Found this very interesting article in this week's Golfworld:
Like oil and water
Links courses and rough don't mix -- and shouldn't have to
The shame of it all is that Paraparaumu Beach GC, venue for the Tiger Woods Southern Hemisphere Invitational -- a.k.a. the New Zealand Open -- is a great links course. Blind shots. Rumpled fairways. Tight lies begging you to hit long irons. Small greens with steep fall-offs on either side. It's got it all. Sadly, it's got even more than that. In addition to the linksland features mentioned above, the boyhood home of Woods' bag-carrier, Steve Williams, was this past week almost totally covered in long grass.
Recreating the scenario that ruined the 1999 British Open at Carnoustie, the organizers -- fearful, no doubt, that someone might break 60 -- narrowed the "fairways" to the point where proper links golf was lost.
This was most noticeable at the 442-yard 17th, a hole that gave the players a distinct choice from the tee. The problem was the thick rough separating the two "fairways." Go left and the ball skipped across the fairway into more rough. Go right and the angle into the hole was a lot more difficult. If there was no rough in the middle, the players would have been able to hit a wide variety of shots from the tee.
It is an unfortunate side effect of the distances golf balls fly in the modern game. Too many people in influential positions have decided long grass on a golf course is the only way to make courses difficult. Not better, just difficult.
Such a strategy ignores the fact a true links does not need long grass. Protection from low scores should come from the speed of the greens, strategic pin positioning, creative bunkering and, of course, the wind. Rough is merely redundant. And boring. There are exceptions. Think Augusta National (before the introduction of the "first cut"). Think Pinehurst No. 2. Think St. Andrews. Think Royal Dornoch. On all of those courses, short grass is used as a hazard. Long grass on those courses would, ironically, make them play easier than they do now.
What happens when a ball misses a green at Pinehurst? It doesn't get stuck in a fringe of ever-lengthening grass. It runs away from the green by as much as 20 yards in places, leaving a much trickier recovery shot than familiar flop shot from greenside rough. In other words, you get difficult shots from easy lies rather than easy shots from difficult lies.
What happens when a drive at St. Andrews is hit down the wrong line? Invariably, it will land on a tightly cut fairway then agonizingly meander off into sand perhaps 50 yards from where it first landed. Which is what you get when you combine contoured fairways with intelligent bunkering.
These examples of the way golf should be played are increasingly ignored -- making it more difficult to identify the best players. With everyone reduced to hacking from long grass, the chances of skilled players separating themselves from the competition by superior shotmaking are reduced.
On a true links, no one can control the final destination of his ball to the same extent as on a soft parkland course. The undulations and predominance of wind mean the links test is total. No matter how well you drive the ball you will be forced to play from a variety of stances and lies. In the long term, the better player will be better able to deal with those circumstances.
In a typical round you are asked to deal with all kinds of bad bounces and "bad luck." Links golf exacerbates the vagaries of fortune we all endure in this maddening game. At least it used to.
January 18, 2002