I was talking with fellow GCA'er Greg Murphy last evening. Greg is the designer of a neat 9-hole track in Saskatchewan Canada, called Katepwa Beach Golf Club...
http://www.golfkatepwa.com/Anyway, I was telling Greg that I'm no big fan of his 5th hole, a short slightly uphill par 3 of some 120 yards to a skyline green, albeit blind to the golfer on the tee box. I did mention, however, that it is growing on me, that particular hole anyway, as my playing partner and I came within 2 feet of recording aces within mere seconds of each other...
Which brought up an interesting question. What would have happened if we'd aced the hole? Not just one, but both of us? Would anybody really have believed such a thing could happen? We had no witnesses (we were golfing as a twosome), the group ahead had moved on to the next tee some one hundred yards away through a grove of trees, and the group behind was somewhere on the previous hole.
Here's a photo from the tee...
To give you a better idea of what the golfer is facing, the hole plays slightly uphill, with a big slope coming down from a large hill on the left side. The golfer, if unable to hit the green on the fly or bounce it up onto the green, does have the potential of rolling his/her tee shot onto the green from the slope on the left side, and this is exactly what both of us did that day, or what we believe we did, as we actually couldn't see the roll of the ball, either ball, once it went down below the horizon of the green.
Here's a photo from behind the green, showing the slope (now on the right side of the photo) which comes down to the green.
So, my question ...
What do you think of a blind green on a par-3 hole? Course architect Les Furber and I had this discussion 10 years ago, and I totally agreed with him then, that the golfer should be able to see the roll of the ball on the green, especially as it rolls into the hole for a hole-in-one. Furber told me that he designs par-3's so that the green is at grade or below, just for that specific reason ... he wants to give the golfer the opportunity to watch the ball roll into the hole if he/she ever was so lucky as to hit it in.
Which brings us to our particular situation ... both of us hitting our tee shots within 2 feet of the hole that day. I think it would have been awesome to have watched mine go in (I was hitting first) and would have been blown away to stand and watch my buddy's go in as well, just seconds later.
Granted, it was intriguing to walk up to the green, knowing that both of our shots were somewhere near the hole, but unsure as to exactly how near the hole, but still...
Thoughts anyone?
Apologies if the photos are large. And not of "Aidan Bradley" quality.
Jim