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Golf Architecture 101: Alister MacKenzie's 13 Principles · Designing Golf

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: The Bible has its Ten Commandments, golf architecture has Alistair
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: McKenzie's thirteen principles of golf course design. Maybe that comparison
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: is slightly hyperbolic, but McKenzie's list of thirteen essential features
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: of an ideal golf course has been enormously influential ever
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: since it was published in nineteen twenty. It has shaped
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: the way that we all think about golf architecture and
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: the way that golf architects go about their jobs. So,
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: in this second installment of our Golf Architecture one oh
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: one series, I'll discuss McKenzie's thirteen principles with my quote
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: unquote student PJ. Clark. I'm Garrett Morrison, and this is
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: designing golf, all right.
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: PG.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: I just introduced to you as my student, but you are,
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: in fact my colleague, a podcast producer for Friday Golf,
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: and you're just getting started on learn about golf architecture.
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: We've done our first lesson Slash episode on the schools
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: of golf course design, Strategic, penal, and heroic. How's all
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: that gone for you so far?
• 1:13
  Speaker 3: I mean, I think we got some good feedback. Seemed
• 1:15
  Speaker 3: like people were into it. I feel smarter for having
• 1:17
  Speaker 3: done it, So I'm excited to keep continuing down.
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: This bethath Okay, good news, good news. We'll see how
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: we feel after this episode. So I had you do
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: a little reading in advance of this one, which probably
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: makes it feel more like school even than the last one.
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: But it wasn't much reading. I had you read Alistair
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: McKenzie's famous thirteen Principles of Golf Course Design. It's a
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: pretty short bit of reading, and we'll reintroduce it to
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: the listeners as we go along here. So we're going
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: to talk about all thirteen or at least refer to
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: all thirteen principles, then pull out a couple to discuss
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: in greater detail. That's how I'm good to sounds great.
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: There is a lot of meat on this bone. Honestly,
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: you could do an entire episode on each one of
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: these items, and maybe eventually we will, but just for now,
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  Speaker 1: we're focusing on kind of the introduction of them and
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  Speaker 1: a few that might be confusing or particularly interesting. So
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  Speaker 1: you know, first of all, Alistair McKenzie one of the
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  Speaker 1: great golf architects of the nineteen tens, twenties, and thirties.
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  Speaker 1: He designed Augusta, National, Cyprus, Point, Royal Melbourne, and many
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: other extremely good golf courses. He was also an excellent writer,
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  Speaker 1: and these thirteen principles come from his book called Golf Architecture,
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  Speaker 1: which Stephen Procter and I talked about in our last
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: episode on the ten books that every golf architecture nut
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  Speaker 1: should read. It's probably the most famous and discussed passage,
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: not only from this book, but maybe from all of
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: the literature of golf architecture over the more than a
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: century that stuff has been written about this subject. So
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: let's read through them. Then we can choose a few
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: to drill down on the first principle. The course where possible,
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: should be arranged in two loops of nine holes. So
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: Alistair McKenzie coming right out of the gate in favor
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  Speaker 1: of returning nines, there should be This is number two.
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: There should be a large proportion of good two shot holes,
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: two or three drive in pitch holes, and at least
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: four one shot holes. So he's talking basically about par
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: fours and par threes here, and different lengths of par fours.
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: He wants there to be all of those. Number three,
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  Speaker 1: there should be little walking between the greens and teas,
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: and the course should be arranged so that, in the
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: first instance, there is always a slight walk forwards from
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: the green to the next tee. Then the holes are
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  Speaker 1: sufficiently elastic to be lengthened in the future if necessary. Okay,
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: so a couple of things in there, close connections between
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: greens and teas, and then he also wants there to
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: be room to move teas back to lengthen the course
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: in the Future's awfully prescient.
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  Speaker 3: As I was, you know, reading through these, I appreciated
• 4:24
  Speaker 3: this one absolutely.
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  Speaker 1: He Alistair mackenzie was exactly that prescient about where the
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: game was going. He knew that the best players were
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: going to continue to get longer and longer, that equipment
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  Speaker 1: was going to get better and better, and that golf
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  Speaker 1: courses would need to be longer as a result. I
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  Speaker 1: don't think he could have imagined.
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  Speaker 3: No, I didn't think he had this. You know, we're
• 4:46
  Speaker 3: going to play the Masters at eight thousand yards. I
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  Speaker 3: didn't think he had that in mind.
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  Speaker 1: If you think about Augusta National and some of those
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  Speaker 1: walks backwards from greens to teas, I mean a couple
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  Speaker 1: hundred yards backwards in some cases. I think he be
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: a ghast, but in any case, he did at least
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  Speaker 1: kind of have some idea of where things are going.
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  Speaker 1: Number four. The greens and fairways should be sufficiently undulating,
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  Speaker 1: but there should be no hill climbing, so he's calling
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  Speaker 1: for kind of a happy medium of topography undulating but
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  Speaker 1: not too severe. Number five. Every hole should have a
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  Speaker 1: different character, very simple variety. Number six. There should be
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: a minimum of blindness for the approach shots, so he's
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: zeroing in approach shots. Doesn't like a lot of blind
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  Speaker 1: approach shots. Number seven. The course should have beautiful surroundings,
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  Speaker 1: and all the artificial features should have so natural an
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: appearance that a stranger is unable to distinguish them from
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  Speaker 1: nature itself. So beautiful surroundings for a course, and whatever
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  Speaker 1: is built within the course should blend nicely into those
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: surroundings or into the landscape. Number eight. There should be
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: a sufficient number of heroic carries from the tee, but
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  Speaker 1: the course should be arranged so that the weaker player
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: with the loss of a stroke or portion of a
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: stroke shall always have an alternative route open to them. Okay,
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  Speaker 1: so there are options for big carries over intimidating hazards,
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  Speaker 1: but there should be a kind of bailouter or an
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  Speaker 1: option for a weaker player not to take on that
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  Speaker 1: carry into kind of work their way around. Number nine.
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  Speaker 1: There should be infinite variety in the strokes required to
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: play the various holes, for instance, interesting brassy shots, iron shots,
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  Speaker 1: pitch and run up shots. A brassy by the way
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: is like a low lofted fairway would so helpful. Yeah,
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: call it? What is it?
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: Click?
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  Speaker 3: You know you're taking this Taking this from the top here.
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: What is a clique is is one of the greatest
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  Speaker 1: questions of our time. Really that has many different possible
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: answers these days. But in any case, what what Mackenzie
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: is talking here talking about here in the ninth principle
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  Speaker 1: is just the variety of different shots that a golf
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  Speaker 1: course should require or inspire a player to try. Number ten,
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: There should be a complete absence of the annoyance and
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: irritation caused by the necessity of searching for lost balls. Okay,
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  Speaker 1: this is one that a lot of modern golf courses
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: don't embody, but doesn't doesn't like the time spent. Mackenzie
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  Speaker 1: doesn't like the time spent looking for lost balls, and
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  Speaker 1: so try to create a course where that doesn't happen
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  Speaker 1: that much. You can find the ball. You might be
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: in trouble, but at least you can find the ball
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  Speaker 1: and play a shot. Number eleven. The course should be
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  Speaker 1: so interesting that even the plus man this is like
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: a plus handicap or really good player. The course should
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: be so interesting that even the plus man is constantly
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: stimulated to improve his game in attempting shots he has
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: hitherto been unable to play. Okay, the phrasing there might
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: confuse some people, but basically what it's saying is that
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: the course should provide opportunities for really, really skilled players
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: to try shots that maybe they aren't capable of or
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: are at the very edge of their abilities. A course
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: shouldn't just be kind of easy all around for a
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  Speaker 1: really good player. Number twelve, and this is kind of
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  Speaker 1: a companion to number eleven. Number twelve, the course should
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: be so arranged that the long handicapped player or even
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: the absolute beginner should be able to enjoy his round
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  Speaker 1: in spite of the fact that he is piling up
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: a big score. So both of those things together, yep,
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  Speaker 1: the course should provide these opportunities for great players to
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  Speaker 1: get even better or to try shots that they haven't
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: been able to play so far. But it should also
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: be fun for less skilled players in spite of the
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: fact that they may be shooting a high score number thirteen.
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  Speaker 1: The course should be equally good during winter and summer.
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  Speaker 1: The texture of the greens and the faraways should be perfect,
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  Speaker 1: and the approaches should have the same consistency as the greens.
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  Speaker 1: That is Mackenzie's final principle. It relates to conditioning, and
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  Speaker 1: you know, maybe we'll return to this at some point
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  Speaker 1: later in this episode, but just keep in mind that
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  Speaker 1: Mackenzie is speaking from the perspective of someone in nineteen
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  Speaker 1: twenty when courses were much much more ruggedly conditioned than
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  Speaker 1: what we're used to now, And so when he says
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  Speaker 1: greens and faaraways should be perfect, what he means by
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  Speaker 1: perfect is not what we think of when we think
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  Speaker 1: of perfect greens. He's think of more of like a
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  Speaker 1: basic standard of the greens should nice and smoothly and.
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  Speaker 2: The green exists.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, right, it's there, it's got grass on it, you know. Okay,
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  Speaker 1: those are the thirteen principles. So I'll ask you, PJ,
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  Speaker 1: where do you want to start in looking at certain principles.
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  Speaker 1: Which ones do you have the most thoughts about or
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  Speaker 1: the most questions about. Give me one and we can
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  Speaker 1: we can start there.
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  Speaker 3: Just overall, you said to me when you assigned me
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  Speaker 3: this homework, you said, don't be afraid to let the
• 10:29
  Speaker 3: doctor have it. I responded to you, after doing some
• 10:33
  Speaker 3: research that, unfortunately, I feel like the doctor has made
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  Speaker 3: some very good points here.
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  Speaker 1: I'm sad to report that the doctor might have known
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  Speaker 1: what he was talking about.
• 10:41
  Speaker 3: Yeah. No, it's very very unfortunate for my willingness to argue.
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  Speaker 3: But I feel like my main two that stuck out
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  Speaker 3: to me we're five and six. The every hole should
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  Speaker 3: have a different character, and the blindness on approach at
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  Speaker 3: at minimum. I feel like, especially on modern golf courses,
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  Speaker 3: especially on a lot of the PGA tour courses that
• 11:08
  Speaker 3: are you know, they're not great, but.
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  Speaker 2: I feel like every hole is not different.
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  Speaker 3: I feel like there's just a lot of you know,
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  Speaker 3: looking the same kind of bomb and gouge and.
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  Speaker 2: You know, long par fours whatever.
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  Speaker 3: Like even at Tory Pines, you're getting lost and on
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  Speaker 3: so many similar holes back and forth.
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  Speaker 2: There.
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  Speaker 1: Absolutely that's one of the main critiques of Tory Pines.
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  Speaker 1: In fact, if you look at the views of the
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: greens from the approach zone, a lot of those greens
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  Speaker 1: have a similar design. That's one of the knocks on
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: that golf course and many other PGA Tour golf courses
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  Speaker 1: as well. So let's focus on number five. So every
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  Speaker 1: hole should have a different character. That's the principle. It's
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: one of the simplest expressions of a golf architecture principle
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  Speaker 1: in this list of thirteen. So when you think character,
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  Speaker 1: a hole has a character, where can that character come from?
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  Speaker 1: What are the points of differentiation between golf holes that
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: stick out to you distance?
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  Speaker 3: I feel like it's probably elevation, Like you know, a direction,
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  Speaker 3: is it the you know dogleg right left, you know
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  Speaker 3: anything like that. I feel like a lot of these places,
• 12:24
  Speaker 3: or at least like a lot.
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  Speaker 2: Of places I play.
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  Speaker 3: I don't play anywhere too terribly nice, but like it's
• 12:30
  Speaker 3: just you're going part four back up and down, just
• 12:33
  Speaker 3: like straight straight every time, and they're all right next
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  Speaker 3: to each other, and it opens up and you know nothing,
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  Speaker 3: nothing about it is tangibly different, you know, as you
• 12:41
  Speaker 3: keep going up and down the course.
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: Yes, right, this is this is about the overall variety
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: of the golf course direction. I'm glad you mentioned that,
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: because a hole's relationship to the wind and to whatever
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: elements there might be is one of the things that
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: can give it character. And if a lot of holes
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: on a golf course have a similar relationship to the
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: wind and to the elements, then it starts to become
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: the case that you don't view those holes as having
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: their own character. So other things that can do that.
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: Dog leg left, dog leg right. You mentioned that distance
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: is a really key one, par par four, par five,
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: par three. It's funny actually that in the principle where
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: mackenzie talks about two shot holes and one shot holes
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: and driving pitch holes, he doesn't actually mention three shot holes.
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: He doesn't mention par fives. But certainly, you know, those
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: are considered to be part of the variety of golf
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: of a golf course and part of the character of
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: a hole. It's it's par score. Other things topography, contour, bunkering,
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: green design views, the esthetics of the shaping of the hole,
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: just how it all looks and presents itself to you.
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: So those are all dimensions along which a hole can
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: have character. Why do you think it's Why do you
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: think it's good for, you know, for holes to be
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: different from each other? Why is that something that is
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: it should even be emphasized. Why is a golf course
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: where all the holes have similar character? Why is that
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: golf course not as good as one where each hole
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: is is different.
• 14:26
  Speaker 3: I don't know if this is like the right phrasing,
• 14:27
  Speaker 3: but I feel like it's more intellectually stimulating, like if
• 14:31
  Speaker 3: you're you're thinking about it, where as opposed to if
• 14:34
  Speaker 3: every hole is the same or very similar, you're not
• 14:37
  Speaker 3: putting a lot of thought into.
• 14:39
  Speaker 2: What you're doing as you're playing it.
• 14:41
  Speaker 3: I feel like, you know, the more strategy comes into play,
• 14:47
  Speaker 3: whether you're you're good or bad, or how seriously you're
• 14:51
  Speaker 3: taking the round. Like, the more strategy comes into play,
• 14:54
  Speaker 3: at least for me, is more appealing.
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: Right. There are a number of things that you can
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: do during a round of golf aside from paying attention
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: to the golf course. If the golf course is boring
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: or is not capturing your attention, then you might just
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: focus on the social experience, so focus on talking with
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: your playing partners. You might focus on your game and
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: trying to accumulate a good score. There are a lot
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: of things that you can do aside from really engaging
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: with the architecture of the golf course. And that's fine, rights,
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: That's what's great about golf. You can you can enjoy
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: it in many different ways. But I think the really
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: good golf courses are the ones that capture your attention,
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: that demand your attention on every single hole where where
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: you know it provokes some thought. And part of that
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: is yet strategy and the challenge of the golf shots
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: that you're hitting. But another part of it is that variety.
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: If each hole is different, then you've got to pay attention,
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: you've got to adjust, you've got to take in something
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: that is new. Right. Yeah, But at the same time,
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: I want to put out one danger of this. If
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: an architect is overemphasizing each hole having a different character,
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: then they might fall into some gimmicks to try to
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: differentiate the holes. Yeah, they might go too far with it.
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: There's probably a happy medium there because if you you know,
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: if an architect is insecure about this, then they might say, well,
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: this hole doesn't stand out enough, so I'm just gonna
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: go ahead and put a bunker in the middle of
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: the green for no reason. Then they'll then they'll remember.
• 16:30
  Speaker 3: It at that that I I there does need to
• 16:34
  Speaker 3: be some happy medium. I also, like, y know, I
• 16:38
  Speaker 3: feel like if you try too hard to differentiate things,
• 16:40
  Speaker 3: like does that.
• 16:42
  Speaker 2: Kind of disrupt the flow?
• 16:45
  Speaker 3: Like I know that that that sometimes you know things
• 16:48
  Speaker 3: are meant to kind of go together. You play two
• 16:50
  Speaker 3: holes as a as a par nine, and and you
• 16:53
  Speaker 3: could do it like that, Like does that get in
• 16:55
  Speaker 3: the way?
• 16:56
  Speaker 2: Then sure?
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: Yeah? Absolutely. I think the real danger here is if
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: the holes almost have too much variety, then the course
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: doesn't have a consistent character in itself. Right, Each course
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: should probably have some kind of unifying theme. Right. If
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: all the holes are super different from each other stylistically,
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: then sometimes it feels like they don't really fit together.
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: Kind of like an album where one song is a
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: country song and the next song is a rap song
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: and the next song is a EDM club banger, and
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: it's like, well, okay, yeah, it's fair. Yeah, all right,
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: so that's number five. Every hole should have a different character.
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: It seems like we generally think this is an important principle,
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: but there are some some things that could be nuanced
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: that could nuance our views about it. I don't know
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: if nuance is a verb, but I just used it
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: as one. You mentioned six also six Principal six is
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: there should be a minimum of blindness for the approach shots.
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so what do we mean by minimum here?
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: Like like how many is too many?
• 18:10
  Speaker 3: Or even like you know doesn't have to be blind right,
• 18:14
  Speaker 3: Like you could have a hard approach shot that you
• 18:16
  Speaker 3: can see exactly where you're supposed to go and still
• 18:18
  Speaker 3: screw it up, Like I don't. I don't think blindness
• 18:20
  Speaker 3: is necessarily the end all be all. This is This
• 18:24
  Speaker 3: might be my biggest gripe of the thirteen.
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: Truthfully, Okay, you you like blindness? Is that what you're saying.
• 18:32
  Speaker 3: I'm not saying I like it, But I don't think
• 18:36
  Speaker 3: I don't think there needs to be a minimum. I
• 18:38
  Speaker 3: don't think it needs to be blind and then things
• 18:40
  Speaker 3: on top of it. I think you could I could
• 18:42
  Speaker 3: see things that I know I'm not supposed to do
• 18:45
  Speaker 3: and then do them anyway.
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: Like I feel like.
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: The blindness is not your primary problem, is what you're saying.
• 18:51
  Speaker 3: No, No, if I don't know where it's going, then
• 18:53
  Speaker 3: I can't be worried about it going places that I
• 18:56
  Speaker 3: don't I can't see you know what I mean?
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: Okay, Well, let's talk about arguments against blind approach shots
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: and arguments for blind approach shots. Why might a blind
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: approach shot be considered bad? I mean, McKenzie doesn't say
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: here what his objection to a lot of blind shots
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: on a golf course is. But what's what do you
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: think the problem with a lot of blind shots would be?
• 19:19
  Speaker 3: Well, if you're playing it for the first time, you
• 19:22
  Speaker 3: you don't really know what you're doing, I guess, like,
• 19:24
  Speaker 3: but wouldn't that kind of be The good part too,
• 19:27
  Speaker 3: is that you don't know what you're doing, so you
• 19:31
  Speaker 3: have no idea where the danger is and you can
• 19:33
  Speaker 3: kind of hit it more freely. Like if I'm thinking
• 19:36
  Speaker 3: about me, if I see like water on the left
• 19:39
  Speaker 3: and I visually see it that, I'm way more worried
• 19:43
  Speaker 3: about it than Oh, I just didn't know that was there,
• 19:45
  Speaker 3: kind of thing like.
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: Well, if you get there and you discover that there's
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: water that you didn't see, you're going to be pretty pissed, right.
• 19:51
  Speaker 3: Yeah, But at that point it's not my fault. It's oh,
• 19:54
  Speaker 3: I didn't know that was there.
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: I see. You can blame it on somebody else, so
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: that's all right, Yeah, yeah, okay, So absolutely, blind approach
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: shots are really disorienting for first time players, and it
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: might be the case that a lot of first time
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: players will say, that's not fair. You didn't show me
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: what I was playing at and so I had I
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: had no context for trying to execute a good golf
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: shot here.
• 20:21
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so that's.
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: Maybe one possible objection to it. What would be an
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: argument in favor of a blind approach shot. Why might
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: a blind approach shot be considered fun?
• 20:30
  Speaker 3: I think somewhat for the same reason that like you
• 20:33
  Speaker 3: you don't know how close you are if you hit
• 20:35
  Speaker 3: a good shot, and it's kind of an element of surprise,
• 20:38
  Speaker 3: and I mean, I feel like it's fun, Like I
• 20:43
  Speaker 3: especially on you know, like I think of this discourse
• 20:46
  Speaker 3: you used to play in Syracuse all the time, Like
• 20:47
  Speaker 3: there's a downhill par three that's just a blind green
• 20:51
  Speaker 3: and you turn the corner and there's only two balls
• 20:54
  Speaker 3: on the green. You go, oh, like who's that? That
• 20:56
  Speaker 3: becomes a conversation topic. I guess I wouldn't say it's
• 21:00
  Speaker 3: a great golf hole, but I would say it's fun
• 21:02
  Speaker 3: because of the memorable rise.
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, it's one of those things. Each hole has
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: its own character, well, that a blind approach shot can
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: give a hole a kind of character. Maybe it's a
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: slightly gimmicky character. Maybe it's a character that some people
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: don't like, but seems like it might be worthwhile to
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: have one or two during the round, and that maybe
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: that wouldn't be too objectionable. Certainly, I think that blind
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: shots can be fun in the sense that you play
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: your shot and then as you're walking up to the green,
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: you get to discover what happened, and that process of
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: discovery can be really interesting and different and provide some
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: useful variety during a round of golf, I would say,
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: by the same token, seeing your ball land on a
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: green and watching it do what it does once it lands.
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: Watching your ball interact with a green complex, whether it's
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: the putting surface itself or what's around it is a
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: key part of the joy of golf too. So if
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: every approach shot is blind, then that becomes problematic. I
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: guess it's one of those everything in moderation principles.
• 22:13
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I just I feel like and this is just
• 22:16
  Speaker 3: like thinking about me and how I approach the game,
• 22:19
  Speaker 3: which is probably is not I'll be the first to
• 22:22
  Speaker 3: admit it's not a good way to do it. But
• 22:24
  Speaker 3: like if I got up to the green and I
• 22:28
  Speaker 3: didn't know it was there, and I ended up in
• 22:29
  Speaker 3: a bunker, like I could have spent the last three
• 22:32
  Speaker 3: minutes walking up to it, like trying to figure out
• 22:35
  Speaker 3: how to get out of this, and then I feel
• 22:37
  Speaker 3: like I'm scrambling because I don't I didn't have the
• 22:40
  Speaker 3: preconceived notion of like, oh, I ended up in this bunker.
• 22:43
  Speaker 2: You know what I mean?
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: Right, So there are arguments for and against blind shots.
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: I would say that this principle among golf architecture nerds
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: currently is maybe the least popular of all thirteen. People
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: object to this one pretty commonly because blind shots have
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: become fashionable again. What we have to keep in mind, though,
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: is that Alistair McKenzie lived during a period when golf
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: architects couldn't really move a lot of earth in creating
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: golf courses, and so blind shots on golf courses were
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: much more common back in the day. Because if you
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: think about it now, if there is some blindness in
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: an approach shot, if there's something, if there's a landform
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: that gets in the way of the view of the
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: green from from the fairway. Then a modern architect can
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: just knock down that landform and create a line of visibility.
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: Earth moving has created the ability for there to be
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: no blind shots on a golf course almost unless the
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: golf course is really really hilly, and then you're probably
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: inevitably going to have some blind or at least partially
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: blind shots. But on modern golf courses, blind shots became
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: much much less common because of the ability to move earth.
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: But think about Mackenzie's context. He existed during a period
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: when courses didn't move a lot of earth, and so
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: there were a ton of these blind shots, and in
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: order to avoid those blind shots, architects had to be
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: really clever about how they routed a golf course. And
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: so part of what mackenzie is saying is we need
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: to be more careful about how we route our golf
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: courses so that there aren't so many blind shots. But
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: then once blind shots became uncommon, people started to say, hey,
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: what happened to those blind shots? We kind of I
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: like those, you know, those are kind of those are
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: kind of fun. Let's bring some of those back.
• 24:47
  Speaker 2: I know, I don't I like it.
• 24:49
  Speaker 3: I guess I never thought of it because I'm not
• 24:53
  Speaker 3: thinking of golf courses this way. Until we started doing this, Like,
• 24:55
  Speaker 3: I never thought of it as a gimmick. But now
• 24:58
  Speaker 3: that you just said that it does, it does feel
• 25:00
  Speaker 3: pretty kind of cheap to me.
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: Well, it's interesting because once you have the ability to
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: eliminate a blind shot, but then you choose to keep
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: the blind shot, or maybe even you choose to create
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: a blind shot by building something. And this is something
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: that some architects have done. Pete Die has done this.
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: He has built, He has built huge mounds in front
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: of greens before just to create a blind shot. Once
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: it feels like the architect is doing it intentionally, you
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: start to receive it differently, don't you. Yeah, yeah, I've
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: always wondered why that is.
• 25:36
  Speaker 3: I don't I don't, I don't know. I I do
• 25:38
  Speaker 3: think that's interesting. That's just I mean, now I'm advocating
• 25:42
  Speaker 3: maybe for the blind shot, because that just adds another position,
• 25:46
  Speaker 3: that just adds another level of you know, and he
• 25:49
  Speaker 3: always calls the course like the defensive coordinator that you're
• 25:52
  Speaker 3: trying to go up against.
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: That, you know. Pete Die, however, many years.
• 25:57
  Speaker 3: Ago, screwed this out, but like put this up to
• 25:59
  Speaker 3: screw with you kind of thing.
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: This episode of Designing Golf is brought to you by
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: the USGA Green Section. The USGA Green Section recently launched
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  Speaker 1: by visiting gsshop dot USGA dot org. Thank you to
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: the USGA Green Section for supporting Designing Golf. Let's get
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: back to the episode. Let's talk about principal number one.
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: I want to highlight this one because I think there's
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: kind of a fun story behind it. So first reactions, PJ.
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: The principle is the course where possible should be arranged
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: in two loops of nine holes. Give me some pros
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: of this principle, and give me some cons of this principle.
• 27:42
  Speaker 3: So when I first read this, I didn't. You told
• 27:44
  Speaker 3: me to save all of my questions, thoughts, and comments
• 27:46
  Speaker 3: for when we do this. But my first thought d
• 27:50
  Speaker 3: or question or comment was is he referring to or
• 27:54
  Speaker 3: alluding to that maybe the two nine holes should be different,
• 28:00
  Speaker 3: like you should have a you know, an easier layout
• 28:06
  Speaker 3: on the front and a harder layout on the back,
• 28:08
  Speaker 3: or two like kind of separate, Like do they have
• 28:12
  Speaker 3: to be Like the way he phrased this in my
• 28:16
  Speaker 3: brain made it seem like he was advocating for two
• 28:20
  Speaker 3: distinct groups of nine like one cohesive.
• 28:26
  Speaker 2: Unit that flows through.
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: That's interesting. I haven't seen it that way so far.
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: I think mostly what he's saying, it's possible he's alluding
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: to something like that, but I think mainly what he's
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: saying is that after nine holes, the course should return
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: to the starting point should return to the clubhouse, and
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: then the next one should return to the clubhouse as well,
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: just for that convenience of returning nines.
• 28:52
  Speaker 3: As a person who plays at beth Page, where the
• 28:54
  Speaker 3: tenth t is about as far away from humanity as
• 28:57
  Speaker 3: you could possibly get, I very much would enjoy this.
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: If this was a thing, you would like there to
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: be returning nines. You would prefer there to be returning
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: nines at beth Page. Why is that? Why is that
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: such a convenience a convenience?
• 29:12
  Speaker 3: I well, I just feel like it's it's easier to well,
• 29:16
  Speaker 3: a you can get like a drink or a snack
• 29:18
  Speaker 3: or something, and you could kind of kind of collect
• 29:21
  Speaker 3: yourself after going through nine. But it's just I think
• 29:25
  Speaker 3: it's a mental thing more than anything else. That like
• 29:27
  Speaker 3: when you get to nine, ten, eleven, especially eleven T
• 29:32
  Speaker 3: for beth Page Black is like all the way in
• 29:34
  Speaker 3: the back corner, you're across the street from everything already,
• 29:37
  Speaker 3: Like it is about as far away from civilization as
• 29:40
  Speaker 3: you can get. And that's just like it's mentally taxing
• 29:44
  Speaker 3: that you know you are not even close to home yet,
• 29:48
  Speaker 3: and you are.
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: You are committed to eighteen holes yeah, and you are.
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: There's no way out except going all the way back
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: through the golf course.
• 29:56
  Speaker 3: I think I think that's where it's it's it's It
• 29:59
  Speaker 3: adds a level of mental intimidation for people.
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: Absolutely, I think that's really true. And so McKenzie's McKenzie's saying,
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: agreeing with you, saying, there are some benefits to returning nines,
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: maybe psychologically for players, maybe just in terms of giving
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: them a break or allowing them to grab something at
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: the clubhouse, assuming that this particular course doesn't build a
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: comfort station or something like that in the middle of
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: the golf course as many do these days. Mackenzie also
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: added some arguments in favor of returning nines that we
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: haven't mentioned yet. What it allows people to play nine
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: holes if they want to. Yeah, that's true, to just
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: play nine. Whereas if you have that out in back
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: eighteen hole routing, then there's really unless you have holes
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: in the middle of the round that return somehow to
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: the clubhouse, then you don't have these loops that you
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: can create easily. It allows for split T starts. You
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: can if you ever turning nines, you can start groups
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: from the first t. You can start them from the
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: tenth tee if you have a lot of groups on
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: a particular morning, and overall, I think it just increases
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: the profitability of the course. You know, in a number
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: of ways. If you have those returning nines, players are
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: going to come back to the clubhouse buy some stuff.
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: And then also you can pack more groups onto the
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: course through these various methods, the split too, starter or
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: just playing nine okay. At the same time, it can
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: be very limiting for the designer right to have returning nines.
• 31:32
  Speaker 3: If you know that you have to rout it back
• 31:35
  Speaker 3: to you know, the top of the hill or wherever
• 31:37
  Speaker 3: you're at after wherever the clubhouse is built.
• 31:40
  Speaker 2: Kind of thing that I could see how that could
• 31:43
  Speaker 2: be annoying.
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: Sure, what if the starting point of your golf course
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: is on top of a hill, as you say, and
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: it has to be there. That's where they're building the clubhouse,
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: that's where they're building the parking lot. Everything is going there,
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: and a couple of miles away there's an amazing set
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: of landform that you'd really like to get to and
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: build golf holes on, but you can't get there if
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: you have returning nines, because you just can't get all
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: the way out there with a few holes before you
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: know you have to come back. In that case, then
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: it can be it can be pretty frustrating for a
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: golf architect to insist on returning nines. And I would
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: also point out that if you look at the highest
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: ranked courses in the world. I'm using Golf Magazine's Top
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: one hundred World Top one hundred list just as an example,
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: if you look at the top thirty courses on that list,
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: I count fully fourteen of them, almost half of them
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: that do not have returning nines. The old course at
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: Saint Andrew's famously is an out and back routing without
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: returning nines. National Golf Links of America on Long Island
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: no returning nines. Royal Dornick no returning nines. Mary An
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: East Course doesn't have have classically returning nines. Pebble Beach
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: certainly doesn't have returning nines. The tenth Green is the
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: farthest point from from the uh from the first t
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: that you get there. Fisher's Island doesn't have returning nines.
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: Royal Port Rush. I could go on and on. So
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: many of the best regarded courses in the world don't
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: have returning nines, including by the way Cyprus Point, which
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: Alistair McKenzie designed.
• 33:23
  Speaker 2: That's that's that's that is That's a good point.
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: I love.
• 33:26
  Speaker 3: I love when people write things down and then completely
• 33:29
  Speaker 3: culture themselves.
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: Well mackenzie McKenzie had to reckon with this later, but
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: I can mention that in a minute. What were you
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: going to say?
• 33:35
  Speaker 3: I so, is that in your opinion, as you know
• 33:40
  Speaker 3: golf courses are here, do you is that correlation or
• 33:44
  Speaker 3: causation or nothing like just a pure coincidence that the
• 33:49
  Speaker 3: best courses in the world do not have this.
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: I think it is certainly correlation. I don't think there's
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: anything about non returning nines that makes a golf course better.
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: You could argue that the freedom to route the golf
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: course how the architect wanted to tends to create a
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: better course than one where you told the architect you
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: have to rout the golf course this way. So maybe
• 34:17
  Speaker 1: there is some causation there, but I think for the
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: most part, a lot of the courses that have non
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: returning nines that appear on these world top one hundred
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: lists are just very old courses, yeah, that were built
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: in an age when returning nines was not a thing
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: old course at Saint Andrew's, nobody was thinking about returning
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: nines when they led out that golf course.
• 34:41
  Speaker 3: They are just thinking, like nobody's looking to get a
• 34:43
  Speaker 3: turkey sandwich at the turn right.
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, you know, Old Tom's Golf repair shop didn't
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: yet carry the breakfast sandwich. But in any case, the
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: most natural way to rout a golf course is just
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: to start at a point, to go out until you
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: realize that you got to turn your ass back around
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: and get back. That is the most instinctive way to
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: rout a golf course. And you know, it's no coincidence
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: that many of the earliest golf courses links courses in
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: the UK and Ireland were routed in this manner, including
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: the old Course Royal Dornick and many other well regarded
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: links courses. A lot of the Open Championship courses don't
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: have returning nines. Real Truon has that kind of classic
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: out and back routing, and so I think that that's
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: part of it. A lot of the courses on these
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: lists are very old courses and returning nines is really
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: something that became fashionable with people like McKenzie advocating them,
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: and it became a kind of hard and fast convention
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: in the middle of the twentieth century. But it's one
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: of those conventions like blind shots, like the prohibition against
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: blind shots. It's one of those conventions that architects rec
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: have started to resist. One of the big things that
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: has happened recently with especially resort courses, is that architects
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: have now been given the freedom by some developers to
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: not have returning nines. Pacific Dunes at the Abandon Dunes
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: resort doesn't have returning nines, and that was one of
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: the big deals. When that course opened, people looked at
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: and said, oh my god, the ninth hole doesn't go
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: back to the clubhouse. What's going on here? It was
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: sort of radical. But then you know, these courses keep
• 36:34
  Speaker 1: getting built Sand Valley, Stream Song, Stream Song, et cetera,
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: et cetera, and and it's just not not a hard
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: and fast rule anymore. A lot of architects like David McLay, Kid,
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: Tom Doak, Corn Crenshaw, Gil Hants are not limited as
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: much by the returning nines convention anymore.
• 36:53
  Speaker 3: So I can't Yeah, I guess this is another thing
• 36:57
  Speaker 3: that I never really like considered too much. But when
• 37:00
  Speaker 3: you go down the list as you just did and
• 37:02
  Speaker 3: being like this doesn't have it, this doesn't have it,
• 37:05
  Speaker 3: this doesn't have it, you start to take I don't know,
• 37:07
  Speaker 3: maybe this is a good idea and you should just
• 37:10
  Speaker 3: go where the land tells you to go kind of thing.
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: Right, Yeah, I certainly want golf courses to be profitable,
• 37:16
  Speaker 1: so I understand why they build returning nines. Yeah, but
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: it can be limiting to a golf architect. And Mackenzie
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: himself later acknowledged this. Maybe it was building Cyprus Point
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: and also the Valley Club of Boncito doesn't have returning nines.
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: He built a lot of golf courses in the later
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: in the nineteen twenties that didn't have this feature to them,
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: and he later wrote that he regretted basically writing interest
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: writing this principle. His book The Spirit of Saint Andrew's
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: kind of like an updated edition of golf Architecture, and
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: he includes a whole couple of paragraphs in there about
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: losing sleep because certain committees that he was dealing with
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: were obsessed with this principle of returning nines.
• 38:03
  Speaker 3: And so this is a classic we're all trying to
• 38:06
  Speaker 3: find the guy who did this exactly.
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: Mackenzie was wearing the hot dog costume and and so.
• 38:14
  Speaker 3: Why do you what do you what are you guys reading?
• 38:16
  Speaker 3: Why are you thinking this?
• 38:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah?
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: Well yeah, and I think it's you know, this is
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: also the way that people often understand lists like this
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: is stricter than the lists themselves were ever intended to be.
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: Mackenzie called these the essential features of an ideal golf course.
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: He didn't say principles. No, I mean he you know,
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: I've been using the word principles. He didn't really even
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: say that that much, and he certainly didn't call them rules.
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: So I think he means these to be sort of
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: this is how you can evaluate whether a golf course
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: is ideal. But not all great golf courses are necessarily
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: going to have these features, and not all golf architects
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: in every situation should follow every rule to the letter.
• 39:01
  Speaker 3: Yeah, no, this is this is very you know, when
• 39:04
  Speaker 3: I said, like, oh, he's presenting a bunch of he
• 39:06
  Speaker 3: has a bunch of good ideas, like this is a
• 39:08
  Speaker 3: very idealistic view of everything. That putting these things into practice,
• 39:13
  Speaker 3: I'm sure are far more difficult than than you know,
• 39:17
  Speaker 3: you would have expected in nineteen ten or whatever he
• 39:20
  Speaker 3: wrote these absolutely.
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: Okay, last one I want to briefly talk about with
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: you is number seven.
• 39:27
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I didn't really get this one, and I just
• 39:30
  Speaker 2: I just didn't get it.
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: The course should have beautiful surroundings, and all the artificial
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: features should have so natural an appearance that a stranger
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: is unable to distinguish them from nature itself. What don't
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: you get about that one?
• 39:42
  Speaker 2: Well?
• 39:43
  Speaker 3: I well, I guess, especially when these were written, you're
• 39:46
  Speaker 3: not thinking of like cell phone towers or like any
• 39:49
  Speaker 3: you know, modern technology. But like my favorite thing is
• 39:53
  Speaker 3: when there's a cell phone tower and they put tree
• 39:55
  Speaker 3: branches on it. It's like, shut up, like don't don't tell
• 39:59
  Speaker 3: me it's raining.
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: All right, distinguish it from nature itself.
• 40:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah, like you know, don't do that. Don't Where did
• 40:06
  Speaker 2: I do?
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: I've never seen this before?
• 40:07
  Speaker 2: Is something intelligence? Oh? Yeah? There there are a couple.
• 40:12
  Speaker 3: There are a couple on on random courses in the
• 40:15
  Speaker 3: central New York region that try to make this helephone
• 40:18
  Speaker 3: towers blend in or like wind turbines, like, shut up,
• 40:21
  Speaker 3: that don't don't do that. So I guess, you know,
• 40:25
  Speaker 3: I'll give Alistair McKenzie a pass because he didn't know
• 40:28
  Speaker 3: wind turbines were going to exist to this extent. But
• 40:32
  Speaker 3: I just like, what what, like, why is the problem
• 40:34
  Speaker 3: if there's like a building, like I don't you know
• 40:37
  Speaker 3: what I mean, Like, I don't I think that's I
• 40:40
  Speaker 3: think it's fine. Like you you mentioned all like the
• 40:43
  Speaker 3: Old Course or all these places in Scotland that have
• 40:46
  Speaker 3: like just walls in the middle of like fairways or
• 40:49
  Speaker 3: next to the green or whatever. It's like it's it's
• 40:51
  Speaker 3: part of the charm, like who cares kind of thing.
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and those can be considered beautiful surroundings. The town
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: of Saint Andrews is certainly a feature of the Old Course.
• 41:01
  Speaker 1: You know, say what you want about the Old Course hotel.
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: I don't think anybody would call that beautiful, but at least,
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: you know, back in the day, the town of Saint
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: Andrews and still to an extent, has an aesthetic charm
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: to it that is part of the Old Course, and
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: so it doesn't necessarily have to be completely natural or
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: open surroundings. But I think it's right to push back
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: on this notion that for a golf course to be
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: ideal then it has to be blessed with a beautiful
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: landscape surrounding it, because that's not a reasonable assumption or
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: expectation for most golf courses. So I think there is
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: some wiggle room with that principle. But it's true that
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: not all golf courses are blessed in this manner, especially
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: now that urbanization has picked up so much, and many
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: golf courses it used to be out in the country,
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: including many of McKenzie's courses, are now surrounded by densely
• 41:53
  Speaker 1: developed neighborhoods. You know. So the really interesting part of
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: this seventh principle to me is the second part of it.
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: Artificial features should have so natural an appearance that a
• 42:05
  Speaker 1: stranger is unable to distinguish them from nature itself. Now
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: you kind of poked fun at this, like, if there
• 42:11
  Speaker 1: are some really unnatural elements on the golf course, then
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: you really can't dress them up, yeah, to look natural.
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: But what do you make of this principle in general,
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: that what an architect builds in the land, the earth
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: that the architect moves should then be shaped and tied
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: in to the natural surroundings. Do you generally agree with that.
• 42:32
  Speaker 2: In a way, right?
• 42:34
  Speaker 3: Like I think, you know, I think back to when
• 42:38
  Speaker 3: we were just down in Florida, and you know that
• 42:41
  Speaker 3: the Florida land is all like flat and very you know,
• 42:45
  Speaker 3: there's not a lot going on there. But then you
• 42:47
  Speaker 3: see some of these places where there are large elevation changes,
• 42:50
  Speaker 3: and you just think of like how much earth they
• 42:52
  Speaker 3: had to move, and to an extent, like it looks
• 42:56
  Speaker 3: like it was just kind of dropped in there, like
• 42:58
  Speaker 3: you're playing like zootokon and you're just dropping things into
• 43:02
  Speaker 3: the flat floor to land. It's like, yeah, here's this
• 43:05
  Speaker 3: giant hill and it's like that's not that didn't exist.
• 43:08
  Speaker 3: But like I see the value in doing that for
• 43:11
  Speaker 3: building an interesting golf course, but you know that it's
• 43:15
  Speaker 3: not natural with you know, you're not in an area
• 43:20
  Speaker 3: that that would happen naturally. So it does, like to
• 43:22
  Speaker 3: an extent, I think, kind of take you out of it.
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: M Yeah, if you can be fooled into thinking that
• 43:30
  Speaker 1: a golf course is more natural than it actually is,
• 43:33
  Speaker 1: if the architect is successful in convincing you that this
• 43:38
  Speaker 1: golf course was just sitting here and all we did
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: was put grass on it, I think there is a
• 43:43
  Speaker 1: special feeling that can come from that.
• 43:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: Absolutely, you're competing against nature rather than competing against an
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: artificial construct, and so that's what a lot of current
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: golf architects go for. The degree to which they succeed
• 43:57
  Speaker 1: depends on their skill. Architects are better at it than others.
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: Corn Crenshaw, Tom Doak are certainly considered to be some
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: of the best architects in the industry at doing precisely this,
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: at building things that are so well blended in to
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: the natural landscape surrounding the golf course that you never
• 44:18
  Speaker 1: think that they built this, or at least you can't
• 44:21
  Speaker 1: tell where the construction started and ended. You know that
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: some construction happened, but you can't identify exactly where it happened.
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: There is a pleasure that comes from that from the player.
• 44:32
  Speaker 1: At the same time, if we insist that all golf
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: courses should look perfectly natural, that can be limiting in
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: a number of ways. What if an architect says, that's
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: not my style. I'm not going for naturalism, I'm going
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: for something more heightened. I'm not a realist author. I
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: don't write realist novels. I write fantasy novels. I mean,
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: I want to do sci fi.
• 44:55
  Speaker 3: It's kind of fun, right like I to an extent,
• 44:59
  Speaker 3: like it might not make for the best golf course
• 45:02
  Speaker 3: like Valhalla. The waterfalls like it's visually appeeling right like
• 45:06
  Speaker 3: it's it's it's fun to look at, like I don't
• 45:09
  Speaker 3: you know, I don't know if it's it's exactly what
• 45:11
  Speaker 3: we're going for here, but it's it's something that I
• 45:15
  Speaker 3: feel like is like a zoo tycoon kind of thing,
• 45:17
  Speaker 3: where like you're building like an amusement park and it's like, oh,
• 45:20
  Speaker 3: we have all this limestone and we're gonna make waterfalls
• 45:23
  Speaker 3: running over it.
• 45:24
  Speaker 1: Jack Nicholas wasn't thinking players are going to believe that
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: these waterfalls were natural. Yeah, you know, you just put
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: him in there because you think they look cool. And
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: we can push back on that and say, ah, they
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: don't look that cool. They look kind of corny. They
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: look they look sort of chintzy, and and the aesthetic
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: is not really really pleasing to me. This is this
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: is like a Thomas Kincaid painting as opposed to something
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: with real artistic merit. But there are other architects like
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: Pete Die for I go back to Pete die a
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: lot because he defied a lot of conventions of the
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: Golden Age in interesting ways and embraced others interesting ways.
• 46:01
  Speaker 1: But Pete Die wasn't necessarily trying to make everything look natural,
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: especially when he was building on some flat Florida swamp
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: that didn't really give him anything to work with. He
• 46:12
  Speaker 1: was trying to build interesting looking stuff, and a lot
• 46:15
  Speaker 1: of the time he succeeded in building things that don't
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: look natural necessarily. They look manufactured, but they're cool to
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: look at. And I think that's something that golf architects
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: should feel free to do if that's what they want
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: to do. But again, everything comes back to execution. Are
• 46:33
  Speaker 1: you executing this in a way that is tasteful and
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: well done? And that's the rubric we should use to
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: judge it. But Mackenzie certainly was a firm advocate of
• 46:43
  Speaker 1: natural golf courses and a pioneer in this art of
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: tying in the manufactured with the natural, which is a
• 46:52
  Speaker 1: real art.
• 46:53
  Speaker 3: Yeah, And I think, like I understand what he's going
• 46:58
  Speaker 3: for with this principle. I think, like you said, like
• 47:01
  Speaker 3: when you're at a place that you feel like you're
• 47:04
  Speaker 3: just competing against you know, whatever. Glaciers moved here however
• 47:09
  Speaker 3: many millions of years ago kind of thing like that's
• 47:12
  Speaker 3: super cool. But I do think there is a you know,
• 47:15
  Speaker 3: there's certainly a market for the the sci fi or
• 47:21
  Speaker 3: however you want to phrase it, just kind of dropping
• 47:23
  Speaker 3: things in here and making them look, you know, visually
• 47:28
  Speaker 3: appealing or visually different than the rest of the things
• 47:31
  Speaker 3: you're going to see.
• 47:32
  Speaker 2: I definitely think the.
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: Futuristic, Yeah, it can be really interesting, you know, not
• 47:36
  Speaker 1: all if you think of building architecture, A lot of
• 47:39
  Speaker 1: the great buildings, they don't look like they naturally occur
• 47:42
  Speaker 1: and out of landscape. I mean, there are architects who
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: tried to emulate the natural landscape and their building architecture,
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: but there are others who tried to set up a contrast,
• 47:53
  Speaker 1: like a hard contrast between the building and the surroundings
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: and discover something interesting in there. And in Golfer connecture,
• 48:00
  Speaker 1: I think there's maybe something similar that that could happen,
• 48:04
  Speaker 1: but it's just hard to do it well. And I
• 48:07
  Speaker 1: suppose that's the that's the issue. All right, Let's wrap
• 48:11
  Speaker 1: up by identifying one principle that we agree with the
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: most and one principle that we disagree with the most. Now,
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: that we've discussed a few of them. What do you
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: agree with the most out of this list?
• 48:23
  Speaker 3: I think I agree the most with two, saying that
• 48:29
  Speaker 3: there should be you know, a couple of part threes,
• 48:32
  Speaker 3: at least four part threes, and then you know, longer
• 48:36
  Speaker 3: part fours, not even getting into part fives. Like I
• 48:39
  Speaker 3: just I feel like having a wide range of distances
• 48:43
  Speaker 3: is good for everybody, every level of player. It's challenging
• 48:47
  Speaker 3: enough for everybody, and this, you know, ideologically makes a
• 48:52
  Speaker 3: lot of sense to me.
• 48:53
  Speaker 1: I agree with you. I think Andy Johnson, founder of
• 48:57
  Speaker 1: FIDA Golf, would disagree with you. I think he wants
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: to see a golf course with all par fours. He
• 49:02
  Speaker 1: started he started to own that block recently. But yes,
• 49:06
  Speaker 1: that's a good one to point out. The one that
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: I agree with the most, or that I resonate with
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: the most, is just the first part of number three.
• 49:14
  Speaker 1: There should be little walking between greens and teas. I'm
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: pretty obsessive about this. I know it's a quirk of
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: mine that not everybody shares. And a lot of people
• 49:23
  Speaker 1: play golf in carts, which is fine. I prefer to
• 49:26
  Speaker 1: walk golf courses, and for me, there's something just so
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: wonderful about a tea being right next to the green.
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: It allows the course to have a flow and to
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: lull you into this continuous state of experience, whereas a
• 49:42
  Speaker 1: long walk or an awkward walk between a green and
• 49:45
  Speaker 1: a tea takes me out of it. It reminds me
• 49:48
  Speaker 1: that the golf course is a constructed thing and not
• 49:50
  Speaker 1: this kind of continuous dream that I'm that I'm experiencing.
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: And so that's one that I emphasize quite a bit
• 49:57
  Speaker 1: as far as my own pleasure and a golf course concerned.
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: Which principle do you most disagree with?
• 50:04
  Speaker 3: Ah, I don't necessarily know if I like vehemently disagree
• 50:09
  Speaker 3: with any of them that I'm taking like downright offense to.
• 50:13
  Speaker 3: I think the blind the blind approach is definitely a
• 50:20
  Speaker 3: kind of one that I would get hung up on.
• 50:22
  Speaker 3: Is that I feel like if you're asking for a
• 50:24
  Speaker 3: minimum of blindness and then throwing things on top of that,
• 50:29
  Speaker 3: I feel like that I like seeing the green. I
• 50:34
  Speaker 3: like seeing if I am lucky enough to hit a green,
• 50:37
  Speaker 3: I would like to see it happen. That's it's pretty
• 50:40
  Speaker 3: much my take on this.
• 50:42
  Speaker 1: Great the one that I have the hardest time with
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: is the last one. The course should be equally good
• 50:50
  Speaker 1: during winter and summer. The texture of the greens should
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: in fair ways, should be perfect. I know he's talking
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: about the ideal golf course here, and to an extent,
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: I get. I get what he's talking about. You know,
• 51:02
  Speaker 1: an ideal golf course meets you know, many of these characteristics.
• 51:07
  Speaker 1: The conditioning should be great. But I think that this
• 51:10
  Speaker 1: standard number thirteen has turned into kind of an impossible
• 51:15
  Speaker 1: expectation among many golfers. And if I were to rewrite
• 51:20
  Speaker 1: this list, I know that would be a presumptuous thing
• 51:23
  Speaker 1: to do. But if I were to rewrite this list
• 51:24
  Speaker 1: for the modern age, I think I would say something
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: really different about ideal golf course conditioning. To me, if
• 51:33
  Speaker 1: you're going to live up to the principle of natural
• 51:36
  Speaker 1: and artificial being blended together in as graceful a manner
• 51:40
  Speaker 1: as possible, then agronomy maintenance is part of that, and
• 51:45
  Speaker 1: overly refined agronomy and maintenance can tend to make the
• 51:50
  Speaker 1: golf course stand out from its natural setting in what
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: I think is a fairly unattractive way. And so if
• 51:57
  Speaker 1: you're going to try to blend the golf course in
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: to its surroundings. Then you have to have the guts
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: to give the golf course some frayed edges in its presentation.
• 52:08
  Speaker 1: And so I think that if I were writing this
• 52:10
  Speaker 1: list for myself, that I would say something along those
• 52:13
  Speaker 1: lines rather than this. But I understand that Mackenzie was
• 52:16
  Speaker 1: speaking from the perspective of somebody who had a very
• 52:19
  Speaker 1: different experience of golf course conditioning.
• 52:22
  Speaker 2: That that would make sense.
• 52:24
  Speaker 3: I mean, I feel like expecting everything to be perfect
• 52:27
  Speaker 3: is a good way to let yourself down.
• 52:31
  Speaker 1: Why don't we end on that note, PG, I think
• 52:32
  Speaker 1: that's those are words of wisdom from the young man.
• 52:35
  Speaker 1: Thank you for doing this with me, appreciate it fun
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: as always.
• 52:38
  Speaker 2: Thanks for having me. This is great.
• 52:39
  Speaker 1: Yeah, this is great, absolutely, and we'll figure out where
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: to go next from here. This episode of Designing Golf
• 52:57
  Speaker 1: was produced by PJ Clark. Thank you, PJ. CLUBTFE go
• 53:03
  Speaker 1: to the Frida egg dot com slash membership and see
• 53:06
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• 53:09
  Speaker 1: One particular thing I want to draw your attention to
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: is that sign ups for our event at Colorado Golf Club,
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: a great Corn Crenshaw design, are live right now on
• 53:20
  Speaker 1: the day that this episode drops. In fact, the event
• 53:22
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• 53:25
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• 54:01
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