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Post by cwdlaw223 on Jul 31, 2011 7:17:38 GMT -5
For me, risk reward. I love holes that show their cards right off the tee and have high risk high reward. I think architects have a tough job making a course the average golfer can play and an experienced player as well.
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Post by Richie3Jack on Jul 31, 2011 9:56:22 GMT -5
IMO, golf course architecture is sorta like writing a story. I personally enjoy course designs where the architect doesn't try to hotshot the course by attempting to designa bunch of high risk and reward holes very early on. By the time you the back nine, it sorta loses its flavor. Often times I find that less is more with design. I like it when the designers creates a bunch of good holes that are not high risk vs. reward types. then maybe a couple of great holes that are more great because of their sheer beauty, then eventually getting some good and great holes that are risk vs. reward styles.
When I think of a great par-5, I think of 18 at Pebble. To me, it's mostly great because of its beauty. It has some risk and reward, but not a ton. A great par-3 to me is #16 at ANGC. I know many prefer #12 and I can't blame them. #12 relies a bit on luck...which can be aggravating if a lot of the holes are like that. But since #12 is the only hole like that, it works brilliantly.
But #16 suits me better because the green is so large and it's unique in that the further away from the tee it is, it's often easier to birdie for the pros (or make a hole-in-one. Anything up front is difficult because the ball will likely run away from the cup and the putt is tough. Just a very unique design where one can used 3 different clubs into depending on the pin position.
One thing I notice about Arnold Palmer designed courses is that that he likes to have the greens sit down below from the approach shot. He does it just enough that it adds to the beauty of the hole while not taking away from the design.
3JACK
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Post by cwdlaw223 on Jul 31, 2011 11:14:30 GMT -5
I agree that too many risk reward holes are aggravating and not ever hole can be great on a golf course. Not ever full course meal should be dessert just like golf holes.
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Post by Richie3Jack on Jul 31, 2011 19:19:45 GMT -5
I don't hate Pete Dye's designs, but I get a little aggravated when he leaves you with a semi-blind tee shot and then a somewhat tight hole with trouble left and right. Often times you can't see the ball past the horizon and a shot that may have been a little off goes into trouble because you don't know exactly where to aim.
He's got some really great golf holes IMO, but usually has too many silly ones.
Fazio OTOH is almost the opposite. He's kinda bland for my tastes. He comes off like a guy trying to design every hole for the mass appeal. I do think he did a nice job with World Woods - Pine Barrens. The thing about Fazio is that I generally know I won't be left with a lot of goofy, annoying holes...but his courses almost always charge a premium to play there and I usually don't feel it's worth it.
I like Arnie's designs. He usually creates something for everybody in mind. He can get a little nutty in the design of the greens. I think he never understood the concept that the greens he played could be hillier because 8 on the stimp was considered fast back then. But now with 10+ on the stimp being quite normal, you can't create the greens he does without aggravting the golfers and slowing up play.
I grew up playing a lot of Donald Ross and Robert Trent Jones courses. I think RTJ is a bit underrated. To me he just embodied good, old school designed courses. I was glad to see that Metrowest in downtown Orlando is a RTJ design to give me something to play like the old days. Ross is my favorite designer, but unfortunately most of his coures have become obsolete because of the advancements in equipment.
3JACK
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Post by 94monarch on Nov 4, 2011 11:48:54 GMT -5
I personally like a great short par four that encompasses risk and reward at some piont. 14 at Muirfield Village, 5 at Lake Nona, 3 at Carnoustie with Jockeys Burn, all great holes. Hit the driver long and in play and you have a relatively easy pitch. Give them the option of an easy layup off the tee but then put the fear of god in them with a 120 yard shot where if you dont control your spin you have little chance of getting up and in. Watch the guys on 14 at Muirfield with their 120 yard wedge shot, thats cool.
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Post by Richie3Jack on Nov 4, 2011 12:27:07 GMT -5
Welcome aboard!
3JACK
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Post by tightdraw on Nov 6, 2011 20:32:10 GMT -5
thought I might chime in on this. Frankly, I think there are several dimensions on which to evaluate a golf hole and its design. The first is the pure aesthetic beauty of the layout and its relationship to the terrain and its surroundings. In this regard, I almost always prefer natural beauty over artificial beauty, though the latter can be aesthetically commanding. Indeed a naturally modest hole can be rendered quite impressive by artificial constructions -- as in the pew bunkering at Oakmont. The second feature is golf aesthetic, and not just beauty. Does it look like a golf hole. Not every hole does. Most don't in fact. Here's what I mean. if you took away all the markers that identify it as a golf hole -- the tee box, the rough, the tree lining, etc -- would it still look like it was meant for golf. This is what is so distinctive of UK seaside courses. If all you saw from the tee was the flag in the distance, it would almost always look and feel like a golf hole. Not true of most holes on most courses. Next is the challenge the hole presents; and to me the best holes are ones that offer many different ways to play them reasonably and ways to revise how you play mid stream. So if the safe landing area off the tee is right center, but you go left by mistake there should be a way into the green left. It may be harder, but it should be available; and so on. Great holes are not just strategy holes; they are thinking man's holes. That is what I love about Alistair Mackenzie and CB Macdonald. To me it is considerably less true of Tilinghast and Ross; the latter is more concerned with how to protect par; and Tilinghast for my taste is far too much the machismo designer of his generation -- witness Bethpage Black, Winged Foot and Baltusrol. Frankly, I think his design at Quaker Ridge is much superior to WF.
That said it is worth noting that there is a great deal of difference between playing a great course and playing a truly fun and enjoyable course. It is just not necessarily fun to play a great course day in and day out. The course should present a mixture of challenge and enjoyment if you are going to play it day in and out; and it should look the part. Most course to me look like housing developments -- many like the housing developments they populate. Some of these are the macmansions of golf courses. Bigger, bolder and completely unbalanced; like the houses they emulate, they have thin brick veneers on the front and vinyl siding all around everywhere else. others are cookie cutter.
That's it for now.
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Post by cloran on Nov 6, 2011 22:02:53 GMT -5
What makes a great golf hole?
IMHO there are just about as many ways to answer this question as there are ways to design a golf hole. I'll run with the first thought that popped in my head... what are the things I DON'T like about some golf holes?
First, my favorite golf holes DON'T have any blind shots. How good is a hole if you can't see half of it?
However... I can live with part of a hole being blind so long as the following rules apply:
If it's a par 5, and I'm in the fairway off the tee, I want a view of the green for my 2nd shot. It doesn't have to be an easy shot, but I want a chance to reach it two no matter how remote it may be.
If it's a short par 4, and I'm in the correct 1/2 of the fairway off the tee, I want a view of the green for my 2nd shot... I can live with a partial view or even not-much-of-a view from the wrong 1/2 of the fairway, but being stymied by an overhanging tree limb or left with no shot around a dogleg just because I'm in the wrong part of the fairway is BS.
If it's a long par 4 I want a view of the fairway off the tee and a decent sized landing area.
If it's a par 3 I want a little room for error, and I don't want an automatic 3 putt if I'm on the wrong part of the green. My favorite par 3 is the 17th at Bethpage Black. A good mid-iron off the tee, but if you miss the hole right or left you're ok. The premium in on distance control. If you're long you're not doing so great, and if you're short... well, good luck my friend. Those bunkers are DEEEEEEP. I love that hole.
So, what makes a good golf hole?
One where good shots are rewarded with opportunities to break par, decent shots are not severely punished and par is still an option, and where poor shots leave the golfer with a chance to pull off the spectacular...
Most of Donald Ross' stuff fits the bill.
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Post by tightdraw on Nov 7, 2011 11:39:38 GMT -5
For the record, I'm ok with blind shots for a variety of reasons. Take the 3rd hole at Yale. You can see the green from the tee, but not from the fairway. So you have already seen it once; must you be able to see it again? Not sure why. There's a premium on feel. There is a marker so you know where to aim; and there are yardage to teh green markers and you had a chance to look at it and absorb from the tee. That's more than enough visuals.
why do people feel you have to be able to see the green or the fairway but not bunkers. I have MUCH more difficulty with bunkering than with blind shots -- especially fairway bunkers, especially fairway bunkers in the fairway and not on the edge.
But then again you get tons of them in the UK on links courses especially and there it's just fine.
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Post by cloran on Nov 7, 2011 16:00:00 GMT -5
TD,
I agree with you on the bunker thing. I want to be able to see everything...
Would you place #3 @ Yale in your top 10 best designed golf holes? Top 50?
I don't mind that blind shots exist at all, but a hole that has one (even when the hole is played properly) isn't making my list.
That being said, I'm only going off of holes I've played and unfortunately I don't get out much.
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Post by tightdraw on Nov 7, 2011 22:10:29 GMT -5
Oh no, i would never put #3 on any list of great holes I have played. I would put numbers 4 and 10 among the best holes I have played. I would place #18 among the worst holes ever on a great golf course. That said, it is an awesome but still terrible hole in most ways from the real tees -- 620yds -- with a drive requirement to rival some of those at Bethpage Black during the Open. The second shot is just insane. Can you imagine a blind second shot to either of two fairways -- one higher, one lower, with unplayable tall grass between them (yuck). And if you crunch your second to the upper level you have a decent chance of a steep downhill lie with a pitching wedge in your hands! or if you crunch it to the lower level you could end up in the woods; and as anyone who has played Yale will tell, these are not woods, but forests. You are more likely to find a bear in the woods than your ball at Yale.
Sam Snead cursed the 9th hole which is the signature hole at YGC; 230yd par 3 with a green at least 60yds long and a swail in the middle four or five feet deep. If you are on the wrong level you would be happy to take a three putt. from front to back the break is at least fifteen feet right to left.
Sam Snead apparently landed on the front level to a pin in the back and hit a wedge on the green. BTW it's water all the way from the tee to the green. and but for a couple of front green side bunkers designed primarily to keep you from going in the water, the green is protected by a forest on the left, back and right. For pin placements at the back into the wind, I have hit punch driver; and i have hit 7 iron to a front pin placement. i don't like the hole. It's weird taht one of the best designed golf courses in the world has no weak holes really, but its two architecturally worst holes are 9 and 18
Well I guess 16 is weak; 500 yd par 5 lacking any distinctive qualities.
I played the course with Ben Crenshaw and he hit several balls on each hole just to see how it played from different locations. He couldn't get over the 8th and 10th
Problem is the course was designed for a different era with different clubs and balls and misses could be heavily penalized. If set up for tournament play, it could be an extremely punitive course -- which I like.
I could play Yale, Pasatiempo and quaker Ridge, and Fairfield CC in rotation for teh rest of my life and be happy. At least happy for a neurotic.
TD
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Post by mchepp on Nov 8, 2011 1:01:29 GMT -5
TD,
Which are your favorites from Pasatiempo? Least favorites?
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Post by tightdraw on Nov 8, 2011 12:42:39 GMT -5
Don't know it well enough to have strong views. I love the back nine overall and the first four holes are to my mind the best four from the get go i have ever played -- but not if one is looking for a good score!!! It was easier when the 1st was a par 5
TD
What's your take
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Post by mchepp on Nov 8, 2011 13:23:10 GMT -5
I agree about the first hole being a par 5. It had a great deal more character when you teed off on top of the cart barn. Now it is just a very difficult par 4. I also not a very big fan of #3. From the back tees I basically almost need to hit a driver on a par 3. I am also not crazy about ending on a par 3. Also the signature hole 16 has a completely blind tee shot where you need to have played there 3-4 times to know where to aim.
They can also get the green very fast and I don't think Mackenzie intended for the slopes to have that much speed. When they get them super fast you are just avoiding making mistakes with your putter.
Outside of these small dislikes I really love to play there.
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