Lancaster CC: Excellent USGA Article, and Pictures, Ahead of U.S. Women's Open

[John Kavanaugh]

Speaking of sexist comments...How good did Julie Inkster look all week.  She is a real treat in every way.

[John Kavanaugh]

One other thing.  The Women need to drop a major.  The whole major this, major that was a huge distraction.  There was even a mention how the girl who won had already won a major.  A Japan major.  Lydia Ko has a bunch more chances to be the youngest to win a major.  It's really hard to care.

[MCirba]

John Kavanaugh,

I agree with Rory that you have a very good point about the staged dramatics of shortening par fours into essentially long par threes as a way to manufacture excitement.   

It is the job of the architect to provide variety and interest; not the governing bodies.

When Mike Davis first did this at Torrey Pines it was an intriguing novelty.   Now, it's become a tedious and predictable substitute designed as comic relief from the otherwise humorlessly stern setups at most majors.

[John Kavanaugh]

I went to play Torrey almost specifically because it was going to host a US Open.  Everyone knows I love the course and thought the 14th was the best par 4 from an architectural viewpoint.  It is a wonderful shortish dogleg left along the barranca with I think an ocean backdrop.  Not that it matters but I had proudly nailed a perfect drive followed by a wonderful eight iron for one of my rare birdies of the day.  Thanks Mike Davis for making it a long par three, thanks for the memories.


See, I don't get either the public or a private course giving up their course for a USGA event if they can't play the same set up either before or once that event leaves.  What the hell is he going to do at Oakmont to make it his course?  I hope he slows the greens down to an eight on the stimp and plays the plays the very long par three from 420.  Or better yet, convert the church pews to where they are parallel to the line of play.  We got to go full Davis on this one.

[MCirba]

John,

Can you imagine the outrage here if the R&A moved up the tee on 1 or 16 to 270 yards at The Old Course to make them risk/reward par three/fours?

[Terry Lavin]

I can understand that the USGA wanted to create excitement with its Sunday setup at Lancaster. The short par 4 was over the top, and I'm relieved that it didn't alter the outcome of the championship. Wie almost aced the hole. If the winner won the championship after an ace of a shortened hole on the back nine of a national championship, there would a hell of a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth. All's well that ends well, I suppose.

[Brent Hutto]

I can understand that the USGA wanted to create excitement with its Sunday setup at Lancaster. The short par 4 was over the top, and I'm relieved that it didn't alter the outcome of the championship. Wie almost aced the hole. If the winner won the championship after an ace of a shortened hole on the back nine of a national championship, there would a hell of a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth. All's well that ends well, I suppose.

Wailing and gnashing of teeth on this forum? Among the usual suspects of bloggers who read from the same playbook as this forum?


Or among the larger public? I suspect the LPGA, USGA and Fox would be hyping a hypothetical Wie hole-in-one yesterday to high heaven and that a majority of the general public (OK, the 1% of the general public who even knew the women were playing a national championship yesterday) would remember it as an all-time great feat of heroics.


It would be pitched as the modern-day women's equivalent of Sarazen's hole-out that Put The Masters On The Map back in the day. Regardless of the ridiculously short yardage and total bastardization of the actual hole.

[Chris DeNigris]

Eh...don't really understand all the teeth gnashing.  Played the same for everyone irrespective of yardage.  No unfairness issue here.  Agree with Rory though- if doable 260 would have been a more interesting yardage.

I love 16 from the further back tees to play it - but wasn't it more interesting spectating for them to try and thread driver/3 wood into that green rather than layup/SW  again and again and again?

[Brent Hutto]

Chris,


I think the complaint is that it was a de facto long Par 3 being called a Par 4 simply to hype every birdie into eagle and any eagle into albatross.


Unless someone were seriously, terribly lacking in distance capability there was no reasonable "option" to lay up and play it as a Par 4. The decision to try and get on the green or at least in the front bunker was a forced choice. To hit a 6-iron and try to get up and down with a sand wedge or something was tantamount to playing for bogey.


It would be similar to calling an uphill 320 yard hole a "Par 5" just because the actual tees are back at 500+ yards. Nobody in a supposedly elite field is going to play two shots for position on a 320-yard hole, just to give themselves a perfect wedge distance for their third shot. To do so would be to cede a stroke to the field before even teeing off.


Unless there's some rational reason for a US Open caliber player to forego trying to make 2 or 3 on a hole then that hole is a Par 3. It might be a brutally difficult Par 3 (although I'm not sure #16 yesterday was even the most difficult Par 3 they faced all week) but it's not a Par 4. [EDIT] In fact on Thursday the Par 3 8th hole played to 3.43 stroke average vs. 3.40 for the 16th on Sunday...


P.S. Heck, they ought to have lowered par by one stroke and had the winner at -7 instead of -8. That seems right up USGA's alley!

[Chris DeNigris]

Brent- I've played 8 and it really is a par 4     And I still made bogey.

Not saying it was a great set up as a short 4/jumbo 3- but it wasn't horrible IMO.  I'm guessing the gals NEVER play a slightly uphill 235 yard par 3 in competition.  So this definitely took them outside their comfy zone.  Was it a bit gimmicky- ok, agree.  But again, it wasn't as if layup/W was more compelling to watch.

I wouldn't use the full field scoring avg on Thursday as a good comp to Sun.

[Terry Lavin]

I can understand that the USGA wanted to create excitement with its Sunday setup at Lancaster. The short par 4 was over the top, and I'm relieved that it didn't alter the outcome of the championship. Wie almost aced the hole. If the winner won the championship after an ace of a shortened hole on the back nine of a national championship, there would a hell of a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth. All's well that ends well, I suppose.

Wailing and gnashing of teeth on this forum? Among the usual suspects of bloggers who read from the same playbook as this forum?


Or among the larger public? I suspect the LPGA, USGA and Fox would be hyping a hypothetical Wie hole-in-one yesterday to high heaven and that a majority of the general public (OK, the 1% of the general public who even knew the women were playing a national championship yesterday) would remember it as an all-time great feat of heroics.


It would be pitched as the modern-day women's equivalent of Sarazen's hole-out that Put The Masters On The Map back in the day. Regardless of the ridiculously short yardage and total bastardization of the actual hole.

I was thinking about the hypothetical competitor who lost by one after a hypothetical ace on a phony par 4 hole. If I were that golfer, I'd think that it would be a cheesy way to lose the U.S. Open by one shot in such a way.

[Joe Bausch]

Speaking of sexist comments...How good did Julie Inkster look all week.  She is a real treat in every way.

I can tell you I arrived on Sunday morning around 10 am and she was in the Lexus tent signing autographs and the line was very long.

[Dan Herrmann]

I think the biggest surprise to me was how well everything was run, the huge fan turnout, the the community involvement.   When you consider that the LPGA Championship had to leave DuPont in Wilmington DE and Bulle Rock in Aberdeen MD, less than 50 miles away, you realize just what a great job Rory and the committee did.   


We attended a bunch of the DuPont/Bulle Rock events, and the crowds were very light compared to LCC.   

[Kris Shreiner]

Dan,
You are spot on with your take on how well that tournament was run. Even when you were leaving, the volunteer staff was constantly  thanking everyone for coming out.
It WAS genuine and heartfelt.
I've been to plenty where they are just wanting you to get out of there so they can go home.
Cheers,
Kris 

[Rory Connaughton]

I'm glad to hear that your experience was that good Kris.
Great community support the entire way through.
Our goal from the beginning was to make this a community event and not an LCC event.


Dan, we had an incredible Championship Director in the form of Barry Deach.
Barry was formerly at Western Golf and ran a number of PGA championships for Kohler.
He arrived here in November '13 and worked tirelessly to make this a great experience for the volunteers, spectators
players and community.

[Kevin Pallier]

Rory


I really enjoyed watching the event on TV - the course looked and played superb. Congratulations to all involved !!


Hope to see another event at LCC sometime in the future or maybe even Rolling Green - good to see the works of Flynn on display.

[Rory Connaughton]

Thank you!
The good news, Kevin, is that Rolling Green is hosting next years US Women's Amateur!
Well deserved.