Happy New Year….
I have put together a Pictorial Discussion of some of our
Nightmares from WGT. I’ve been
collecting these for a while and this posting is the result.
More accurately, these are the “lesser-heralded” situations
that I find recurringly cropping up in my own rounds. Certainly, there are certain “Legendary” WGT
Trouble spots – The Green at Bethpage Black # 15 and the water at Kiawah # 17
both come immediately to mind. These are
trouble spots that are widely known and can affect every player every time they
encounter them.
As there are entire threads of discussion devoted to the
“Legendaries”, I am leaving them out of THIS discussion.
These are the lesser – but common - vexing trouble spots we have all come to know
– and to deal with. This list is NOT all-inclusive by any means but more of a selection of
the ones that I deem to be common and insidious. Some of them “look innocent” on the surface –
but then as we play we learn that they are not.
This review includes a representative sample from all of our
courses – both Stroke Play and Closest To The Hole.
1. Bethpage Black # 13 – “Striped Crud” (Front
of Green)
Did my ball land in Jell-O? What is with the sickly soft bounce and then
stop dead 1 foot beyond impact? This was
SUPPOSED to bounce and roll right up to the hole for an easy putt! NO DICE.
When your ball hits this stuff, it is simply DEFLATING. I would far rather have a Green In Regulation
25 feet past the hole than to suffer the humiliation of being stopped dead in
this stuff. MOST of us are playing a 3rd
shot wedge or short iron into this green.
Get out your counter-intuition and REMOVE any notion of bounce and
roll. The hole is so close to the front
of the green that there is simply no way to accomplish that. In fact avoid the entire short front right
side of this green – it is fraught with all kinds of danger from the sand to
the heavier rough to yes – The Striped Crud.
2. Pinehurst No. 8 – Challenge # 8 –
“The Invisible Line” (Green)
This green has an Invisible Line
running the length of it. As the player
is hitting out of the sand and there is usually wind involved, contending with
The Invisible Line is generally very much a guessing game. Hit short of the green and forget it - Stopped dead in the rough with a nice +20
Penalty added to your score. BUT….impact
the green and this is where it gets interesting. The Invisible Line seems to be someplace
between 12-15 feet from the fringe. Hit
short of the line and your ball stops dead on the green. Probably 20-25 feet from the hole. Hit just past The Invisible Line and guess
what? It is like a bounding ricochet
where the ball bounces a few times and then rolls – and you are lucky if you do
not roll to the Fringe beyond the hole.
I detect there is some break/slope at work here but as we don’t putt
this green it is hard to really tell.
Anytime you are less than 15 feet – take it and go quietly. I do.
3. Kiawah # 16 – “The Neck” (Fairway –
2nd Shot)
Very often the 2nd shot on a Par 5 is merely
covering distance. It is somewhat
non-descript and not particularly noteworthy.
This one is an exception. Here it
can make or break whether you Birdie or Bogey.
(NOTE: MOST of us are not
reaching the green in 2). For most of us
the second shot will be aimed and landing somewhere through the narrow “Neck”
of the fairway where it jogs absurdly to the right before bending back to the
left towards the green. Needless to say
it is surrounded by sand and rough hazards of varying severity. Your Worst Enemy in deciding how to aim this
challenging shot will be a Right-to-Left crosswind. Do you hang the entire 2nd shot
over that Right side deep fairway trap
and HOPE you carry the Rough at the end?
It CAN and DOES happen. If
successful you have a nice short wedge and are looking at a Birdie. If unsuccessful you may well be “In The Long
Weeds”. Failing to compensate for the
effect of wind could very well land your ball in the LEFT sand bunker. Decisions Decisions – and this one often NOT
an easy one. On rare occasions (with a
strong headwind) and depending where my Drive from the tee landed, I have
actually laid up and sacrificed the extra yardage of trying to go “through the
neck” for the safety of the fairway – thereby forcing a much longer approach
shot into the green.
4. Wolf Creek – Challenge # 3 – “Rollaway
Anguish” (Green approx. 12 feet
short of the hole)
Another CTTH frustration.
How many times has this happened?
“My ball is flying RIGHT AT THE HOLE!
Even so… I notice no heartbeat.
Hmmm…” And then you learn
why. Ball hits the green bounces and
rolls up each tier including the final back shelf….ALMOST. L You see the ball roll to a stop 11-12 feet
short of the hole and then The Unthinkable begins. A backward trickle down the slope. 13 14 15 16 etc Feet. I’ve had a number of frustrations with the
ball within 12 feet but ending up 20-26 feet AWAY. Wind can make getting within 10 feet here
particularly tricky – and even if the catastrophe I described above transpires,
you are STILL better off than “15 Feet from Hole” BUT off the back of the green
in the ROUGH (+20 Penalty).
5. Bethpage Black # 11 – “Left Fairway Incursion Of Rough”
(Drive)
How many of us have visited this unpleasant little spot
where the Rough juts into and disrupts what we THINK should be Fairway? This thing comes into play particularly if
there is a Right-to-Left crosswind – but I have had it ensnare me with a
slightly off-center Drive as well – a Drive that would be safe on most other
holes. You hit your drive and it is
edging left and it looks OK until you get the camera view of the landing…and
you end up in this nasty little surprise.
Due to the way a ROUGH lie complicates the approach (2nd)
shot on this hole (which is in and of itself a daring feat of
counter-intuition), ending up in this stuff can easily result in a Bogey. Avoid this nasty business if at all
possible. (NOTE: Very similar situation exists at Bethpage
# 18 as well).
6. Saint Andrews Old Course – Challenges 3 and 7 – “The Backstop” – (Front of Green)
This one requires 2 pictures to demonstrate. Same Green used in several challenges – this
danger most evident in # 3 and # 7. Pictured
above is THE RIGHT WAY of landing this shot.
“The Backstop” is circled. Hit
this thing with your shot and forget it.
Stops dead and rolls away into oblivion.
The final number almost does not matter it will ruin your round. Carry over this thing every single time. Gets VERY complicated sometimes due to wind
and also the ever-present lightning quickness of the green.
Pictured below: THE
WRONG WAY of landing this shot – and the fate you will suffer. NOTE that the entire white line on the green
is ROLL not Bounce.
7. Edgewood Tahoe – Challenge #5 – “Razor Thin
Tolerance” (Green)
This looks innocent.
It isn’t. The green is
elevated. Often you are contending with
wind. The green itself is particularly
shallow from front to back – and you would think that the way it slopes uphill
away would help. Sometimes it does but
not as often as I wish it did. There
seems to be a very narrow range of possible places to land the drive and hold
the ball close to the hole. Very often
you will roll uphill past the hole and onto the back Fringe or worse yet the
Rough. Try getting tricky landing it
short of the hole and you learn about the steep bank that fronts the green and
you are stuck dead in the Rough there.
This hole looks a lot simpler than it is.
8. Kiawah # 3 – “Schizoid Green”
(Green 8-15 Foot putts)
“Short Par 4”. “Easy
Birdie”. Yeah right. I feel like the Palm Tree in the distance
Mocks Me. Yes – sometimes it IS a Birdie
– but not nearly as often as it ought to be.
The culprit? What is The Deal
with the green? 8-15 foot putts are
often confronted with a completely contradictory putting grid. The breaks are NOT severe – and this is where
it deceives us. In most cases the dots
on the grid are moving “just a little bit” – often, barely at all. BUT they are moving in conflicting
directions! How can a 12 foot putt have
so much “contradictory information” between the ball and the hole? You aim your putt at the left edge of the cup
and it misses a ball’s width to the right.
Aim at the right edge and it misses a ball’s width to the left. Give up on the whole idea and putt it
straight? IT MISSES ANYWAY. Egads.
(Oh – and OCCASIONALLY it goes in).
9. Bali Hai – Challenge # 9 – “75% Too
Much Green” (Green)
The entire right half/front portion of this green exists for
only one reason. It exists to
accommodate the final resting place of a ball hit slightly short or left of the
hole. Similarly to Wolf Creek # 3
(discussed above) but even more potentially tragic is the way a ball will
glance at the hole within 12-15 feet before turning left and heading back down
the hill with a final result often 30-35 feet from the hole. What a way to destroy a CTTH that had gone so
well up to that point.
10. Kiawah # 13 – “Debtor’s Prison For
Greedy Souls” (Back Left quadrant
of Green)
You are salivating over the prospect of a potential Birdie
after having hit a nice well-centered-drive.
Ostensibly, the second/approach shot here is not all that difficult –
but be careful of how over-excited you become.
CONTROL the second shot. Above
all else, do NOT hit it long. What happens if you do? Particularly if you are BEHIND the hole and
more than about 10 feet away, you will start to see the price you will pay for
your greed. Although this green overall
is not necessarily flat and there CAN be some tricky putts, there will be a
HEAVY DEBT to pay if you are in the back left quadrant. This is due to a particularly large and nasty
swale/hump that you will have to navigate with your putt. Think in terms of aiming a 25 foot putt 8
feet wide/right of the hole and PRAYING
(if that is your thing – otherwise it is HOPING). Players who have visited this spot have
learned NOT to be greedy and end up in this particular debtor’s prison as
payment for the greed. The price you pay
may well be a 3 putt Bogey.
BONUS for those who have read ALL THIS WAY - here is a # 11 :-)
11. Bethpage Black # 1 – “The Trees” (Right of
Fairway / Rough)
Subtitle: Chapter 3 of “Learning Not To Be Stupid”
So you strayed way right on your Drive? Guess what?
Forget the green. Even if you
LOOK LIKE you have a clear line through or over the branches, odds are you are
in a 40-50% ROUGH Lie and you will never make it. You will only inherit more misery and
heartache. Take a high lofted wedge and
chip out (or PUNCH if so inclined) back out to the nearest available
Fairway. In most cases the Birdie you
fantasized about back on the tee is GONE …but you can still save a Par. Do this because TO DO THE OTHER – well, it
will lead to a 5 or a 6 – and amongst some of us (not Me) a “Disconnect”. NOTE – even if NOT in and amongst the trees,
but if you landed in the Right Rough a similar logic usually applies – forget
the Green with the 2nd shot and just get back in the Fairway. Rare exceptions MIGHT work out if you are
in 20-25% Rough and there appears to be
a clear line / escape to the green – but if you take this risk, be prepared to
take the lumps. On rare occasions this
could pay off. For shorter Drivers,
“Blind” second shots (i.e. you cannot see the green) off of a Fairway Lie
usually work out fine if hit correctly.
Just because you can see the trees, you should be OK if in the Fairway
to go for the green on the second shot -
you should learn to make the Blind shot.
Honorable Mention: Edgewood
Tahoe Challenge # 8 – Ski Slopes and Hotels
This one not part of the “official” list because it is not specifically related to Game Play - but I thought I
would throw it in for pure aesthetic beauty – Isn’t it nice we can see the Ski
Slopes and Hotels in this awesome view?
So that’s my list. I
may do a volume 2 of these at some point in the future – but for now – enjoy
this one.
My thanks to all the great players I have met and also to
the WGT staff for making these scenarios and challenges possible and engaging
to play.
Additional Reading: Chapters 1 and 2 of “Learning Not To Be
Stupid” in THIS thread: "For The Frustrated Player: A Tale of A Hard-Fought Par At Bethpage" URL: http://www.wgt.com/forums/t/7352.aspx
Best Regards For A Great 2010, AtlantaCoaster :-)