Bacon Park Savannah Playday

[ward peyronnin]

I look forward with pleasuarable anticipation to my dewsweeping solo expedition to this D Ross muni tomorrow. O C Welch, one of those deadpan  car dealer tv pitchmen reminiscent of days of yore bid on the management contract for this Savannah golf landmark and hired Rich Mandell of Pinehurst fame for a redo. As a lot of us know Rich knows what he is doing and the mature savannah spaced trees and subtle Ross touches and a $22 green fee are definitely alluring.
I will take pics and do my best to post unless some much more qualified practitioner of the art has preceded me. Affordable golf HO!

[A.G._Crockett]

I look forward with pleasuarable anticipation to my dewsweeping solo expedition to this D Ross muni tomorrow. O C Welch, one of those deadpan  car dealer tv pitchmen reminiscent of days of yore bid on the management contract for this Savannah golf landmark and hired Rich Mandell of Pinehurst fame for a redo. As a lot of us know Rich knows what he is doing and the mature savannah spaced trees and subtle Ross touches and a $22 green fee are definitely alluring.
I will take pics and do my best to post unless some much more qualified practitioner of the art has preceded me. Affordable golf HO!

I'll be interested to hear what you think.  I played there five or six years ago before the current management company took over and before Mandel worked on the course.
At that time, as you may already know, the 18 Ross holes were still there, but were "imbedded" in three different nines.  In order to play the Ross course, you had to jump around between the three, which I was able to do because it was a cold, rainy late February day and NOBODY was on the golf course.  Those 18 holes were good; the nine that had been added were a soppy mess.
Savannah used the Ross course for the city championship and some other events; it looks from the website like they have finally made the leap and gone back to a Ross 18 with the other nine holes as some sort of a stand alone.  If so, then good on them.
My recollection is that there might be one or two holes that had to be changed years ago because of road expansion, but I'm not sure about that. 

[Rich Goodale]

Yo Wardo (and AG)


I played a Ross course in Savannah 40+ years ago.  Would that be the same place?


What time are you planning to play?  I'm 2-3 hours away today down in Amelia Island.  I could come tomorrow or whenever.  Let me know.


Rich

[Tim Gavrich]

Ward--


I played Bacon Park about 6 weeks ago and quite enjoyed it. The greens were struggling but seemed to be on their way back. They putted a lot better than they looked, for the most part. If they can get it in consistently good shape, it'll be a real winner for locals and well worth seeing from farther away, too. 17 is one of my favorite long Ross par 3s.


Enjoy!

[ward peyronnin]

This was a filller as I dropped my wife Darlene off at the airport at 5:45; went into Savannah to the Diner on Abercrombe for a massive Western Omelet and showed up for the post dawn first booking. Ran around the course in 2 hrs 10 even tho I hit two balls etc.
There is just no getting around it is rough and lacks money to doll things up but  the course still has chops. Imagine an African savannah landscape but the Bilboa( live oak, pecan, hickory) trees are twice as tall and spread out which creates a VAST playing field framed by primordial forest and separated by groves of the same. The level ground definitely makes interest and strategy elusive. But this is basic golf at its most elemental: spy the target and do your best to focus on the shimmering line of play that bounces around the 200 yd wide playin "corridors". Hit and chase and hit again.  Reminescent of Mammoth Dunes endless turf perhaps. I will indulge myownself and recall the post where I espoused the introduction of mid sized massing of plants(gorse). In this case a properly funded green staff could deliver sections of native that would mightily add to the visual complexity and aesthetics and deliver a linksy feel with an impressive backdrop.
I have a difficult time lassoing the correct current wisdom on what constitutes a Ross green style. None of these tea cupped although all were raised nor were they wild with a few exceptions. But there are some very good flatland greens including4- an inverted maiden with a spine separating two anterior bowls, 9 - a redan with maybe 4 feet of elevation- 12- a beautifully raise knoll like platform impacted right and left at varying distances out by the ephemeral reach of live oak extensions, 13- a bunkerless mesa much like a Rainor short at 376 yards. I also like 17 as a mighty test of the golfers resolve to finish strong as I feathered a driver just two paces short of the green,

I am not good enough to know what is new or old but one can see that Rich Mandell restored modest but will rimmed unfussy but interesting bunkers and used small cops and knobs at strategic points. Only 18 holes are maintained and I am told they are all the Ross holes. Is it a course I could play every day. Not really. But is it a course you can whirl around with your buds regardless of skill level who will have fun but that the good player needs to pull his focus back to to score- yes.

Prob a 5 or 4.5 on my rater scale I dont know about Doak scale. I will try to post pics when I have the energy to gfigure out how

[Richard_Mandell]

Ward,


Glad you got out to play Bacon Park.  We had the original Ross drawings for each green and built them to his plans.  I don't believe they ever were built to his plans previously.  When I got there, there were 18 tiny postage stamps, all built-up way too much.  We actually dropped them down to reflect Ross's notes.


We did the project in three phases, with the Ross front nine and back nine the first two summers.  The third nine we rebuilt the next summer which became a radical departure from its previous incarnation as we eliminated all the sand bunkers, filled in some ponds to eliminate forced carries, and built nine of the craziest greens I have ever built.  Think old Sitwell Park greens but at a smaller scale. Definitely pushed the envelope on those.


Derek Duncan just completed an article about Bacon Park which will be in the November issue of Golf Georgia Magazine so keep an eye out for it. 


Also, I just completed a podcast with Derek.  Here is the link (and we do discuss Bacon Park a bit):  http://feedtheball.com/2018/09/30/episode-32-richard-mandell/

[Kyle Harris]

Based on some of the comment here, it's as if the golf course was so drab everyone was lulled into shooting a boring 58.


1. No hole over 500 yards.
2. I birdied the last two holes hitting only 3 2-irons for full shots.
3. Neat uses of old drainage canals that cross the property.
4. The 4th, 9th, and 17th are highlight holes that would fit on any great golf course.

[ward peyronnin]

I enjoyed playing Bacon Park and would do it again. I don't find it boring at all just a different style of golf than I am accustomed to.
 I think most all the greens were well done, i noticed a lot of squared front corners for instance. I tried to convey that the ancient trees make up for the uniformally level ground. And is it classic ODG economical routing. Old MacDonald is relatively level too but makes up for it with a multiplicity of features that are more memorable than Bacon Park could muster but Bacon Park delivers some very cool holes and nuances.

I don't understand your post Kyle but boo rah to your 58 and nuclear two irons; well done and keep up the supplements

[Kyle Harris]

I enjoyed playing Bacon Park and would do it again. I don't find it boring at all just a different style of golf than I am accustomed to.
 I think most all the greens were well done, i noticed a lot of squared front corners for instance. I tried to convey that the ancient trees make up for the uniformally level ground. And is it classic ODG economical routing. Old MacDonald is relatively level too but makes up for it with a multiplicity of features that are more memorable than Bacon Park could muster but Bacon Park delivers some very cool holes and nuances.

I don't understand your post Kyle but boo rah to your 58 and nuclear two irons; well done and keep up the supplements

Oh, I think I reached the 58 mark around the 13th hole.


You realize you just compared a municipal golf course in SE Georgia at a price point an order of magnitude lower to one of the premier destination golf courses in the world?


That's sort of the tenor of my post. You'd play it much more frequently than other alternatives in Savannah if you lived there. Not every golf course on the planet is designed to out do your rose-tinted version of past experiences. Let's not be the guy that goes back to his home course and says, "Hey, these guys are doing this so why don't we?" Or at least lets not be the guy that doesn't bother to listen to the answer.