Chamblee rant on current architectural trend

[Michael Morandi]

Brandel went on a bend today decrying the current architectural bias for wide fairways with few trees or penal consequences for an errant drive. This was his way of praising the driving demands of Royal Troon, where a missed fairway can put you in some tall, deep rough, to say nothing about the steep faced fairway bunkers. He noted, as did I in saying the Pinehurst Open involved too much luck , that  Bryson won the event despite ranking 66th in driving accuracy that week. Very un-US OPEN like. He said that the randomness intended by the  wire grass was not very random, as balls rarely settled in it. He praised the Arnold Palmer Invitational for growing the rough against the wishes of the top tour players. Have we gone too far with wide fairways to suit our interest in strategy? 

[Craig Sweet]

Are the fairways too wide for 99.9% of golfers?  Do more than 1% of golfers consider strategy as the designer might have intended?


Do more than 50% of golf course owners, or memberships, care about anything more than pace of play and maximizing rounds played?   

[Kevin_Reilly]

Tell Brandel to play the Cashen course for a few days (paying for his own golf balls) and then get back to us.

[Ally Mcintosh]

Are the fairways too wide for 99.9% of golfers?  Do more than 1% of golfers consider strategy as the designer might have intended?


Do more than 50% of golf course owners, or memberships, care about anything more than pace of play and maximizing rounds played?

I am not condoning what Brandel said (I don’t agree with his basic take) but:


- The 1% you talk about above are certainly not the pro’s. They care little about classic strategy


- The golf course owners who care about pace of play do so to get more revenue. So they probably also care about cost of maintaining short grass.


For what it’s worth, I like wide fairways. But there are some golf courses where even my wildest drives and mishits go unpunished because it doesn’t make a whole lot of difference to how I take on the next shot. I do like a sense of having to execute my drive how I want to. 14 drives where I suffer little consequence no matter how poorly I am hitting it just removes fun, doesn’t add to it.

[Sean_A]

Imo rough is meant to be hit or miss…and it certainly is at Troon. I saw loads of good shots from decent lies in the rough yesterday. Is Chamblee watching the same event? Few things worse I can think of is knowing your ball is completely dead when 5 yards off the fairway. Golf is essentially a game about recovery shots…so they should be on offer most of the time. Pinehurst was spot on.

Ciao

[Mike_Clayton]

Isn't part of the problem wide fairways needing to be allied with firm/hard greens and pins difficult to access from bad angles.
Royal Melbourne doesn't need narrower fairways - but nor do you need a pitch mark repairer. Augusta likewise.

[Jeff Schley]

Isn't part of the problem wide fairways needing to be allied with firm/hard greens and pins difficult to access from bad angles.
Royal Melbourne doesn't need narrower fairways - but nor do you need a pitch mark repairer. Augusta likewise.

Yes great point, over irrigation and preference for the greens to be "green". Firm and fast on links aren't lush green it is shades of brown, embrace it.

[Mark_Fine]

On this site we often forget that the best players in the world play a different game and look very differently at courses than we do. For those players, Brandel is spot on with his comments.  When there are no real pros or cons for hitting the ball 300+ yards in the fairway vs 300+ yards somewhere else 30 or 40 yards off line, is that great architecture?  For 99% of us, it might still be but for the best players it is not.  I played this past weekend at my home club, which is a fantastic old William Flynn, with a guy who had 180+ mph ball speed and carried his driver 320 yards.  He hit the ball in spots I had rarely ever seen before.  The course, which was soft from some rain, had little defense for him.  Angles didn’t matter, the height of our rough didn’t matter, even some of our trees didn’t matter. Even if the course was firm it probably wouldn’t matter.  On our one dogleg par five (550 yards from the tees we played) lined by trees on the right, he flew his tee shot over all of them and had 130 yards into the green.  He hit a sand wedge for his second shot. 

For 99% of us, Lehigh and many many others courses are fantastic and we love and appreciate all the angles, the width, the strategy, the ingenious golf architecture designed into the golf course.  But for the best, who play a different game, they see things very differently. 

This is a constant struggle for courses that are primarily designed for 99% of us but also hold tournaments for the best players in the world once a year or once every five or ten years.  We can only move our tees back so far and I sure don’t want someone messing with Lehigh just so we can make the course more interesting and challenging for that 1%.  But as Brandel correctly says, to do so, changes would need to be made and unfortunately the other 99% wouldn’t love them.

Tournament only courses, change the ball/equipment, …, we’ve discussed many of the options but this is where the game is right now at least for the top players in the game.

[Ronald Montesano]

Mid and High handicap amateur wide misses involve duck hooks and slices. Those balls are moving laterally and losing distance.

Top amateurs have more pushes and tugs than sliders. Pros don't miss nearly as wide as talking heads and keyboards would have us believe.

[Sean_A]

On this site we often forget that the best players in the world play a different game and look very differently at courses than we do. For those players, Brandel is spot on with his comments.  When there are no real pros or cons for hitting the ball 300+ yards in the fairway vs 300+ yards somewhere else 30 or 40 yards off line, is that great architecture?  For 99% of us, it might still be but for the best players it is not.  I played this past weekend at my home club, which is a fantastic old William Flynn, with a guy who had 180+ mph ball speed and carried his driver 320 yards.  He hit the ball in spots I had rarely ever seen before.  The course, which was soft from some rain, had little defense for him.  Angles didn’t matter, the height of our rough didn’t matter, even some of our trees didn’t matter. Even if the course was firm it probably wouldn’t matter.  On our one dogleg par five (550 yards from the tees we played) lined by trees on the right, he flew his tee shot over all of them and had 130 yards into the green.  He hit a sand wedge for his second shot. 

For 99% of us, Lehigh and many many others courses are fantastic and we love and appreciate all the angles, the width, the strategy, the ingenious golf architecture designed into the golf course.  But for the best, who play a different game, they see things very differently. 

This is a constant struggle for courses that are primarily designed for 99% of us but also hold tournaments for the best players in the world once a year or once every five or ten years.  We can only move our tees back so far and I sure don’t want someone messing with Lehigh just so we can make the course more interesting and challenging for that 1%.  But as Brandel correctly says, to do so, changes would need to be made and unfortunately the other 99% wouldn’t love them.

Tournament only courses, change the ball/equipment, …, we’ve discussed many of the options but this is where the game is right now at least for the top players in the game.

Hang on, wasn’t it less than 19 guys that finished under par at Pinehurst? Chamblee sees what he wants to see.

Ciao

[Mark_Fine]

Sean,
There are other ways to challenge the golfers and it was mostly diabolical greens at Pinehurst #2, but accuracy off the tee wasn’t really tested/that important.

[Dan_Callahan]

In fairness to Brandel, he very clearly said he was talking about the setup of tournament courses for pros. He made the point of saying that wide fairways and low rough make for a perfect combination for the typical golfer who is out there playing with buddies. But when it comes to the best players in the world, he would like to see greater punishment for errant drives and a premium placed on accuracy over power. Not sure I agree with him ... watching pros hack out sideways during some of those US Opens a few decades ago wasn't much fun. But he was careful to say that he was only talking about the setup at professional events, and specifically at the US Open and the Open Championship.

[George Pazin]

You could get a lot right by simply employing Costanza's Opposite Strategy to everything Brandel says.

[Mike Bodo]

Imo rough is meant to be hit or miss…and it certainly is at Troon. I saw loads of good shots from decent lies in the rough yesterday. Is Chamblee watching the same event? Few things worse I can think of is knowing your ball is completely dead when 5 yards off the fairway. Golf is essentially a game about recovery shots…so they should be on offer most of the time. Pinehurst was spot on.

Ciao

Agree completely, Sean. I saw a lot of good shots out of the hay yesterday and today. More than I thought would happen. It's the wind and bunkers that are kicking everyone's arse.

[Kalen Braley]

The rough is certainly at play, but I don't see it as being unique in this case.

The big differentiator seemed to be the bunkers. They were a very real challenge for these guys and on several occasions they left their 1st shot in them or had to play out away from their target.

How often do we see pros faced with this in the US?  I can't think of even one example on any of the tour stops.

[Rob Marshall]

Are wide fairways really a current trend or is it that a lot of the well known newer courses are in areas where it is inherently windy?

[Mike Bodo]

How often do we see pros faced with this in the US?  I can't think of even one example on any of the tour stops.

This begs the question why the guys that came to the states from the U.K. didn't employ many of the same bunkering design techniques? I'm sure there's been a discussion topic on this very subject, but I've always found it interesting that U.K. archies produced bunkers on the courses they designed/built in the U.S. very different from those back home.

[Tom_Doak]

How often do we see pros faced with this in the US?  I can't think of even one example on any of the tour stops.

This begs the question why the guys that came to the states from the U.K. didn't employ many of the same bunkering design techniques? I'm sure there's been a discussion topic on this very subject, but I've always found it interesting that U.K. archies produced bunkers on the courses they designed/built in the U.S. very different from those back home.

Revetted bunkers had yet to become in fashion when Donald Ross and his contemporaries lived in the U.K., before coming to the U.S.  The bunkers in the early days were much less severe in terms of shape, but then the sand wasn't raked, either.  I'm not sure exactly when revetted bunkers became the norm, but it was the result of increased volumes of play and the need to shore up green side bunkers to stop wind erosion from damaging the greens.

[Mike Bodo]

How often do we see pros faced with this in the US?  I can't think of even one example on any of the tour stops.

This begs the question why the guys that came to the states from the U.K. didn't employ many of the same bunkering design techniques? I'm sure there's been a discussion topic on this very subject, but I've always found it interesting that U.K. archies produced bunkers on the courses they designed/built in the U.S. very different from those back home.

Revetted bunkers had yet to become in fashion when Donald Ross and his contemporaries lived in the U.K., before coming to the U.S.  The bunkers in the early days were much less severe in terms of shape, but then the sand wasn't raked, either.  I'm not sure exactly when revetted bunkers became the norm, but it was the result of increased volumes of play and the need to shore up green side bunkers to stop wind erosion from damaging the greens.

I knew there had to be a discussion topic from the past on this. Seems the consensus was revetted bunkers had been around since the 1800's around the time of the advent of irons.


https://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php?topic=51575.0


Not sure if they had yet become the "norm" or en vogue by the time many of the U.K. archies crossed the pond in the late 1800's and early 1900's, but it sounds as though they'd been in existence for a bit - in particular at TOC. If I'm not mistaken, didn't Dornoch have revetted bunkers during Ross' time there?


I'd love to do a deep dive on this - either in a separate thread or bump this old thread up, but I have to believe between all the great minds on this site we can come close to pinpointing when this bunkering style became prevalent and why it wasn't replicated in the U.S. - especially at coastal courses like Pebble Beach and Cypress Point.

[Tommy Williamsen]

I didn't hear Brandel's comments. One of the major differences between the pros and amateurs is that we have to search for an errant tee ball. They have spotters who find the shot in the hay. For us, it might be a lost ball. I wonder how many shots spotters have saved for the players.

[Mike Bodo]

I didn't hear Brandel's comments. One of the major differences between the pros and amateurs is that we have to search for an errant tee ball. They have spotters who find the shot in the hay. For us, it might be a lost ball. I wonder how many shots spotters have saved for the players.

Oh, I'm guessing quite a number of balls that would have otherwise been lost were it not for spotters.

[Michael Morandi]

"To me it's incredibly clear that the US Open was a fluke. You will see a much more proper champion this week."
- Brandel Chamblee

[Tom_Doak]

"To me it's incredibly clear that the US Open was a fluke. You will see a much more proper champion this week."
- Brandel Chamblee

Hmmm . . . perhaps part of what's gotten Brandel's craw is that a long-hitting LIV guy won the U.S. Open.


But, Brandel as a player was a short and straight hitter.  Every such player thinks that long hitters should be penalized for their waywardness.  He is just talking his book.

[Tom_Doak]

Not sure if they had yet become the "norm" or en vogue by the time many of the U.K. archies crossed the pond in the late 1800's and early 1900's, but it sounds as though they'd been in existence for a bit - in particular at TOC. If I'm not mistaken, didn't Dornoch have revetted bunkers during Ross' time there?


I'd love to do a deep dive on this - either in a separate thread or bump this old thread up, but I have to believe between all the great minds on this site we can come close to pinpointing when this bunkering style became prevalent and why it wasn't replicated in the U.S. - especially at coastal courses like Pebble Beach and Cypress Point.

Mike:


Do the deep dive, but let's not distract from this thread.  I really don't know the history, I just remember that few of the photos of bunkers in Horace Hutchinson's 1891 book depicted revetted bunkers  The technique existed, but they appeared to be mostly used to shore up eroded areas.  I'm looking at the book now.  The only bunkers on The Old Course that appear to be revetted are the Strath and the right-most face of Hell bunker; of the four pics of Dornoch there is one with sleepers at the top of the face, but none with sod walls.

[Mike Bodo]

Not sure if they had yet become the "norm" or en vogue by the time many of the U.K. archies crossed the pond in the late 1800's and early 1900's, but it sounds as though they'd been in existence for a bit - in particular at TOC. If I'm not mistaken, didn't Dornoch have revetted bunkers during Ross' time there?


I'd love to do a deep dive on this - either in a separate thread or bump this old thread up, but I have to believe between all the great minds on this site we can come close to pinpointing when this bunkering style became prevalent and why it wasn't replicated in the U.S. - especially at coastal courses like Pebble Beach and Cypress Point.

Mike:


Do the deep dive, but let's not distract from this thread.  I really don't know the history, I just remember that few of the photos of bunkers in Horace Hutchinson's 1891 book depicted revetted bunkers  The technique existed, but they appeared to be mostly used to shore up eroded areas.  I'm looking at the book now.  The only bunkers on The Old Course that appear to be revetted are the Strath and the right-most face of Hell bunker; of the four pics of Dornoch there is one with sleepers at the top of the face, but none with sod walls.

Agreed, Tom.