Lido- Virtual Build

[Peter Flory]

For amusement purposes only.  Here is my virtual self time traveling to test out the hole (I left the ball trail on so that you can see where the shot was going).  Was lucky to just walk straight onto the 8th hole.  Place was a ghost town. 

[Jim Nugent]

Peter, I'm pretty sure #8 was the Biarritz.

You are correct.  It was of the variety where the dip was before the putting surface in this case.  There is a bunker roughly where the chasm was on the original hole. 

Peter, how do you know the dip was before the putting surface?  I suspect that may not be the case.

Also, I'm not sure what chasm you're talking about, because the original hole in France did not have a chasm.  The Biarritz course did, for a while, but that was not the hole CBM based this template on. 

[Peter Flory]

Peter, I'm pretty sure #8 was the Biarritz.

You are correct.  It was of the variety where the dip was before the putting surface in this case.  There is a bunker roughly where the chasm was on the original hole. 

Peter, how do you know the dip was before the putting surface?  I suspect that may not be the case.

Also, I'm not sure what chasm you're talking about, because the original hole in France did not have a chasm.  The Biarritz course did, for a while, but that was not the hole CBM based this template on.

here is a pic of the green (just imagine the griping of tour players with that sort of turf now):



The plastacine seems to show it before the green and I believe that the narrative accounts described it that way as well.  I'll try to find that language and post it tonight along with a zoomed view of the plastacine. 

[Alex Miller]

Hey Peter,


This is awesome and I'm loving this thread / the work so far. Just wanted to say that in the pic of the 8th the green seems to have a more substantial right to left tilt (or flare in the back right) than your rendering shows so far. You can see how the turf blocks some of the first story of the house behind, with more of the building being blocked on the right side than left. You may already have this captured, but it looks like it could be even more than in the first rendering.


Thanks!
Alex

[Garland Bayley]

This is just plain awesome.  Amazing that you can get enough data to even guess at the contours.  Applaud all of your hard work.

+1

[Jim Nugent]

Peter, I think you're right about the swale on #8.  Besides the photo you posted, I just saw this passage from a November 26, 1916 article about Lido:

"The (8th) hole is a perfect one-shotter and with a deep depression in front of the green a high tee-ball with stop must be used here to get best results." 

Maybe the writer was wrong, but he says the best shot there was not a low running shot, but a 230 yard carry that landed softly on the green.  Did such a shot exist in 1916? 

[Peter Flory]

Hey Peter,


This is awesome and I'm loving this thread / the work so far. Just wanted to say that in the pic of the 8th the green seems to have a more substantial right to left tilt (or flare in the back right) than your rendering shows so far. You can see how the turf blocks some of the first story of the house behind, with more of the building being blocked on the right side than left. You may already have this captured, but it looks like it could be even more than in the first rendering.


Thanks!
Alex

I agree with you.  There are other differences that I can see as well on the left side of the green.  It's fairly easy to get the basic gist of a hole, but takes a lot of time to polish it.  The image that I just posted with the mower on the green appears to be much less dramatic than it looks from the tee.  So it is that sort of contradictory info that I have to reconcile as well. 


Also, the plastacine verion has that portion of fairway that bulges out to the right.  That appears to have never been construction or washed away by the time of the photos.  I'll probably trim it in the final version because I'm sure that it would be wiped out in the first storm anyway. 


By the way, I did stumble upon the definitive narrative of them losing the hole.  The text discussed a storm at night in January that erased it.  Such a shame, but inevitable it would seem.  Just an unrealistic hole that happened to be spectacular while it lasted.

[Peter Flory]

Peter, I think you're right about the swale on #8.  Besides the photo you posted, I just saw this passage from a November 26, 1916 article about Lido:

"The (8th) hole is a perfect one-shotter and with a deep depression in front of the green a high tee-ball with stop must be used here to get best results." 

Maybe the writer was wrong, but he says the best shot there was not a low running shot, but a 230 yard carry that landed softly on the green.  Did such a shot exist in 1916?

Thanks for finding that.  That is the passage that I was going to look for. 

I got into hickory golf over the past couple years, mainly as a way to understand how these old courses play.  I do have a high 230 yard shot with vintage equipment, but I can't guarantee that I wouldn't put it in the Atlantic Ocean or 20 yards left on a hole like this.  It would have been a shot only for pros or top ams back then. 

One thing that I'm really getting an appreciation of after reading all these old accounts is that the mid level players and duffers really knew their limitations and were much happier playing par 4s at 3 shot holes and a hole like this one as a 2 shotter.  I bet 10% or less of the players on the Lido hit this green in regulation in its initial form. 

[Craig Disher]

Peter,
Do you know the  date for your most recent photo? The green must have been sprayed with salt water whenever there was a strong breeze out of the south. I don't know how good turf could have been maintained under those conditions.

I've sent you an IM.

[Peter Flory]

Peter,
Do you know the  date for your most recent photo? The green must have been sprayed with salt water whenever there was a strong breeze out of the south. I don't know how good turf could have been maintained under those conditions.

I've sent you an IM.

I don't know the date, but I can try to research for you.  It's one of the best pics that I've seen from the course.  I started a folder where I have been saving every scrap of information that I could find.  That includes every pic and article posted in the previous Lido threads here as well as anything that I could find from magazine archives: Life, American Golfer, Golf Illustrated, etc.  I've organized everything so that when I work on a hole I can quickly review all known information about it.  I'm also keeping a word doc that assembles all written information about each hole (cut and pasted language from various articles) and pictures from holes that the authors listed as similar in nature- mostly from NGLA, Piping Rock, and the British holes that were the original inspiration. 

[Mike Hendren]

Peter, I'm enjoying this thread - keep it up.

Also, thanks to you I've been jamming out to Boz Scaggs with a closed door in my office this morning. 

[Jim Nugent]

I got into hickory golf over the past couple years, mainly as a way to understand how these old courses play.  I do have a high 230 yard shot with vintage equipment...

Including the golf ball of 1916? 

[Sven Nilsen]

You are correct.  It was of the variety where the dip was before the putting surface in this case.  There is a bunker roughly where the chasm was on the original hole. 

Peter:

As you note, on the original version of the 8th at Lido there was a cross bunker to be carried, but there was a good bit of turf after the bunker and before the swale.  On many of the versions that we see today this turf would be considered the front portion of the green. 

Its tough to tell from your images if you have the swale starting right after the cross bunker or not. 

If I had to guess, the turf before the swale was probably pretty close to the same level as the green itself.  The topo below is the best evidence of the various levels of the land around the hole.  There aren't many photos of the original version that I've found, and none of them are really clear enough to provide much definition.  My guess is that when they built the new version of the hole they did it in the area of the land between the cross-bunker and the swale, which was already raised up and is what we see in the images of the second version of the hole.

I'd also guess that the author of the article Jim quoted had no idea as to how CBM believed the hole should be played.

Sven

Feb. 1915 Vanity Fair -

[Peter Flory]

I got into hickory golf over the past couple years, mainly as a way to understand how these old courses play.  I do have a high 230 yard shot with vintage equipment...

Including the golf ball of 1916?

I have used the McIntyre Ouimet balls and they go pretty well.  But most of the time I just use a soft modern ball, like a Wilson Duo or a Chromesoft due to their availability. 


So, my answer is... maybe.  When we play this summer, I'll bring some replica balls with me. 

[Peter Flory]

You are correct.  It was of the variety where the dip was before the putting surface in this case.  There is a bunker roughly where the chasm was on the original hole. 

Peter:

As you note, on the original version of the 8th at Lido there was a cross bunker to be carried, but there was a good bit of turf after the bunker and before the swale.  On many of the versions that we see today this turf would be considered the front portion of the green. 

Its tough to tell from your images if you have the swale starting right after the cross bunker or not. 

If I had to guess, the turf before the swale was probably pretty close to the same level as the green itself.  The topo below is the best evidence of the various levels of the land around the hole.  There aren't many photos of the original version that I've found, and none of them are really clear enough to provide much definition.  My guess is that when they built the new version of the hole they did it in the area of the land between the cross-bunker and the swale, which was already raised up and is what we see in the images of the second version of the hole.

I'd also guess that the author of the article Jim quoted had no idea as to how CBM believed the hole should be played.

Sven

Sven- that map is really good and when I first saw it, it cleared up some of the parts of the course that were mysterious to me.  #5 was the biggest revelation for me in terms of the shaping.  Also, it cleared up the way that the fairway was contoured for the drive on #12.  I read accounts of how there was a bit of a speed slot there, but I couldn't imagine because it was so close to the water. 

In terms of the rebuilt green with the boardwalk, I did briefly have them both on my plot and I think that they moved it further inland to make room for those tin huts. 

Here is a closeup of the 8th on that Vanity Fair diagram (the black box is the bunker):


There is some kind of horseshoe shape in the ground after the bunker and in the valley before the green.  Also note that the topo lines indicate that the green is raised, but they don't show that the other areas would be.  So, in my current draft of the hole, I don't have as much as a dramatic biarritz type shape as I see at other version of the hole. I have the fairway and the bunker on roughly the same level as the tee (except the tee is a little elevated), and then I have a dip after the bunker and a rise up to the green, which I currently have as being something like 5 feet above the initial fairway section before the bunker. 


Sort of shaoed like this:



                                       ________
-----------------\________/

I'd actually like some help on this topic from the board.  Sven- if you can, post a side view elevation drawing of what you think that it was probably like.  I think this is one of those areas where there is a blindspot and we need to make our best call.  First of many. 

[Ally Mcintosh]

Looking at that Vanity Fair diagram, I’d say the area before the swale is the hogsback, raised at the same level (or as near to) as the green.


But I’ve never looked at anything to do with this hole before.

[Sven Nilsen]

Looking at that Vanity Fair diagram, I’d say the area before the swale is the hogsback, raised at the same level (or as near to) as the green.

I agree with this, and it fits CBM's own descriptions of what a Biarritz should look like.

[Tommy Naccarato]

Peter, Congratulations! You’ve dragged me out of GCA retirement to make a comment here!


I’ve done a fair amount of research on Lido; as well as had many a great conversation with Uncle George Bahto about the place; one of the most memorable while driving back from Shinny/National as well as Macdonald & Raynor’s graves with the top down in his red Caddy Escalade! (The man had passion!)


One thing to add to this:  given the water table; where they got the sand (much of it was from the lagoon, probably more then the Channel, which was overly silty) the fairways were somewhat raised with everything between the holes somewhat more at natural grade (flat). Those areas, because the routing was so tight, we’re heavily planted with sea bent sprigs, which eventually made the place famous for lost golf balls.  So famous, that no one played it despite the architecture! This coupled with early agronomist issues were like a death kneel.


On the 8th, the hole literally played out on the beach!  It didn’t last long thanks to a hurricane condition which destroyed the hole.


Everything else looks pretty cool!  Looking forward to see how you handle the 10th with its Alp’s hill.

[Tom_Doak]

For what it's worth, I've worked on several versions of the Biarritz where the approach area was a bit lower than the green, but sort of ramped up toward it, because of the natural slopes.  [These would include the holes at Yeamans Hall and Mid Ocean, as I first saw them.]  On those, the leading or tee-side edge of the "front plateau" is maybe five feet lower than the front of the green, but the opposite edge [just before the swale] is only maybe a foot or two lower than the front of the green.


Lido, however, started from flat ground, so I don't know why Raynor would have made the approach significantly lower than the green in that location.

[Garland Bayley]

...
Lido, however, started from flat ground, so I don't know why Raynor would have made the approach significantly lower than the green in that location.

Wasn't the hole in question built on fill? Couldn't it have been simply a matter of not spending time and money on filling it all to the same level?

[Peter Flory]

Peter, Congratulations! You’ve dragged me out of GCA retirement to make a comment here!

I’ve done a fair amount of research on Lido; as well as had many a great conversation with Uncle George Bahto about the place; one of the most memorable while driving back from Shinny/National as well as Macdonald & Raynor’s graves with the top down in his red Caddy Escalade! (The man had passion!)

One thing to add to this:  given the water table; where they got the sand (much of it was from the lagoon, probably more then the Channel, which was overly silty) the fairways were somewhat raised with everything between the holes somewhat more at natural grade (flat). Those areas, because the routing was so tight, we’re heavily planted with sea bent sprigs, which eventually made the place famous for lost golf balls.  So famous, that no one played it despite the architecture! This coupled with early agronomist issues were like a death kneel.

On the 8th, the hole literally played out on the beach!  It didn’t last long thanks to a hurricane condition which destroyed the hole.

Everything else looks pretty cool!  Looking forward to see how you handle the 10th with its Alp’s hill.

Tommy- welcome back.  I'm glad to get your comments, especially since you've put so much thought into this. 

In one of those old articles, I did read where the author was going on about how difficult it was to find your ball in the near white sand and bents.  He suggested that a great invention would be the orange golf ball.  Tough place to caddie I can imagine. 

Regarding your commend on the natural grade and the built up fairways- that is what makes this project somewhat doable.  It would be much harder if there were more natural landforms.  For this build, I first set everything about 5 feet above the water table, which gives me a little wiggle room down if I need it- like on the 8th.  Then, I plan to built up each hole from there like I did on #1.  One other nice thing about the generally flat plot and the build up system is that I can do the holes out of order as most of the elevations don't carry over.  I'll probably hop around based on which holes I have the most information on first.  That way I will get a better feel for the place and practice that tricks that I'll apply to get the environment looking right.  Can hopefully apply those lessons to the holes with less info later. 

There are definitely going to be some challenging holes when there are more dramatic features.  I'll need some advice on the alps hole in terms of how to handle the little fairway section over the alps and bunker.  The knoll hole will be tricky too without a direct photo.  I can see it in the background in some others, but not well. 

[Peter Flory]

For what it's worth, I've worked on several versions of the Biarritz where the approach area was a bit lower than the green, but sort of ramped up toward it, because of the natural slopes.  [These would include the holes at Yeamans Hall and Mid Ocean, as I first saw them.]  On those, the leading or tee-side edge of the "front plateau" is maybe five feet lower than the front of the green, but the opposite edge [just before the swale] is only maybe a foot or two lower than the front of the green.

Lido, however, started from flat ground, so I don't know why Raynor would have made the approach significantly lower than the green in that location.

Here is a photo of Mid Ocean. 

That is sort of the general idea of what I was thinking Lido's was like, except that the distance between the end of the crossing bunker and the front of the green at Lido appears to be 50 yards based on my measurements after locking it into scale using the aerials + drawings and plastacine.  The drawings appears to show the dip starting almost immediately after the bunker, so that is still about a 40 yard gully.  It also seems a little different because of that horseshoe shape to the way that it begins. 

I'll put more work into this and will post updated versions from better angles when I can for more feedback.

Just for others to consider, here are what I think are the 2 best views of the hole (in addition to the one where they are mowing the green):

The camera is from a fairly elevated position.  I drew a line where it looks like the green would start based on the slopes for the false front and another over the horizon of the shelf.  Note that the cross bunker isn't really visible.  It looks like a sliver of it might be peeking through.  The long grasses might be blocking it, or it may have been washed away by this point.  Similarly, this tee isn't the original tips.  It might be a forward tee or the back tee might have been lost. 

And here is the pic with Ray putting.  Note that in this pic, the right side of the green (the side toward the water) appears pretty flat, while in the pic above, it is highly built up.  It seems logical to think that the Ray version is more original and the pic above might be after fortifications were added to protect the green from the surf.  This would reconcile with Tommy's comment, which is that the green was basically on the beach when it was originally built.  The green above and the one that I have built so far really both have that buffer between the target and the beach.  I'm strongly reconsidering that now. 



One other thing that was bothering me was that I couldn't see that big right to left tilt in the pic with the mower, but it was so prominent from the pics from the tee.  I think the answer was that it was no illusion.  It just changed.  This poor hole was getting battered right out of the gate. 

[Jim Nugent]

This poor hole was getting battered right out of the gate.

It makes me wonder why they built it so exposed to the ocean in the first place. 

[Peter Flory]

This poor hole was getting battered right out of the gate.

It makes me wonder why they built it so exposed to the ocean in the first place.

I think they might have been trying to compete with the British links.  Maybe a little inferiority complex.  A lot of the hype that looks like it came out when this was being built and shortly after mentioned that it had British qualities. 

Even the caption for the Ray photo read "Ray putting on the eight green at Lido with the seas waves lapping the edge of the green.  All of the atmosphere of Britain's seaside links to be had here."

In another account that I read, it declared that the 8th at Lido may be the most expensive golf hole in the World and estimated it's value at something like $250K.  Their rationale was that it was the opportunity cost of the hole because the land would be worth that if sold off. 

So, if the elements didn't get the hole, it seems like economics may have anyway, especially when the club started to struggle financially. 

[Sven Nilsen]

That is sort of the general idea of what I was thinking Lido's was like, except that the distance between the end of the crossing bunker and the front of the green at Lido appears to be 50 yards based on my measurements after locking it into scale using the aerials + drawings and plastacine.  The drawings appears to show the dip starting almost immediately after the bunker, so that is still about a 40 yard gully.  It also seems a little different because of that horseshoe shape to the way that it begins. 

Take another look at the topo map of the hole.  Everything that is white is turf with the bunker being black, everything else is the sandy waste. 

From the tee there was sandy waste, a bit of turf, the cross bunker, more turf (which from the topo is elevated just like the green), the swale (the collection of tightly mapped topo lines), and then the green proper.

What you are calling a forty yard gully after the bunker was a raised area (the hogsback feature), or what on a fully green-turfed version would be the front portion in front of the swale.

This is probably the best photo I have that shows all of this.  The foreshortening makes it difficult to differentiate the different pieces, but you can make out the bunker and the dark line where the swale was.

If you haven't read them, I'd recommend finding the CBM and Whigham articles on the templates they were planning to build at NGLA.  There are a ton of clues built into the descriptions of the various holes that will help you in figuring out what they were trying to do with each one.