]

 the conclusion I came up with is that you want wide fairways because you want, on average, consistent level of difficulty from tee to green.

Richard,

I think the flaw in your premise is your assumption that driving in the fairway leaves the golfer with a universally equal, and prefereed approach angle to the green.

An examination of the 1st fairway and green at GCGC illustrates the flaw in your premise.

Drives hit left of middle are faced with a dicey approach over a large, deep fronting bunker with bunkers directly behind the line of approach.
Drives hit right of middle are faced with a wide open approach with no such impediments.
Approaches can be putted (Neil Regan style) or Wedged since nothing but fairway exists between the golfer and the green.

There are holes where being in a particular sector of the fairway offers a but a single advantage, the lie.
Golfers may be far better off in the rough in one location as opposed to being in another sector of the fairway.

What does that mean?

Let's say I can hit my 7 iron 150 yards and my driver 250 yards (I think that is pretty typical for a "decent" player). An average green size is about 5000 square feet (although the modern courses tend to be substantially larger), which means they are about 24 yards by 24 yards in dimensions.

From the middle of the fairway 150 yards away with my 7 iron, I have about +/- 4.6 degrees of room for error on my trajectory (left or right) and still hit the green. Obviously, there are many other factors like wind, shape of the shot, etc. but for this discussion I think this simple calculation will suffice.

But, the other factors are some of, if not THE critical factors.

The configuration of the green/surrounds as it relates to the DZ is paramount.
The contour of the green/surrounds as it relates to the DZ is paramount
The slope of the green/surrounds as it relates to the DZ is paramount.

To illustrate the above, let's pretend that a drive is hit to a DZ and that the DZ is 50 yards wide.
And that DZ now leaves the golfer with an approach that mirrors that on of the approach from the 4th tee at NGLA, the Redan hole.
The tee is probably 10 yards wide.
Try hitting into that green from 40 yards left or 40 yards right of that tee.
Then factor in the winds that typically blow on that hole.

Another perfect example, found at NGLA, is the 1st hole.
Hit your drive in the fairway to the far right and you have a blind shot over a large gaping bunker from an awkward lie to a green that's not necessarily receptive to approaches from that angle.

Hit your drive in the left/left center of the fairway and you have a perfect view of the green and an unimpeded approach that is just fairway.
On your approach you can hit clubs from driver to putter to a green that's far more receptive from that angle.


If I transfer the same room for error (+/- 4.6 degrees) to the driver length of 250 yards, you get equivalent fairway width of 40 yards.

I think that's the second flaw.
I don't think you can equate margins of error on the 7 iron and driver, and, you can't equate the targets because DZ's tend to be receptive to all drives hit from the designated tees, whereas all approaches from the DZ aren't equal..

That means that (at least for left/right accuracy) hitting a 40 yard wide fairway is about equally difficult as hitting a 7 iron into a 24 yard wide green.



See my comment above.

Once could argue that you have much more vertical (short long) room for errors with the driver since fairways tend to be much longer than greens, however, since the driver is much longer (magnifying small faults) and you swing at a much higher speed, I believe the difficulty level is still very similar.

What about putts? If a typical putt is from about 30 feet away, +/- 4.6 degrees means you can miss by up to about 2½ feet. Which seems very similar in difficulty with the 7 iron as you are expected to hit 2 putts, and 2½ feet putt should be quite makeable.

I think another flaw surfaces here.
The 7 iron is usually hit a very finite distance.  In your example, 150 yards.
With a putt, you're JUST factoring in left/right margins of error, ignoring vertical errors.

So, to me, wide fairways are not just a question about angles and strategy, it is about fairness and consistency. If you make the fairways too narrow, you are asking more out of driver accuracy than iron accuracy or putting accuracy.

That would depend upon what the golfer is faced from the DZ to, and on the green.

Oakmont, Winged Foot and other courses are testimony that just because you're on the green doesn't mean that the challenge has been diminished.

I prefer courses that test your skills in even fashion, and that means wider fairways. With bigger greens that are popular, the fairways should be easily 40 to 60 yards wide to offer equivalent challenge to the user.

Could you name five (5) courses with 40-60 yard wide fairways with big greens ?

Don't wider fairways accomodate a broader spectrum of golfers ?

Good golfers, mediocre golfers, poor golfers, hookers, slicers, short drivers, long drivers, low ball hitters, high ball hitters ?

Without difficult rough, what, meaningfully, seperates wide fairways from modest to narrow fairways ?

It is all about the fairness.

Are you sure it's not about offering a reasonable and enjoyable challenge, on the same field of play, to all level of golfers ?

Good points, Patrick.  They support my premise that the widest of fairways still has an ideal area for the tee shot that yields the best angle of approach.  A sixty yard fairway could effectively play only 20 yards wide, as illustrated by your example of #1 at GCGC.  It makes me laugh when some "experts" complain that wide fairways make the game too easy. 

Ace

Everything needs to be in context. By definition, wide fairways do make the game easier.  There is no question that the more rough there is the more difficult a course is.  The question at hand is how can we make wide fairways challenge scratch and higher cappers thereby making a particular course enjoyable for nearly all - which surely has to be a goal that archies at least contemplate when they design because its really the biggest bang for buck they can deliver (which I spose really answers Richard's thread question)?  IMO, the only way to do that (assuming the architecture is decent) is to keep courses keen. And to back this up the right sorts of grasses need to be used to keep courses keen.  It all gets back to the consumer eventually.  The more people who want to putt on bent (or whatever the latest craze is) greens in hostile climates the less chance we have to keep courses keen and therefore make wide architecture work.  We also have to learn to go with weather cycles and accept that the presentation of the course depends on weather.  To keep courses keen we can't be feeding them in a way where they are presented the same on a daily basis.   

Ciao

[Troy Alderson]

Wide fairways = higher maintenance budgets.  The increase will differ depending on grass type but the bottom line is it will cost the club more money.   

Scott,

That is not necessarily true. All the turf is cut with fairway mowers or rough mowers. You are just changing which mower is cutting the grass. When we fertilize the fairways and roughs we tend to water them the same and fertilize them the same, at least the rough that is adjacent to the fairways where we would cut the turf shorter to fairway height. There are minimal increases in cost including overseeding if needed, additional fairway equipment, and labor. But you are taking some of that cost away from the rough mowing. How wide the fairways are cut is up to the superintendent and their limits of irrigation and contouring. I maintained wide fairways within the limits of a $300,000 budget based upon tree lines, irrigation, and contouring.

Troy

[Richard Choi]

Pat, I think this time, it is you who is missing the point of my post:)

I could not agree MORE with the first half of your post. You are right on that even when you have a wide fairway, under the hands of a good golf course architect, the shot value changes dramatically (I would argue the degree of change in shot value between one area of the DZ and another is what makes great courses great).

And you are again correct that just hitting the green does not mean that you have hit a good shot. A well designed greens have small areas of target zone related to the pin position that is MUCH SMALLER than the green itself.

But can't you see the parallel between the two points above? Just like not all DZ's are not the same, not all targets on greens are the same. You have CONSISTENT shot values from tee to DZ AND DZ to green!!! However, if the fairways are too narrow, DZ no longer exists, you are praying just to HIT the fairway. And my point is that to have the consistency, if you have an average green size of 24 yards wide, you should have fairways that are 40 to 50 yards wide. But even with that fairway width, your DZ may be only 10 yards wide, just like your ideal placement on the green may be only 4 or 5 yards wide.

You are also correct that 7 iron distance dispersion is probably more consistent than the length dispersion for a putt (relative to the length of the putt). But you are dismissing the amount of errors that are introduced with lie, wind, and contact (thin or fat shots with a 7 iron have much more severe distance effect than toe or heel hits on a putter). I would still argue that the difficulties are consistent.

You asked, "Could you name five (5) courses with 40-60 yard wide fairways with big greens ?"

I am still working on your other challenge, but this one, I can answer fairly easily:)

1. Chambers Bay
2. The Plantation Course at Kapalua
3. Rustic Canyon
4. Bandon Trails
5. Pacific Dunes

[George Pazin]

Otherwise it [width] is highly overrated, and in fact not really understood by those who haven't much experience playing seemingly wide course that actually play very narrow (e.g. the Old Course).

Interesting that you say it is overrated and not understood by many, and then follow that up with one of the very reasons us ignorant folk push for wider fairways...

[Jason Topp]

Richard:

You would be interested in the first chapter of Dave Pelz's Short Game Bible.  Pre Shotlink era- Pelz personally tracked PGA tour accuracy, measured as a comparison of the distance the ball finished away from the target to the distance of the attempted shot.

He found three groupings of the data for any individual player that he believed provided a good indication of their skill:

- For full swings - the average distance (I believe mean) from the target ranged from 5% to 9%.  On full shots, tour players were very good at distance control, but tended to miss wide left or wide right.  A tour player tended to have consistent performance for all full shots.

- For partial shots, the error rate was much larger and the errors tended to be errors of distance rather than of direction.  Kite was at 13%, but through practice reduced that number to 5% - which explains how Kite had a successful career despite a shaky putter and an indifferent tee to green game.

- For Putting - he did not discuss the data much.  He mentions that he measured that data wrong.

[Rich Goodale]

Glad you find my post interesting George.  Thanks.

What exactly are the reasons that (non) ignorant people like you like push for wider fairways?  Do you really like apparent width that is practically narrow?  Why?  Thanks again, in advance.

Rich

[Patrick_Mucci]

Richard,

It's been a few years since I played Pacific Dunes, but, I don't remember the course having fairways 40-60 yards wide with very large greens.

I thought some of the greens presented rather small targets.

I haven't played the other four courses you mentioned so I couldn't evaluate your assessment.

[Sean_A]

Glad you find my post interesting George.  Thanks.

What exactly are the reasons that (non) ignorant people like you like push for wider fairways?  Do you really like apparent width that is practically narrow?  Why?  Thanks again, in advance.

Rich

Rich

I understand your comment about TOC being effectively much narrower than it appears, but one couldn't say the course is narrow.  Other than finding a bunker (which I think there are far too many of at TOC), the course offers space in the least desirable areas and much less space in the desirable areas.  Isn't this mainly what width is about?  Are there many other courses you have in mind which the large print giveth and the small print taketh away?  George is right, being able to find your ball quickly and play is not some sort of secondary design thought.  Its important to me and one of the main reasons i go back to places and choose to visit often times in the winter. 

Ciao

[Willie_Dow]

Speed of play !

Narrow fairways with two inch rough, which with a growing spring grass, has us looking - looking - and looking for balls makes for a long day !

My play at Bent Pine, Joe Lee seemed to understand this premise.  Seldom more than fours with our foursome.

[Rich Goodale]

Glad you find my post interesting George.  Thanks.

What exactly are the reasons that (non) ignorant people like you like push for wider fairways?  Do you really like apparent width that is practically narrow?  Why?  Thanks again, in advance.

Rich

Rich

I understand your comment about TOC being effectively much narrower than it appears, but one couldn't say the course is narrow.  Other than finding a bunker (which I think there are far too many of at TOC), the course offers space in the least desirable areas and much less space in the desirable areas.  Isn't this mainly what width is about?  Are there many other courses you have in mind which the large print giveth and the small print taketh away?  George is right, being able to find your ball quickly and play is not some sort of secondary design thought.  Its important to me and one of the main reasons i go back to places and choose to visit often times in the winter. 

Ciao

Sean

I made the point about speed of play and minimizing lost balls in my first post.  Glad you agree with me.

Rich

[Ross Tuddenham]

It is all very well to say that in theory a wide fairway is preferable and it can add strategy but what do you do when the available space does not allow this?

Is it not then acceptable to demand some accuracy from the tee.  Especially if the course in on the short side.  I don't get what's wrong with saying to the player either hit an accurate drive for a 9 iron approach or a 3 iron off the tee for a 5 iron approach.  IF there is no room to create angles then why not test other skills a player may have?

[Patrick_Mucci]

It is all very well to say that in theory a wide fairway is preferable and it can add strategy but what do you do when the available space does not allow this?

Many, if not most of the early courses were designed with wide fairways.
It's hard to imagine a site where wide fairways couldn't be employed.
Can you name five golf courses where it would be impossible to craft wide fairways (40 yards)

Is it not then acceptable to demand some accuracy from the tee. 

Just because a fairway is wide, DOESN'T mean that you're NOT demanding accuracy off the tee.

Especially if the course in on the short side. 

The length of the course is almost immaterial, it's the relationship of the features in the DZ to the green and surrounds.

I don't get what's wrong with saying to the player either hit an accurate drive for a 9 iron approach or a 3 iron off the tee for a 5 iron approach. 
IF there is no room to create angles then why not test other skills a player may have?

How would there be "no room" to create angles.
Angles can be created at the green end.

I don't know that your math is correct.
The difference between a 9-iron and a 5-iron is about 40 yards.
The difference between a driver and a 3-iron is about 60 yards, hence your example should probably be 3-iron and a 3-iron.

Can you name five courses where it's a drive and a 9-iron versus a 3-iron and a 5/3-iron ?

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