2018 Curtis Cup at Quaker Ridge

[Ronald Montesano]

KL and I are on site for the weekend. I've posted this first bit on BG.C, and will add more architecture and swing pieces, as the orb revolves.


Link #1: https://wp.me/p20nYT-7lz


RM

[Ronald Montesano]

You can also follow the Twitter @buffalogolfer and Instagram @buffalogolfer for photo updates...RM

[Ronald Montesano]

Another post, this time a brief course tour: https://wp.me/p20nYT-7lL

[Tim Martin]

I attended the event on Friday and the golf course is fantastic. Quaker Ridge is very difficult and the shots on and around the greens were giving the players all they could handle. Great venues and no ropes/security make this and the Walker Cup the premier events for spectators.

[Ronald Montesano]

I think the madness of US Open attendance peaked in 2015 at Chambers Bay. The vicious slopes between holes precluded spectator access, due to certainty of injury. As a result, the crowds were even harder to move about. Doesn't detract from CB as a course, but it does minimize its viability as a tournament site.


In contrast, courses like QR are ideal for spectators, especially at an event like this. If I could attend one USGA event this year, it would be the inaugural Senior Women's Open at Chicago Golf Club. One of the founding USGA clubs, essential arquitectural merit, and the first playing of a tournament. The course is eminently walkable, from all reports, and the crowds will not be excessive.


Tim is correct. In my mind, the Open is an experience, but the other USGA events are a relationship with the course and the competitors.

[Jeff Schley]

I attended the event on Friday and the golf course is fantastic. Quaker Ridge is very difficult and the shots on and around the greens were giving the players all they could handle. Great venues and no ropes/security make this and the Walker Cup the premier events for spectators.

I watched yesterdays matches and the crowd getting up close was cool.  The players are proabably being followed by their families and some other die hards so it made for a unique atmosphere.  Love Quaker Ridge and played last year with a couple of the pros there who were a great asset to that club for sure.

[Ronald Montesano]

Kevin Lynch (the gregarious one) has been among the gallery and he engages everyone! He relates that folks are just fans of women's golf. Here is a piece he just finished: http://buffalogolfer.com/wordpress/curtis-cup-2018-saturday-am-four-ball-recap/

[Lynn_Shackelford]

Naturally the best viewing, from behind the golfer, is what makes the Walker Cup and Curtis Cup so appealing.  It looked on TV like some great play on a very difficult course.  Having never played it, I was interested in watching.  Fox did an okay job in showing the holes.  They didn't have many maps or aerials which would have helped.
Sadly I did notice the mowing patterns.  They have a large cut of rough fronting the bunkers, one of my pet peeves.  Nothing to detracts from the "maintenance meld" or intended architecture faster than to see a ball roll short of going into the sand because it is stopped by the rough.

[Jeff Schley]

Ron what do you think of the bunkers?  I thought that was the biggest defense at QR myself.  Of course outside of tucked pins.

[Ronald Montesano]

1. KL latest piece, on Saturday afternoon play: http://buffalogolfer.com/wordpress/curtis-cup-2018-saturday-afternoon-recap/


2. Lynn, I'll be sure to pay attention to that brace of rough before the bunkers.


3. Jeff, the golfers out here are so accurate that they simply don't find fairway bunkers, at least in team play.We'll see if being on their own makes a difference in the singles matches today. They found more green bunkers with wedges on #9 than on any other hole. That wee shot demanded the utmost precision. The recoveries from green bunkers are fair. No one is zip-spinning to a stop, but they are able to control them well.

[Steve_ Shaffer]

Recent Hanse interview about his work at QR:


https://www.lohud.com/story/sports/high-school/golf/2018/05/03/golf-course-architect-gil-hanse-all-things-quaker-ridge-and-tillinghast/569715002/[/font][/size][/font]

[Ronald Montesano]

Great to meet Mark Chalfant at Quaker Ridge today. Here's my bit from today: https://wp.me/p20nYT-7mr


More later.

[corey miller]

Can someone familiar with the course reconcile Gil's comments in the first two questions (concerning Quaker Ridge) with Tillinghast work at Winged foot? 


Are those comments (match play etc etc) an indication of QR being more like WFW than WFE? 


Throwing Fenway into the mix, what differentiates the four courses that have all been renovated by Gil? 

[John McCarthy]

Did the Swing Doctor make an appearance at QR?

[Ronald Montesano]

Since we didn't golf there, we didn't doctor the swing