[JMEvensky]

Peter,if I understand you correctly,I disagree. I think the 3-handicap-Gib is the exception.

My surmise is that it's in fact the lower handicap player more responsible for the cookie cutter "championship" course. In my experience,they prefer the sameness of course-to-course layouts--it doesn't require any adjustment to their frames of reference.

"I shot 74 at course A and 73 at course B" is easier to measure if each course is similar.And most low handicaps are really into measuring.When you throw Gib's 5900 yard course into the mix,it screws up their reference point.

Gib's an outlier (on several thousand levels). He'll take the time to understand why the 5900 yard course should be measured against a different set of criteria.IMO,most low handicaps won't.

[Gib_Papazian]

I'm going to have to agree. 8 or 9 years ago, before i stopped playing much due to injury and circumstance, much of my golf was played with non-GCA low-handicappers, most of whom - although they loved to play with me - thought I was a bit of a nut.

We'd be playing an unfamiliar course and I'd occasionally stop to marvel at a really unusual or interesting feature - even if my ball was nowhere near it; yet nobody could understand the point of paying attention to anything but my own shot or where my opponent stood. I tend to stand on the tee with arms folded, picking apart what is in front of me - not because I'm trying to defeat it as player - but more to make mental notes of how the overall geometry and hazards work together.

Low-handicappers, as a rule, hate uncertainty. The odd bounce, blind shot or completely unfair hole (450 yard par-4 with tiny, undulating green) just pisses most of them off to distraction - and they usually end up shooting a zillion, vowing never to come back. Too much ego and not enough love of the whimsical adventure that is all things golf.

You know the type, the maxi-pad stud who comes back from Scotland trumpeting what he shot at Carnoustie, but whining like a bitch that Cruden Bay and Berwick are quirky, old fashioned and stupid. The truth is usually that Mr. Giant Schwantz got his rectum rerouted and cannot admit to anybody he shot 92 at Prestwick with a 10 on the Cardinal and picked up lying 8 after two lost balls on the Himalayas.

In reality - aside from my three best golfing friends - I don't like playing with non-architecture buffs anymore. I can only tolerate so many stock market tips or manly tales of shagged pussy when Regan was president. Yeah, I am a snob and have reached a point where I'd rather walk a quirky, unknown gem with one of us than play a famous track with Schmuck, Duck and Pluck.

So, I guess that makes me an "outliner" in "several thousand" (and one) ways. The truth is, I enjoyed original - and even strange - courses even more when I played more than once a month. When you've got a full arsenal of knock-downs and bump shots, the opportunity to get really creative and pull it off using the ground game is more satisfying.

I used to get confused because I could "see" a whole bunch of ways to skin the cat - and was therefore a better evaluator of courses than I am now - which is a marginal nine handicap with a weak back and the yips.

As a matter of fact, aside from guys like Fortson or Merrill Hiserman (who many of you know), I don't even like playing with low handicappers these days because they take it far too seriously.

Unless of course, I get to watch them come completely unglued trying to overpower a short, quirky golf course smarter than they are.        

    

[Thomas Dai]

I'm going to have to agree. 8 or 9 years ago, before i stopped playing much due to injury and circumstance, much of my golf was played with non-GCA low-handicappers, most of whom - although they loved to play with me - thought I was a bit of a nut.
We'd be playing an unfamiliar course and I'd occasionally stop to marvel at a really unusual or interesting feature - even if my ball was nowhere near it; yet nobody could understand the point of paying attention to anything but my own shot or where my opponent stood. I tend to stand on the tee with arms folded, picking apart what is in front of me - not because I'm trying to defeat it as player - but more to make mental notes of how the overall geometry and hazards work together.
Low-handicappers, as a rule, hate uncertainty. The odd bounce, blind shot or completely unfair hole (450 yard par-4 with tiny, undulating green) just pisses most of them off to distraction - and they usually end up shooting a zillion, vowing never to come back. Too much ego and not enough love of the whimsical adventure that is all things golf.
You know the type, the maxi-pad stud who comes back from Scotland trumpeting what he shot at Carnoustie, but whining like a bitch that Cruden Bay and Berwick are quirky, old fashioned and stupid. The truth is usually that Mr. Giant Schwantz got his rectum rerouted and cannot admit to anybody he shot 92 at Prestwick with a 10 on the Cardinal and picked up lying 8 after two lost balls on the Himalayas.
In reality - aside from my three best golfing friends - I don't like playing with non-architecture buffs anymore. I can only tolerate so many stock market tips or manly tales of shagged pussy when Regan was president. Yeah, I am a snob and have reached a point where I'd rather walk a quirky, unknown gem with one of us than play a famous track with Schmuck, Duck and Pluck.
So, I guess that makes me an "outliner" in "several thousand" (and one) ways. The truth is, I enjoyed original - and even strange - courses even more when I played more than once a month. When you've got a full arsenal of knock-downs and bump shots, the opportunity to get really creative and pull it off using the ground game is more satisfying.
I used to get confused because I could "see" a whole bunch of ways to skin the cat - and was therefore a better evaluator of courses than I am now - which is a marginal nine handicap with a weak back and the yips.
As a matter of fact, aside from guys like Fortson or Merrill Hiserman (who many of you know), I don't even like playing with low handicappers these days because they take it far too seriously.
Unless of course, I get to watch them come completely unglued trying to overpower a short, quirky golf course smarter than they are.        

Great post Gib. Hilarious (and oh so true)

atb

[Ronald Montesano]

I got through page two of four before I lost patience.

Why is this a thread?

[Mike Hendren]

No single person can codify anything.  The mass consumer will ultimately decide.  Besides, doesn't there have to be a plumbline for the bold and brilliant to depart therefrom?

Bogey

[Peter Pallotta]

Gib, Jeff - you're both right, I think, especially about Gib being an outlier. (I think my pen ran away from me, and I was determined to rhyme "me" with something, and "three" was just literally waiting there....)

I guess in my long winded way I was just trying to explore what frees one up to play golf differently, on different kinds of courses -- and I think that once having been a good golfer has at least something to do with it.

Enjoyed the back and forth - much more interesting than what 'popular culture' passes off as entertaining every day

Best
Peter

[Gib_Papazian]

Evidently, Ronald finds our prose prosaic, so profound pontifications in our professorial patois are primarily for pedantic prophylactics.

Ron,

If two pages is all you could stomach here, the legendary Merion thread went on like the 100 year war and ruined a half dozen friendships. After 10 pages it began to read like a drunken 2am bar fight between five idiots too loaded to land a punch.

From the movie Tombstone (that I dearly love):

Billy Clanton: Why, it's the drunk piano player. You're so drunk, you can't hit nothin'. In fact, you're probably seeing double.
[Billy Clanton draws a knife]
Doc Holliday: [takes out a second gun] I have two guns, one for each of ya!

  


  

[Ronald Montesano]

What's the opposite of a thread-jack? What the alliteratory Gib just did!

Try to drive me away? I see through that smokescreen.

Where is the cowardice in proposing a a non-standard norm? Here's a baseline:

33 55 44444 36   33 55 44444  36    72

Could be German, could be Aspergery, could be OCD. People like order.

No architect herein (ASGCA or otherwise) will affirm that a norm is a requirement.

I have precious few friendships as it is. I elect to not ruin any of them by reading pages three and four.

[Gib_Papazian]

Interestingly, in one of the many versions of our perpetually monkeyed with Ocean Course at Olympic, from 1983 to 1997, the golf course started out: 5-3-5-3-5-4-3-4-5-3 the first ten holes - a similar (though less jumbled) pacing as the back nine of Pac Dunes.

Hardly anybody notices the back nine of Pac Dunes only has two par-4s because it wanders the land absolutely seamlessly.   

To be perfectly honest, after a round or two in that particular incarnation, it did not seem the slightest bit awkward - even followed by six par-4s in a row, and then a 3-5 finish. Putting aside that the Ocean had been hurriedly cobbled together in the wake of landslides where three holes along the bluffs were lost, most members grew to love its originality.

Even now, after a complete redesign by Weiskopf (routed by John Fleming), we still have unusual pacing that - again - does not really draw attention to itself. Now we start: 5-3-4-5-3 and then 4-4-4-4. Back side: 3-5-4-4-4-4-4-3-4.     

 

[Tom_Doak]

Interestingly, in one of the many versions of our perpetually monkeyed with Ocean Course at Olympic, from 1983 to 1997, the golf course started out: 5-3-5-3-5-4-3-4-5-3 the first ten holes - a similar (though less jumbled) pacing as the back nine of Pac Dunes.

Hardly anybody notices the back nine of Pac Dunes only has two par-4s because it wanders the land absolutely seamlessly.   

To be perfectly honest, after a round or two in that particular incarnation, it did not seem the slightest bit awkward - even followed by six par-4s in a row, and then a 3-5 finish. Putting aside that the Ocean had been hurriedly cobbled together in the wake of landslides where three holes along the bluffs were lost, most members grew to love its originality.

Even now, after a complete redesign by Weiskopf (routed by John Fleming), we still have unusual pacing that - again - does not really draw attention to itself. Now we start: 5-3-4-5-3 and then 4-4-4-4. Back side: 3-5-4-4-4-4-4-3-4.     

 

I try to avoid having a lot of par-3's and a lot of par-5's clustered together, because I think it breaks up the flow of the round a bit.  Pacific Dunes was an exception to my rule, obviously.  I think I like it better because the par-3's do not alternate every other hole ... you have the two together at the turn, 10 and 11, and then the other two are spaced apart, at 14 and 17.  I didn't think of that when we routed it, but I've always liked how it feels once we started playing it.

Often my favorite stretch of a golf course is a stretch of three or four consecutive par-4's -- even at Augusta National, when the 9th through 11th suddenly break the pattern.  12-13-14 at High Pointe was another.  6-7-8-9 at Pacific.  7-8-9-10 at St. Andrews Beach.  And of course, 8-9-10 at Pebble. 

[Jeff_Brauer]

So we are using two ocean front golf courses to illustrate a point?  I imagine the scenery distracts the golfer somewhat from noticing the routing sequence.  I also imagine that on an Iowa cornfield course, where the backdrop is continuous corn, they might be more prone to notice several par 4's or even 2 par 3's in a row.

That said, my favorite course as a kid in Chicago had back to back par 5's and finished with a par 3.  I had read enough to know those two things were supposed to be bad, and yet they never bothered me.

As a result of all my experience, I try to separate the 3's and 5's throughout the round, but don't obsess about it.  I will say I have never found the place to do back to back par 3's. CP is obviously a good example of a reason to do it, and even then, 16 was originally a 4, although I have never heard what hole was going to be a 3?  Maybe 18 would have been better as a 3 with the green beneath the club....the mind boggles at the what ifs.

[Garland Bayley]

If the course provides a new puzzle to be solved with each new hole, it does not matter what order pars are. However, if you are presented with the same stuff over and over again, then making a sequence like 4, 3, 4, 5, 4, 3, 4, 5, 4 substitutes for good design.
One of the least interesting courses I have ever played was David Toms' Carter Plantation. Repetitious drives pinched by 3 bunkers both left and right, and hazard surrounded greens on flat land made most of the course redundant.

[Jud_T]

If it's not a standard then why do so many of us nerds feel compelled to rebel against it?  In addition to all the usual suspects already mentioned, of which I have a particular bug up my ass about the USGA handicap system, I'd like to posit the following:  we wet ourselves over match play on quirky sandy ground that nature intended for the purpose, yet on this side of the pond that's not the game 99.9% of golfers play.  They play connect the dots golf on overly green courses in hot humid climates on soil that is loam or clay.  Many haven't even heard of fescue, let alone played on it.  Most play 5 hour weekend rounds on public courses where there's little point in giving a putt as you'll just be waiting longer on the group in front of you.  They never see interesting match play on quirky links courses on TV (thank you Ryder Cup whores).  Personally I'm down with brown and quit an overwatered par 72 championship track for one of the handful of places in this country where a real ground game isn't some quaint occurrance that happens in the fall the morning after the course maintenance staff party.  Sometimes I think we are simply tilting at windmills.

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