Latest / Designing Golf / Golf Architecture 101: Routing

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Golf Architecture 101: Routing · Designing Golf

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: What is the most important step in designing a golf course.
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: If you ask pretty much any practicing golf architect, they're
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: probably going to tell you that it's routing. But routing
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: is also one of the hardest aspects of golf architecture
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: to talk about. Even to longtime enthusiasts, this subject can
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: be pretty intimidating and mysterious. So in this episode of
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: Golf Architecture one oh one, we're going to try to
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: demystify the art of routing a golf course. I'm Garrett Morrison,
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: and this is designing golf all right. As always in
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: the Golf Architecture one oh one series, my guest slash
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: student is PJ Clark. PJ, how you doing, Garrett.
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: I'm doing great.
• 0:56
  Speaker 3: I like our little matching sweatshirt action we got going
• 0:59
  Speaker 3: on here green.
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: We have vivid greens going on sea foam.
• 1:03
  Speaker 2: After Saint Patrick's Day.
• 1:05
  Speaker 3: We're celebrating a day late here, but spring has sprung,
• 1:07
  Speaker 3: so I like our little spring actually we got going on.
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: I mean I just wear green all week on Saint
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: Patrick's Week. Were releasing this episode, well, actually we're releasing
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: this episode this week. We're turning around pretty pretty fast.
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: So so yeah, we've we're on theme. You're a little
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: bit under the weather after an active week at the
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: Players Championship, so I appreciate you hopping on with me.
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: I'm ready to go.
• 1:30
  Speaker 3: I had a great experience at TPC Sawgrass on Monday,
• 1:34
  Speaker 3: and I'm ready to learn about what I should have
• 1:37
  Speaker 3: been learning while I.
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: Was out there.
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: You got to see a little bit of pretty high
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: level architecture out there. Now, I will say that when
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: it comes to TPC Sawgrass, routing isn't the main thing
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: about that course that is interesting because there, I mean,
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: there are some interesting aspects of TPC Sawgrass is routing.
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: We can even talk about that in this in this
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: installment of of golf Architecture one on one. But there
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: wasn't much there to begin with. Yes, So it's not
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: like Pete Dye was looking at great landforms and thinking
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: about how to use them. The golf course could just
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: kind of go wherever because they were building everything Florida.
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: Baby, everything's flat. Just throw some stuff out there.
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah, golf course architecture is a different type of thing
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: in Florida for the most part. So we are talking
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: about routing today. What have you gathered about routing just
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: by you know, producing the Friday Golf podcast for a
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: little while. What sort of tidbits about this subject have
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: have you absorbed so far?
• 2:43
  Speaker 3: I think the different kind of different kinds of routing,
• 2:49
  Speaker 3: I guess. I'm sure there's a more technical term for it,
• 2:52
  Speaker 3: but an out and back where you come back after
• 2:54
  Speaker 3: the front nine and then go go back out again
• 2:56
  Speaker 3: and then circle back towards the clubhouse, or if you know,
• 3:00
  Speaker 3: of course that you just go out like all the
• 3:03
  Speaker 3: way out and you come back in after eighteen, like
• 3:05
  Speaker 3: there's no kind of circle back thing, and then kind
• 3:10
  Speaker 3: of using the land to the advantage of you know,
• 3:15
  Speaker 3: where you're placing holes, like how far is the walk
• 3:17
  Speaker 3: necessarily between holes maybe? Or sure how close things are together?
• 3:22
  Speaker 3: And I feel like it probably impacts you don't want
• 3:25
  Speaker 3: too many I feel like you could say this about
• 3:28
  Speaker 3: anything that we talked about in golf architecture what I want,
• 3:30
  Speaker 3: but you don't want too many of the same type
• 3:34
  Speaker 3: of holes next to each other, Like you don't want
• 3:37
  Speaker 3: a bunch of basic, you know, straight par fours next
• 3:41
  Speaker 3: to each other. So I feel like that probably has
• 3:43
  Speaker 3: something to do with routing.
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: Question mark absolutely all of those things pertain to the
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: subject of routing, and we can kind of build a
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: framework here where you can fit some of those fragments
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: that you've that you've gathered over time. But all of
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: that that you're saying, we're going to touch on in
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: this discussion. So just by way of establishing a definition
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: of routing, what is routing? Basically it means identifying the
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: locations of the tees, fair ways, and greens for each
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: hole and then linking those features together into full holes
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: and sequences of holes that become the golf course. So
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: you know, it's it's really about building up from a
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: topographical map, from a piece of land a layout of
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: a golf course.
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: As it is craziest.
• 4:41
  Speaker 3: I don't understand how anybody could do that. I'm not
• 4:44
  Speaker 3: a visual learner. I don't like see things when they're
• 4:47
  Speaker 3: on a page in front of me that I could
• 4:49
  Speaker 3: just my brain just does that. I don't know how
• 4:52
  Speaker 3: you could just look at a map and be like, yeah,
• 4:54
  Speaker 3: there's a golf course there. That's the craziest thing to me.
• 4:57
  Speaker 3: I don't understand how it ever happens.
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: What kind of learner are are you? By the way,
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: I should probably know this.
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: I don't know. I think I need to read things.
• 5:04
  Speaker 3: I'm not the textual. Yeah, it's not in the abstract,
• 5:08
  Speaker 3: not in the abstract at all. If I read it,
• 5:10
  Speaker 3: I'll remember it.
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: But I don't.
• 5:12
  Speaker 3: I can't do anything that involves visualizing anything.
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: I'm kind of the same way. I'm pretty textual. But
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: auditory also is helpful, and those are those are kind
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: of separate paths that different students benefit from. Anyway, that's
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: that's going back into my teacher's bag. But in any case,
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: it is It is hard to overstate how important routing is.
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: I'm sort of surprised, actually we haven't covered the topics
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: so far. In golf architecture one on one, A strong
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: routing is often the thing that separates a good golf
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: course from a mediocre golf course. It is the skeletal
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: structure of a course, and just from a practical standpoint,
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: if you have a good routing, so many things about
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: the course just work better. The course will likely be
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: cheaper to build than you would expect, it will drain better,
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: it will be more walkable, the pace of play will
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: be better. And most important, a good routing is, in
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: my mind, the key thing that makes for an enjoyable
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: playing experience, even if the players not really aware of
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: the fact that the routing is creating pleasure. It's not
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: something that golfers normally think about in those terms, because
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: you like, a good routing is harder to perceive than
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: really high level conditioning or interesting bunker shapes or cool
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: greens or whatever. Right, routing is sort of the invisible
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: factor that influences everything about the course but never fully
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: shows itself, And often it's the thing that makes you
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: enjoy a course that otherwise might not have that much
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: going for it. If you have a course that's not
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: in very good shape, or has lost a bunch of
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: bunkers over time, or is over tr read, but you
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: play it and you're like, why did I enjoy that
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: so much? Usually it's because the course has a solid routing.
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: So when someone says a municipal golf course or an
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: affordable golf course has good bones, often I think what
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: they really mean is that it has a good routing.
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: Does that resonate with you or remind you of any
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: courses that you've played.
• 7:28
  Speaker 2: It's a good question.
• 7:29
  Speaker 3: Uh, I don't know if the off the top of
• 7:31
  Speaker 3: my head necessarily but I mean that makes sense. Like
• 7:34
  Speaker 3: I hear you guys talk about good good bones all
• 7:36
  Speaker 3: the time, and how you know if X, Y and
• 7:39
  Speaker 3: Z or restored or fixed that it could get a
• 7:43
  Speaker 3: lot better. But you need the uh, you need the
• 7:46
  Speaker 3: basic golf holes to exist before you can put the
• 7:50
  Speaker 3: kind of finishing touches on everything. So I feel like
• 7:53
  Speaker 3: that's a that's a good way to think about it,
• 7:55
  Speaker 3: that you just laid out, That just clicked, That just
• 7:57
  Speaker 3: clicks something in me.
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: There a lot of the courses at Bethpage, aside from
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: the Black Horse, are your classic good bones golf courses.
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: You know, the Red course has really really good bones
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: and it's in good shape too.
• 8:10
  Speaker 3: I was going to say, I don't know if I
• 8:12
  Speaker 3: didn't know if Red would apply necessarily, because I think
• 8:15
  Speaker 3: reddis everybody here loves Red more than they love Black, honestly.
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, it definitely has a little bit more charm.
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: And again, you know, Okay, so the black Horse has
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: an exceptional routing, I think, but part of what makes
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: makes Red so pleasurable is that it's just a little
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: bit more fun.
• 8:35
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and.
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: So, and I think part of the reason for that
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: is that the choices that were made in the routing
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: of that course lend themselves to fun rather than just
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: this kind of adventure of difficulty that the black course provides.
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: In any case, I think you know. One of the
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: reasons I think studying routing or no, a little not
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: studying it necessarily, just knowing a little bit about it
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: is important for golfers is that it can help you
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: appreciate golf courses that don't have huge maintenance budgets, right,
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: or that are otherwise maybe not very well known or
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: widely appreciated. It allows you to find hidden gems and
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: appreciate hidden gems because routing is something that a lot
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: of unexpected courses have a good routing right. And so
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: that's kind of what we're digging into in this episode,
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: the ability to appreciate golf courses for more than just
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: their kind of surface appearance or for the easy things
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: that there are to appreciate. We're talking about some of
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: the deeper things about golf courses that we can understand
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: and enjoy here. So what we'll cover two main topics
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: in this episode related to routing. The first will be
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: how an architect goes about routing a course, and the
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: second will be how a player can assess the quality
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: of a course's routing, and those are really two separate things,
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: so we'll talk about both of those things. But before
• 10:15
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• 10:20
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• 10:25
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• 10:31
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• 10:36
  Speaker 1: from six x to twelve X, so when you're on
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: the golf course, you can just see your target better.
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: You can identify your exact landing spot more clearly, you
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: can assess the contours of the fairway or the green
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: more easily. You can actually see the characteristics of a
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: pin placement. All that stuff is is pretty useful and
• 10:56
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• 11:00
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• 11:04
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• 11:09
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• 11:13
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• 11:19
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• 11:24
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• 11:26
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• 11:30
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• 11:34
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• 12:02
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• 12:07
  Speaker 1: it out. Okay, let's get into a topic number one
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: for the day PG, which is how an architect routes
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: a golf course. Now, obviously, I myself have never routed
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: a golf course, so what I'm about to tell you
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: is really one big synthesis and simplification of things I've
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: learned from talking to architects and reading things that architects
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: have written. Maybe you should find a teacher for this
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: subject who has actually designed golf courses before. I don't know,
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: I feel like I'm a bit of a charlotte in here.
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: So I'll do my best.
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: Though I think this is gonna be great.
• 12:43
  Speaker 3: I think because I know basically nothing, I think anything
• 12:47
  Speaker 3: is progress at this point.
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: One particular architect who is very informative on the subject
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: of routing and knows a lot more than I do
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: is Tom Doak. No one has done as much as
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: Doak specifically to popularize the discussion of routing. It is
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: really his signature topic. And one thing that Doak likes
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: to say that I always think about is that routing
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: a golf course is like putting together a puzzle, except
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: that you never know whether you've found the right answer.
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: There are many possible answers and results that the routing
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: process could yield, and you just can't know whether the
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: one you've come up with is the best one. You
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: just have to decide that it's good enough and you
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: sort of go with it. But most golf architects agree
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: broadly on the goal of routing, and that goal is
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: twofold one. You want to take advantage of a property's
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: best natural assets, and you especially want to take advantage
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: of its topography, which is to say, it's contour, undulation,
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: elevation change, et cetera. You want your holes to interact
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: with those features in an interesting way. Two, you're trying
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: to connect the holes you found in the landscape into
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: a walkable, compelling sequence. And we'll talk a little more
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: later about what makes for a good sequence of holes.
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: So those are the two goals that most architects would
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: agree on when it comes to routing. Maximize the natural
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: topography and connect the holes into a sequence that makes sense.
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: So the first step in the routing process is to
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: familiarize yourself with the site. Often this is done remotely
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: using aerial photographs and what's called a topographic map or
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: topo map. Have you ever seen a topo map? Do
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: you know what these look like?
• 14:50
  Speaker 3: I have, because we have some on the website. I've
• 14:54
  Speaker 3: encountered it at some point, and some designing notebooks and
• 14:59
  Speaker 3: the whole desig contest, right, there was a map involved
• 15:03
  Speaker 3: in that, so I'm generally familiar. I wouldn't say I
• 15:06
  Speaker 3: know how to read it, but I've seen one before.
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: You know, some people just have this thing where they're
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: able to read a topo map and other people are
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: baffled by them. I think most people can get to
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: a state of competence with reading a topo map, but
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: they're certainly those who are talented at it. And you know,
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: what I want you to envision with a topo map
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: is a map of a site with a bunch of
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: curving lines one and these lines represent different elevations, and
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: so when the lines are close together, that means it's steep.
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: When the lines are far apart, that means that it's flatter, right,
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: And so that's that's kind of what you and you
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: learn to just sort of recognize ridges and valleys and
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: different topographical features by looking at a topo map. But
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: this is a this is a key tool in the
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: routing process. It's really important. So you know, experienced architects
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: will often be able to come up with a rough
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: routing or at least a few options for routings just
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: by studying a topo map and identifying places where they
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: know holes will fit. But it's also critical to get
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: out to the property, walk around and see what will
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: work and what won't work. From the ground. Now, in
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: those initial stages of routing, architects are typically looking first
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: for green sites. They're looking for interesting features to build
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: greens into because greens are the focal point of a
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: golf course, So if you want to take advantage of
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: a property's best natural assets, right, if that's goal number
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: one of routing, If you want to draw the player's
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: attention to interesting features in the landscape, the best way
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: to do that is to build your greens into those
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: features because players really spend the most time on the greens,
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: and the most interesting stuff happens and important stuff happens
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: on the greens. So again, maximizing natural topography means finding
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: good places to put greens. You're also just looking for
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: places where greens can be constructed and maintained relatively easily.
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: So on steep properties, you're trying to actually identify flatter
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: areas where you could naturally put a green that would
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: be functional, because if you put a green on a
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: piece of land that is too steep, then the ball
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: is not going to stay on it, right, It's not
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: going to work. So if you have a very hilly
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: or just big, you know, tilted site, what you're looking
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: for on the topa map is those places where the
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: lines are farther apart so that you can actually naturally
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: place a green there without having to build big structures
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: to hold to hold the green up flat on flat properties,
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: you really have the opposite problem. What you're looking for
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: on flat properties is whatever topographical features there might be,
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: and that's where you'll want to locate at the greens.
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: So if you have a flatter property and you're looking
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: at the topa map, you're looking more for where the
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: lines are closer together, because you might actually have some
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: interesting landforms there that you can tie greens into. You
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: don't just want to build greens on plane flat land.
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: I mean sometimes you have to do that, but it's
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: not preferred. You want to hook your greens into interesting features. Okay.
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: So once you have located some green sites, then you
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: can start looking for fairways or especially landing zones for
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: tea shots, because landing zones in some ways are similar
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: to greens where where you need it to be functional,
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: You need the ball to be able to stay there.
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: You need something of the right size and relative flatness
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: to work as a fairway. And also you want your
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: fairways to be interesting. You don't want them just to
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: be flat, so you know, find some top graphical features
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: to route your fairways over. Now, often fairways are best
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: placed in valleys or along the crest of a ridge,
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: or just on gentle slopes or gently undulating ground. That's
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: where fairways work. Green sites can be kind of smaller, right,
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: Fairway sites have to be generally broader. And then finally
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: you can find some tees or locations for putting different teas.
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: But this isn't quite as important because tees are small
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: and they can be built relatively easily, even on ground
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: that isn't well suited naturally to a tee. So you
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: found your greens, you found your fairways, you found your tees.
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: So basically what architects are doing in the early stages
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: of routing is looking for the best natural locations for
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: playing areas, and that is greens, fairways and all that
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: makes sense.
• 20:01
  Speaker 2: So far, that does make sense. I think when when.
• 20:07
  Speaker 3: You when you're looking for a green on the topo map,
• 20:12
  Speaker 3: is that just for the green itself or the entire
• 20:16
  Speaker 3: green complex of like what you're looking to do with
• 20:19
  Speaker 3: the green, like bunkers or slopes to the side of it,
• 20:22
  Speaker 3: or you just trying to put the actual putting surface down.
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: I think you're looking for a good place for an
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: entire green complex, okay, And you know the reason for
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: that is sometimes the topographical features that you use for
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: a green complex are not within the putting surface itself necessarily.
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: Sometimes it's just good to put a green kind of
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: near a really interesting topographical feature. If there's like a
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: big abrupt knoll, you're not gonna put the green on
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: top of it because you'd have to you'd have to
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: move some earth to to make that happen. But if
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: you put the being kind of next to it, then
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: it's interesting to look at because you're you're you're orienting
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: the player's vision toward that cool landform, and you know
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: it might not factor into the putting surface itself, but
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: the green complex ties into it. But it's there, right, Yeah,
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: And that's that's just you know, a lot of what
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: architects are doing a routing is just pointing players at
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: the cool features of the landscape.
• 21:24
  Speaker 2: Cool.
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: That brings us to the second major step in routing
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: a golf course, which is connecting these sites for greens,
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: fairways and tees into a full sequence of golf holes.
• 21:38
  Speaker 3: Now, this is this is where you lose it. Yeah,
• 21:41
  Speaker 3: this is this is the crazy part where you know,
• 21:43
  Speaker 3: good luck. I'm happy people do it, but I don't
• 21:46
  Speaker 3: understand how we get there.
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm glad you think so, because I feel the
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: same way about it. It's it just seems impossible, right
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: If you start by looking for all these separate green
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: sites and fairway landing zones, how do you even start
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: to construct golf holes out of that stuff? Much less
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: a full sequence of eighteen holes, much less a sequence
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: of eighteen holes as it has a part of seventy
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: two in a yardage of the way you know, et cetera,
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: et cetera. This is really where the puzzle metaphor kicks in,
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: because yes, it is very tricky to link together all
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: these different spots into anything resembling a conventional golf course. Now,
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: one key thing that skillful architects do is that they
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: suit the length and type of hole to the character
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: of the land. Often this means putting shorter holes on
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: more severe land and longer holes on less severe land.
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: And the reason for that is that a long hole
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: on severe land will require probably a lot of earth
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: moving to build and will usually be very difficult to play.
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: So it's just more practical to put short holes on
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: the most severe kind of transitional sections of the property.
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: But the architects should also have a sense of winter
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: viholate that principle to create something unique and exciting. So
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: you know, the open last year was at Royal Port Rush.
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: A famous hole at Royal Port Rush is the sixteenth
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: Calamity Corner. Yes, it is a par three, so I
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: guess technically a short hole, but it's a long part three.
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: This is not a one hundred and forty yard part three.
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: This is a very long strike and it's on an
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: incredibly severe piece of land. It's it's you know, kind
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: of on the edge of this huge canyon. And that
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: hole is incredibly memorable, really a great great golf hole,
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: and it is it is function, it does work, it's playable.
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: But in that instance, the architect had a sense in
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: the architect being in this case, Harry Colet had a
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: sense for when to use a severe piece of land
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: for a longer hole relative to par because he was looking,
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: he was he was shooting for the star there, right.
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: Probably the conventional thing to do with that piece of
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: land would have been to create a short part three there,
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: but but he went big and ended up with with
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: something great. So with all of these kind of rules
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: that I'm talking about, architects violate them when when they
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: see fit and that's what what makes golf architecture kind
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: of in art as opposed to an exact science.
• 24:26
  Speaker 3: You know, rules are meant to be broken. They're just guidelines.
• 24:29
  Speaker 3: They're they're there. It's fine. I feel like you can
• 24:33
  Speaker 3: you can get away. If you can do it well,
• 24:35
  Speaker 3: you can get away with it. And that's what people
• 24:37
  Speaker 3: make people like Calamity Corner.
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: Yeah, greatness consists of knowing when to when to break
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: the rules, as as we've seen with you know, some
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: of the decisions that the Jets have made recently. They
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: might break the rules, they might violate common sense, but
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: you know, greatness is the goal and and greatness is
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: coming in the future.
• 24:56
  Speaker 3: Right. Uh, people would tell you that. I don't know
• 24:59
  Speaker 3: if Hi Wood, but people would I feel like, you know,
• 25:03
  Speaker 3: our friend Harry Colton might be a little bit better
• 25:05
  Speaker 3: off than the Jets are.
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: But all right, obviously, you know, there's only so much
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: you can do on properties with just purely natural golf holes.
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: It's pretty rare that you would have, you know, a
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: routing consisting only of natural golf holes that you just
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: found in the landscape. So it is in this part
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: of the process that the architect decides which natural holes
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: to include, and then what must be done to link
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: those holes together. So say you have two great natural
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: holes that are just sitting there in the land waiting
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: to be grasped, and you want to use them. You
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: want to incorporate them into your routing. But between them
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: you have terrain that's not very well suited to golf.
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: Either it's extremely severe or it's too flat and boring.
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: Something needs to be manufactured there in order to bring
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: that hole up to the standard of the natural holes
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: on either side of it. And it's during the routing
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: stage that the architect decides, Okay, we'll make something out
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: of this piece of land in order to have these
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: two great natural holes, and really good architects are able
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: to make it seem like that bad piece of land
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: in the middle was actually good all along. You know where.
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: That's where the art of construction and design kicks in
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: later in the process. Okay, Now, once you've figured out
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: which holes go where, you have to consider the overall
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: sequencing of the golf course. Most clients, most developers, are
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: gonna want eighteen holes, two loops of nine, and a
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: par of seventy or above. They're gonna want two to
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: four par fives, four to five, par three's, tennish par fours.
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: So those are all the conventional things. You know. It's
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: good when developers are willing to not have those things,
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: I think, in order to allow the architect to just
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: work with land and find what's there. But most of
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: the time they're going to want those conventional numbers. They're
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: going to want a max yardage of more than seven
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: thousand yards, so right there, on most projects you have
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: a lot of standards to meet. But the more important
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: thing to me personally into a lot of good architects
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: is that the routing have some sort of variety, balance
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: and flow across the round. Whether that means it has
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: the usual composition of par four's, part three's and par
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: fives doesn't matter as much to me as long as
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: there is variety, balance and flow. And we can talk
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: a little bit later about about what those things mean. Variety,
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: balance and flow. Another thing that good architects look for
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: in this kind of connecting part of the process is
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: something you mentioned earlier, PJ, and that is reasonably short
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: grain to tea transitions, which we'll also talk about later.
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: But those are the basics of how an architect goes
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: about routing a golf course. Is there anything in there
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: that kind of stands out to you as surprising or notable?
• 28:20
  Speaker 3: I feel like not necessarily surprising, but when you have
• 28:25
  Speaker 3: just a blank canvas trying to having the guidelines to fit,
• 28:31
  Speaker 3: you know, I need seventy two hundred yards and I
• 28:34
  Speaker 3: need eighteen holes of a par seventy two, So I
• 28:39
  Speaker 3: can't get like super creative, Like I don't know, like
• 28:43
  Speaker 3: you said, is there room for more open interpretation in
• 28:49
  Speaker 3: new builds now, where like maybe it's a bar like
• 28:52
  Speaker 3: sixty eight and it's a little shorter and there's more
• 28:56
  Speaker 3: to get creative with?
• 28:57
  Speaker 2: Or are are is the tradition of.
• 29:01
  Speaker 3: You know, par seventy two eighteen holes nine and nine
• 29:05
  Speaker 3: kind of thing?
• 29:05
  Speaker 2: Is that still?
• 29:08
  Speaker 3: I feel like it's still the prevailing theory, But is
• 29:11
  Speaker 3: there more kind of latitude with that now?
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: I think there is more latitude with that now. And
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: that's partly because we have developers like the Kaiser family
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: who are open to crazy ideas from the likes of
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: Tom Doak to have you know, a PAR sixty eight
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: course like like Sedge.
• 29:30
  Speaker 3: Valley, So he does he just see that on a map,
• 29:34
  Speaker 3: like he just gets the map and is like, I
• 29:37
  Speaker 3: can only build you know, however long this is going
• 29:40
  Speaker 3: to be like sixty eight hundred yards, so it's got
• 29:42
  Speaker 3: to be a par sixty eight.
• 29:43
  Speaker 2: Is that how it works?
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: I don't think that in that case he looked at
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: the map and said, I can only build a par
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: sixty eight course here. I think what Doak did on
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: the Sedge Valley project at Sand Valley was that he
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: assessed this piece of land and saw that it kind
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: of had these sort of smaller pockets in the property,
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: like there were kind of more severe crowded undulations in
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: that property as compared to like Mammoth Dunes or Sand Valley,
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: which have more kind of broad slopes. And his general
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: impression was what would fit really well here is kind
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: of a sporting golf course that's a little bit shorter,
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: that doesn't have the max yardage of seven thousand or above,
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: that doesn't have the max par of seventy two. Just
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: something smaller would fit. And I think also Doke independently
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: wanted to build a course like this, wanted to challenge
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: the notion that a course had to have a part
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: of seventy two and a certain yardage, So I think
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: it was a combination of looking at that site and
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: just having a general sense that a smaller course would
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: fit here, but also I kind of want to build
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: this type of course just to get people thinking a
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: little bit. Now. Douk, as I mentioned before, is an
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: intellectual of routing, like this is his big subject. He's
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: written books about the routing process. He loves talking about it,
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: and it's something that he's brought to the four more
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: than any architect has done, I think in the history
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: of the profession, and so he does love these experiments
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: in routing. He's done a reversible course, for instance, at
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: the Loop at Forest Dunes in Michigan, and Pacific Dunes.
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: His big kind of breakout design has some really interesting
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: elements of its routing. It has back to back par threes,
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: it does not have returning nines. At that point in
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: golf architecture history, those things were unusual, and I think
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: courses like Pacific Dunes have made them more acceptable. Yes,
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: we are seeing more experiments and routing. We're seeing a
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: willingness to challenge the usual conventions, and I think that's
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: a good thing because I think that architects have often
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: had to abandon the goal of maximizing natural topography for
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: the sake of meeting certain conventions in the past, and
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: I would rather architects just focus on maximizing the land. Now,
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: if you go way back in the history of golf,
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: you find even more interesting stuff. Before the eighteen whole
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: round became standardized, and it was really the old course
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: at San Andrews that standardized the eighteen hole par seventy
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: two round or par seventy sorry again San Andrews par
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: seventy two. I should know off that I'm getting old PJ.
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: But in any case, it standardized the eighteen whole round.
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: But before before that happened, before that became widely accepted,
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: you had seven whole golf courses, you had twelve whole
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: golf courses. People really were looking to fit a course
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: to the land rather than create an eighteen hole, par
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: seventy two golf course. And so there's some inspiration in
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: the deep past of golf. But you know, we've gotten
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: to the point with you know, USGA ratings and handicaps
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: that it's kind of hard to build a thirteen hole
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: golf course. But there is a little bit of wiggle room,
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: all right, So let's move on to the second half
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: of our episode. Here, I want to talk about how
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: you as a player can assess the routing of a
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: golf course. Now, this is this is really what's because
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: neither of us PJ probably is ever going to route
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: a golf course. I don't know. Maybe maybe we will.
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: We've got we've got a lot of life to.
• 33:47
  Speaker 3: Live, there's still time. I would call it unlikely. I
• 33:50
  Speaker 3: think you're more likely than me, But I don't know.
• 33:53
  Speaker 3: I could get on the sticks on two K and
• 33:55
  Speaker 3: see what happens too, I don't.
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: I haven't played around with that, but maybe I need
• 33:59
  Speaker 2: to after this.
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: That's very true. I've forgotten about virtual routing that that
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: is definitely a possibility for both of us. But in
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: any case, the most relevant thing to both of us
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: would be how do you play a golf course and
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: say whether it has a good routing or a poor routing?
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: And I don't think this is something that comes naturally
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: to most people, even even to people who are really
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: interested in golf architecture. Usually the quality of a routing
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: doesn't come up all that much, or you know, you know,
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: usually we're talking about whole design, strategic versus penal golf architecture,
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: or we're talking about green contouring or bunker shaping or
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: aesthetics or how good the land is. Those things are
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: easier to talk about, and I think the reason that
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: routing doesn't get talked about all that much from the
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: golfer's perspective is that it is hidden. It is subterranean,
• 34:56
  Speaker 1: so to speak. The golf course just goes where it goes,
• 34:59
  Speaker 1: and the player doesn't have a lot of visibility as
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: to where it could have gone instead. And furthermore, the
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: player really doesn't have any idea of the challenges or
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: the limitations that factored into the routing process. Maybe the
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: land didn't have that many natural green sites or fairway
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: landing zones. It's hard to tell when you just play
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: a golf course how much natural goodness was there for
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: the architect to work with. Maybe there were environmental regulations
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: that dictated where the holes could and couldn't go. Maybe
• 35:32
  Speaker 1: the golf course was just one part of a real
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: estate plan and the architect just had to accept the
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: land that he was given. These are things that we
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: just can't really know by playing a golf course, so
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: we have to be somewhat humble. I think when we're
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: talking about routing, because usually we don't know what we
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: don't know, and if there are problems in the routing,
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: the golf architect isn't necessarily to blame. At the same time,
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: our experience of the golf course is our experience of
• 36:05
  Speaker 1: the golf course, and if the routing seems bad, then
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: it's bad. Right. Maybe the golf architect isn't at fault,
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: But in the end, the course was built for the player,
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: and so it's fair for the player to offer an assessment.
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: That's kind of how I think about it. So with
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: all that said, I have five questions that you can
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: ask during your next round in order to evaluate the
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: routing of a golf course. These are just five specific
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: questions that you can ask of a golf course after
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: you've played it to see whether you think the routing
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: is effective fantastic. The first question, is there a variety
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: of good natural green sites. So greens can go on plateaus,
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: they can go in saddles, they can go on dolls
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: or punch bowls. They can be benched into a hillside
• 37:04
  Speaker 1: backwards or sideways. They can be on ground that tilts
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: to the left or tilts to the right. Or back
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: to front or front to back. They can have different
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: kinds of surrounding topographical features like creeks and ravines and
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: cliffs and rockout croppings and other natural hazards. So there
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: are all sorts of different places where greens can go,
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: and a good routing finds a variety of those places.
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: I think we've all played courses where the greens are
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: all kind of on the same type of landform, especially
• 37:41
  Speaker 1: you know, on the top of ridges, just on hilltops.
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: There are certain courses where you know, it plays from
• 37:47
  Speaker 1: a tee down through a valley and back up on
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: a hill, over and over and over again. This is
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: a flaw in routing because you want variety. Yes, those
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: greens are great, they drain well, they're often very attractive,
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: they just work well. But you don't want only that
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: in a round of golf. You also want greens on
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: lower pieces of land or just more varied pieces of land. Okay,
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: So that's the first question. Is there a variety of
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: good natural green sites. Related to that is question two,
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: which is do the holes have a variety of topographical profiles?
• 38:29
  Speaker 1: And what I mean by this is how do the
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: holes move across the land? What is the terrain doing
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: over the course of the entire hole. So holes can
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: move uphill, they can move downhill. You can have a
• 38:45
  Speaker 1: flat drive followed by an uphill approach. You can have
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: a flat drive followed by a downhill approach. You can
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: have an uphill drive followed by a flat approach, et cetera,
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: et cetera, all those permutations. You can play ridge to
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: ridge like I just described earlier. You can play up
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: and over from a low te to a high fairway
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: to a low green. You can play sidehill. You can
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: play side hill in reverse camber where the hole kind
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: of goes up against the slope, dog legs up against
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: the slope. You can play side hill in positive camber
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: where the whole kind of dog legs with the slope.
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: You can play straight across the side hill. You can
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: have undulating holes in various ways. And then within each
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: of those categories that I just named, you have a
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: lot of different scales and iterations. Right, So that's the
• 39:38
  Speaker 1: topographical profile of a hole. Does it make sense when
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: I talk about topographical profile of a golf hole.
• 39:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah, And I think you.
• 39:48
  Speaker 3: Not having any variety would be terrible, right, Like the
• 39:54
  Speaker 3: point if you're playing every hole flatter, everything goes uphill,
• 39:58
  Speaker 3: and you're just climbing, climbing, climbing the whole time, Like,
• 40:01
  Speaker 3: I don't know what the fun is in having to
• 40:03
  Speaker 3: hit different shots and what is presented to you. So
• 40:07
  Speaker 3: I feel like that, at least to me, of the
• 40:10
  Speaker 3: two questions so far, that one is an easier answer
• 40:13
  Speaker 3: than the first one that I would be able to
• 40:17
  Speaker 3: actively figure out as things are going, because I know
• 40:19
  Speaker 3: a direction I'm going.
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: Yes, And it's a little bit hard to you know,
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: answer the first question. You know, what are the green sites?
• 40:27
  Speaker 1: What are the natural features of the green sites? Because
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: greens are often so built that whatever the natural terrain
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: was previously might be a little bit concealed because the
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: green was just constructed up from a piece of land.
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: But as you see more courses, as you see more greens,
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: you start to be able to tell, you know, look
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: at the land in general around the green and kind
• 40:50
  Speaker 1: of discern what it was. And in both of those questions,
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: the topographical profiles of the holes and the natural green sites,
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: what you're looking for is variety. You're looking for things
• 41:02
  Speaker 1: to be changed up from hole to hole during the
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: round because that allows us to. That keeps things fresh,
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: that creates excitement and interest during the round of golf.
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: It helps you remember the round of golf, It tests
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: different shots. Variety is really the thing that a good
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: routing generates, and variety is one of the most important
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: aspects of a good golf course. So right there, you
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: see the importance of routing. But yeah, I mean, you know,
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: a clear flaw that some courses have is that they
• 41:35
  Speaker 1: kind of you know, the whole sort of move the
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: same way or you know, most commonly, what I see
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: is that very rarely do certain courses play along a
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: side hill. Right That's kind of a common flaw that
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: I see where the architect didn't really take advantage of
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: opportunities to have holes running along a tilt, because that
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: can create some really interesting golf trying to hold the
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: high side of the fairway to get an advantage, curving
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: the ball into the slope to try to hold that there.
• 42:11
  Speaker 1: Sidehill holes can be so interesting, but often architects disregard
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: them because they're focusing on the ridge to ridge hole,
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: or the uphill hole or the downhill hole. I think
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: having that extra element of the side hill hole is
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: really an indicator of a quality routing. All right, moving
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: on to the third question, does the course engage directly
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: with interesting natural features without overdoing it. Some courses, to
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: my eye, seem to go out of their way to
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: avoid the property's most compelling natural features, so you can
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: look at them, but you aren't playing over them, and
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: to me, this is really dissatisfying. Now, by the same token,
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: some courses are too direct in their approach to severe
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: topography and end up having too many blind shots and
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: just end up being exhausting to play. As you know,
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: I'm okay with the occasional blind shot, but if it's
• 43:16
  Speaker 1: whole after whole after hole, that's an indication of a
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: flawed routing. That's an indication that the holes are moving
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: too directly over the most severe topography. So that's a
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: routing flaw as well. Well routed courses incorporate the property's
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: best natural assets while also having a sense of when
• 43:35
  Speaker 1: to use quieter land. There's a happy medium there somewhere. Now.
• 43:43
  Speaker 1: A giveaway of a flaw when it comes to asking
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: this question of a golf course is when the holes
• 43:51
  Speaker 1: are always just kind of moving through valleys, when they're
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: always just kind of on the flatter land at the
• 43:57
  Speaker 1: bottom of a valley, and you're instantly passing by the
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: ridges or the knolls instead of playing into them or
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: playing over them or doing something interesting with them. Often
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: the easiest thing to do in routing a golf course
• 44:13
  Speaker 1: is just to avoid the severe places, but that can
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: also make the golf course kind of boring. Question four.
• 44:23
  Speaker 1: Is there a well sequenced balance of whole types? And
• 44:28
  Speaker 1: a wholes type can be defined by par length, difficulty direction, right,
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: So this is we're starting to.
• 44:38
  Speaker 2: Let this one stands out to me.
• 44:44
  Speaker 3: I mean, it's a terrible example because this is like
• 44:47
  Speaker 3: not the golf courses that we discussed on this this
• 44:51
  Speaker 3: wonderful podcast about we talk.
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: We talk about any golf courses here, any golf courses.
• 44:56
  Speaker 3: Drumlin's Country Club in Syracuse, New York, where I've played
• 45:01
  Speaker 3: more golf probably than I will ever play at any
• 45:03
  Speaker 3: place in my entire life, because I would just play
• 45:06
  Speaker 3: every day. You get to the top of this hill
• 45:09
  Speaker 3: to start the back nine, and holes nine ten or nine, eleven, thirteen, fourteen,
• 45:20
  Speaker 3: and sixteen are practically all the same hole.
• 45:24
  Speaker 2: They are just like straight.
• 45:27
  Speaker 3: I'll put a hill somehow in both directions and it's
• 45:31
  Speaker 3: just straight and there's one tree on the top of
• 45:35
  Speaker 3: this hill that basically shares like all of these holes,
• 45:38
  Speaker 3: and it is the most repetitive thing, and like it's
• 45:41
  Speaker 3: wide open, so you can play across the holes and.
• 45:44
  Speaker 2: It's like total it's insane.
• 45:47
  Speaker 3: And I, by the end of playing there for four
• 45:51
  Speaker 3: years as much as I could, you start to play
• 45:55
  Speaker 3: other golf courses and you go, oh, it's not supposed
• 45:57
  Speaker 3: to be like this.
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: Have to be this way. Yeah, yeah. Often we realize
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: that about the courses that we play when we're younger.
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: I certainly, Yeah, you come to think that certain things
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: are normal, but then you play another course and you're like, oh, yeah, okay, yes,
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: that is what you're describing is a routing flaw that
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: is a fault in the routing process of the design.
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: So that's a great example, and it's not necessarily a
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: problem that across the round you might have holes that
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: are this way. The problem is is that they're all
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: back to back to back, right. The problem is that
• 46:37
  Speaker 1: they're not spread out. So that's a sequencing issue, and
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: that's what we're getting into right now with these kind
• 46:43
  Speaker 1: of last three questions that we're asking about the routing
• 46:46
  Speaker 1: of the golf course. The first three are talking about
• 46:50
  Speaker 1: the location of the holes, the sighting of the holes.
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: Is there a variety of good natural green sites, Do
• 46:55
  Speaker 1: the holes have a variety of topographical profiles? Does the
• 46:58
  Speaker 1: course engage directly interesting natural features without overdoing it? Those
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: questions relate to where the architect put the holes. It's
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: in you know, those are in the part of the
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: process where the architect is maybe looking at the topographical
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: map or walking the site and identifying good natural features
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: to try to maximize this fourth question here, is there
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: a well sequenced balance of hole types? Has to do
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: with putting all those holes together and the order in
• 47:27
  Speaker 1: which they appear in the round. So, in addition to
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: what you're talking about, which is a you know, how
• 47:35
  Speaker 1: how holes use the land, whole type can also pertain
• 47:40
  Speaker 1: to par three's, par fours and par fives. You don't
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: want four par threes in a row. You don't want
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: four par fives in a row. You want them spread
• 47:48
  Speaker 1: out throughout the round. A balance of long holes and
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: short holes, the balance of difficult holes and easy holes. Again,
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: it's okay to have five long holes in relation to
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: par over the course of a round. You just don't
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: want them all in the same place in the round.
• 48:08
  Speaker 1: You want a balance of straight holes and dog legs
• 48:11
  Speaker 1: left and dog legs right. You want maybe a few
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: zigzag holes that move both directions. You want a balance
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: of into the wind holes down wind holes, holes where
• 48:21
  Speaker 1: the wind is coming in off the right or off
• 48:23
  Speaker 1: the left, or holes where the wind is quartering. This
• 48:27
  Speaker 1: is also a very common flaw in poorly routed golf
• 48:30
  Speaker 1: courses where the holes are all kind of sitting along
• 48:34
  Speaker 1: to axes right, either either going one direction or going
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: the opposite direction, and kind of packed in like sardines
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: on the property. That can be a very easy way
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: to rout a golf course because you're packing a lot
• 48:48
  Speaker 1: of holes into the property. But the problem is that,
• 48:52
  Speaker 1: in relation to whatever the wind is that day, you're
• 48:55
  Speaker 1: facing the same kind of shot over and over and
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: over and over. Like you're you're looking at the sun
• 49:02
  Speaker 1: in certain ways. So say the sun is setting and
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: a lot of the holes point at the sun, then
• 49:07
  Speaker 1: then you're having Then you're having a hard time. So
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: there are many reasons that you want holes moving in
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: all sorts of different directions. Now, you just played TPC
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: sawgrass the Stadium course. To me, the most exceptional thing
• 49:21
  Speaker 1: about TPC sawgrass is routing is its balance and variety
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: in whole types difficult holes, long holes, holes traveling different directions.
• 49:33
  Speaker 1: Something that Pete die always did is he had his
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: par fours are almost always did is he had his
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: par fours pointing in four different directions, and that I
• 49:42
  Speaker 1: believe is the case of TPC Sagrass. So if you
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: have a certain wind on a certain day, then those
• 49:48
  Speaker 1: par threes are going to be relating to the wind differently.
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: And also there there's a short par three there, and
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: there's a very long part three, and then there are
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: a couple of par threes that are maybe somewhere in
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: the middle. So that balance and variety of par three
• 50:07
  Speaker 1: holes is a signature of Pete Dye's design and something
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: that he really thought about when he was designing a
• 50:14
  Speaker 1: golf course. Is this something that you picked up on
• 50:16
  Speaker 1: as you were playing the course, this kind of balance
• 50:18
  Speaker 1: of different types of holes.
• 50:20
  Speaker 3: Yeah, definitely, And I mean especially after like walking it
• 50:23
  Speaker 3: all week for the players and then actually getting to
• 50:27
  Speaker 3: play it, I definitely had a new found appreciation.
• 50:29
  Speaker 2: Like my favorite hole is to watch.
• 50:33
  Speaker 3: I think I was biased ended up being my favorite
• 50:35
  Speaker 3: holes to play as well.
• 50:36
  Speaker 2: Because I was just most excited to play those.
• 50:39
  Speaker 3: But I feel like everything was just sequenced so well,
• 50:43
  Speaker 3: and it definitely helped that I was like overly familiar
• 50:47
  Speaker 3: with the golf course, and I knew what every hole
• 50:49
  Speaker 3: was and I knew what was coming next. But I
• 50:51
  Speaker 3: think like, as you're going through and playing it, like
• 50:56
  Speaker 3: you know you're gonna get beat up on, like you know,
• 51:00
  Speaker 3: nine and ten, and then you get a little bit
• 51:04
  Speaker 3: of a lull on twelve and thirteen might be a
• 51:06
  Speaker 3: little bit easier, and then fourteen is going to punch
• 51:08
  Speaker 3: you in the face again. And it's a good little
• 51:11
  Speaker 3: like there's he puts the pedal down and then he
• 51:15
  Speaker 3: relaxes it for two holes, and then you you maybe
• 51:18
  Speaker 3: go up a little bit, and then by the time
• 51:20
  Speaker 3: you get to sixteen, seventeen, eighteen, everything is just full
• 51:23
  Speaker 3: gas pedals through the floor. And I really appreciated that
• 51:27
  Speaker 3: that it felt like, you know, every time that you
• 51:31
  Speaker 3: had a hole that was overly difficult, there was always
• 51:35
  Speaker 3: like kind of a reprieve around the corner.
• 51:37
  Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, And that is a testament to Die's ability
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: to sequence holes, to link holes together into balanced, flowing,
• 51:50
  Speaker 1: varied sequences. He was so good at that. Now, a
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: lot of what we've discussed in this episode maximizing natural
• 51:57
  Speaker 1: features is not really pertinent to most of Pete Die's designs,
• 52:02
  Speaker 1: because he was often building golf courses on swamps and
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: deserts and sites that didn't have much to offer. Now,
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: when his sites did have some natural features to maximize,
• 52:12
  Speaker 1: he generally did a good job of going after them.
• 52:17
  Speaker 1: But a lot of what he did with routing that
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: was really good was create sequences of holes that had
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: variety within them. Yes, he would always give you a
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: kind of reprieve after a very difficult hole. You'd just
• 52:32
  Speaker 1: consider the closing stretch. Right, Fifteen is an incredibly hard hole,
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: sixteen is an opportunity, seventeen is scary but scorable, and
• 52:41
  Speaker 1: then eighteen is very difficult. So you know, right there
• 52:45
  Speaker 1: you have in terms of just difficulty, you have such
• 52:49
  Speaker 1: a variety of holes there. And then you can also
• 52:51
  Speaker 1: talk about just in that sequence, you know, how many
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: different variations of a golf hole are explored, with the
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: way the holes kind of turn or the direction that
• 53:04
  Speaker 1: they travel, or you know, et cetera, et cetera. Variety
• 53:09
  Speaker 1: is really Pete Die's specialty and something that comes out
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: in its golf courses consistently. All right, Fifth question, are
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: the green to tea transitions short enough to walk comfortably?
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: And if they're not short, are they at least interesting?
• 53:25
  Speaker 1: So I think one key to a good green to
• 53:28
  Speaker 1: tea transition is that it moves you forward to a
• 53:31
  Speaker 1: new part of the property. In those cases, the transition
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: can be kind of long and still be enjoyable. But
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: if the green to tea transition takes you backwards over
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: land that you've just seen or played over, then it
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: is less enjoyable. Then it feels like an interruption that
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: takes you out of the flow of the round. So
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: I think the key with green to tea transitions is yes,
• 53:56
  Speaker 1: they should be They should be short. They really should be,
• 53:59
  Speaker 1: because otherwise the course becomes hard to walk, pace of
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: place suffers, and you start forcing people to use carts,
• 54:06
  Speaker 1: which is a big bugaboo of mine. I just don't
• 54:09
  Speaker 1: think a golf course can be great and also only
• 54:13
  Speaker 1: be navigated with a golf cart, because I think walking
• 54:16
  Speaker 1: is that the soul of the game. But a lot
• 54:18
  Speaker 1: of people are less radical on that issue than I am.
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: But the key thing really is that the green to
• 54:25
  Speaker 1: tea transition doesn't take you out of the round. It
• 54:28
  Speaker 1: doesn't cause you to lose your focus on the experience
• 54:32
  Speaker 1: or the golf course. And a poor green to tea
• 54:34
  Speaker 1: transition can do exactly that. It takes you out of it.
• 54:38
  Speaker 1: You stop thinking about the course, you stop thinking about
• 54:40
  Speaker 1: the land, you start thinking about the golf and you're
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: just kind of frustrated. Okay, now where do I have
• 54:45
  Speaker 1: to go? I have to walk backwards to get to
• 54:48
  Speaker 1: this next tea. That doesn't feel good.
• 54:50
  Speaker 3: You always want to, at least mentally for me, I
• 54:53
  Speaker 3: feel like you always want the illusion of moving forward, right,
• 54:57
  Speaker 3: Just yeah, move keep going in the direction that you
• 55:01
  Speaker 3: think you're going to be going, not having to walk back.
• 55:05
  Speaker 3: Especially if you're like me and you know you put
• 55:07
  Speaker 3: up a big number on a hole and then you've
• 55:09
  Speaker 3: got to.
• 55:09
  Speaker 2: Walk past it to move on, it's not as fun.
• 55:13
  Speaker 1: You always want to feel like you're discovering something new. Yeah, So,
• 55:17
  Speaker 1: in that sense, a lengthy green to tea transition can
• 55:20
  Speaker 1: sometimes be If it's like a well designed green to
• 55:23
  Speaker 1: tea transition, it can be kind of pleasurable. And my
• 55:26
  Speaker 1: favorite example of this is bandon trails, where there are
• 55:30
  Speaker 1: a lot of long green to tea transitions, but you
• 55:34
  Speaker 1: can see that the architects put effort into the transitions themselves.
• 55:39
  Speaker 1: The paths are really interesting between the holes, and they're
• 55:42
  Speaker 1: always moving you to something new. They're always revealing something
• 55:47
  Speaker 1: to you. So you're okay with walking a long way
• 55:50
  Speaker 1: between holes because it's part of the pleasure of the round.
• 55:54
  Speaker 1: So when the green to tea transitions are long, they
• 55:57
  Speaker 1: should at least be moving you forward, moving you to
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: something new. But usually I would say that a sign
• 56:03
  Speaker 1: of a good routing is that the green to tea
• 56:05
  Speaker 1: transitions are short and very manageable. You're walking off the
• 56:08
  Speaker 1: green and onto the next tee pretty quickly. Final question.
• 56:13
  Speaker 1: Sixth and final question, and this one is kind of
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: kind of funky. Does the routing have a sense of story?
• 56:22
  Speaker 1: Does it have a sense of narrative to it? Is
• 56:26
  Speaker 1: there rising and falling action? Is there a culmination in
• 56:31
  Speaker 1: an exciting finish? So I think the best routings don't
• 56:37
  Speaker 1: just pack all of the excitement into one part of
• 56:39
  Speaker 1: the round, especially not in the beginning part of the round.
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: They distribute the high points throughout and then save some
• 56:49
  Speaker 1: sort of big flourish for toward the end of the round.
• 56:54
  Speaker 1: One of the great examples of routings that have that
• 56:59
  Speaker 1: tell different story and are more or less effective is
• 57:03
  Speaker 1: the kind of three famous courses along seventeen mile drive
• 57:07
  Speaker 1: in Pebble Beach, Spyglass Hill, Cypress Point and Pebble Beach.
• 57:12
  Speaker 1: Spyglass Hill. Starts off with a bang. It takes you
• 57:16
  Speaker 1: downhill spectacular first hole takes you plunging toward the ocean
• 57:20
  Speaker 1: and into the dunes, and for the next few holes
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: you're playing in the dunes. But then you climb back
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: up into the forest and you spend the rest of
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: the round up in the forest, and it's beautiful up there.
• 57:33
  Speaker 1: But you're like, wait, am I done with the dunes?
• 57:36
  Speaker 1: Like are we really Is that really it? We're just
• 57:39
  Speaker 1: going to visit them once at the beginning of the
• 57:41
  Speaker 1: round and we're going to spend the rest of the
• 57:42
  Speaker 1: round up here. That's a little disappointing. Pebble Beach, on
• 57:47
  Speaker 1: the other hand, you start inland and you make your
• 57:51
  Speaker 1: way out to the coast. You're on the coast from
• 57:54
  Speaker 1: hole four to hole ten. Then you go back inland,
• 57:59
  Speaker 1: wind back and a figure eight motion and you get
• 58:03
  Speaker 1: back out to the coast on seventeen and eighteen. So
• 58:06
  Speaker 1: you've got that high point in the middle of the round,
• 58:08
  Speaker 1: spectacular holes along the coast, and then you come back
• 58:13
  Speaker 1: to the ocean for the grand finale. Cyprus Point is
• 58:17
  Speaker 1: a little more complex, but also has a sense of narrative,
• 58:21
  Speaker 1: a sense of story. You go into the forest and
• 58:23
  Speaker 1: back out to the dunes, into the forest, back out
• 58:26
  Speaker 1: into the dunes, and then finally you make your way
• 58:29
  Speaker 1: out to the coast for fifteen, sixteen and seventeen, and
• 58:34
  Speaker 1: then there's some falling action at the end where you
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: climb back up through the forest to the clubhouse. That
• 58:41
  Speaker 1: is sense of story, That is sense of narrative in
• 58:44
  Speaker 1: a golf round right there. And it's different from Pebble Beach,
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: but you have a feeling of a full structured round
• 58:51
  Speaker 1: in a way that you kind of don't at Spyglass Hill.
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: So does this makes sense as a concept, a sense
• 58:58
  Speaker 1: of narrative and a.
• 58:59
  Speaker 3: Round of gold, Yeah, I think so. I think it's
• 59:04
  Speaker 3: something I think it might be easier to look at, well,
• 59:10
  Speaker 3: like after you play rather than while you're playing, because
• 59:13
  Speaker 3: you're not so worried about you know, actually hitting the
• 59:17
  Speaker 3: shots and the action of doing but I think it's
• 59:21
  Speaker 3: easier to look back on and see how you can
• 59:26
  Speaker 3: see your own rises and falls throughout the round and
• 59:31
  Speaker 3: what the course kind of provided to make that happen
• 59:34
  Speaker 3: for you.
• 59:35
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I mean, good stories are not just one
• 59:40
  Speaker 1: high point after another that becomes exhausting. Good stories have
• 59:46
  Speaker 1: a sense of when to go big and when to
• 59:49
  Speaker 1: go subtle, and how to save some of the most
• 59:52
  Speaker 1: interesting stuff. The big action scene or the big reunion
• 59:57
  Speaker 1: between the happy couple. You know, you don't want that
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 1: to happen a third of the way through the movie.
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 1: You want that to happen toward the end. Maybe not
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 1: exactly at the end, but but but in the closing
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 1: stretch of the film. And a really good routing has
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: a feeling of that timing. It's different at every golf course,
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 1: but it's certainly something that sets the really great courses apart.
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: And again going back to TPC Sagras, there's clearly a
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 1: big finale at TPC Sagras. Die had a sense of drama,
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 1: a sense of narrative in the course of that round,
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 1: and he deployed those high points and those more subtle
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 1: points really smartly, really well in TPC Sagras.
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 3: Uh. Yeah, there's a there's a bit of a crescendo
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 3: there at the end. You think that you're little bit
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 3: you're looking forward to the whole time and then and
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 3: and see what happens. But I I mean, I think
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 3: there's plenty of highlights in the middle that gets you
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 3: to that part. I mean, after a whole week of
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 3: watching it be played in the tournament, I was excited
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 3: to play every hole, but I guess in a normal week,
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 3: like I don't know, even then, like I didn't feel
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 3: like there was anything that was like lulling me to sleep.
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 2: Really, I was just excited to be out there. And
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 2: maybe that's me, but I don't know.
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, it's a lot of high points during the round.
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 1: But you know, like whole three, the par three, Yes,
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 1: this isn't kind of the most memorable hole in the world.
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 1: You know, there are a few holes sprinkled through the
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 1: back nine that that aren't that aren't gung ho and
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 1: in throwing, you know, cool stuff in your face shot
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 1: after shot, so there is a little bit of rising
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 1: and falling action there. But it's true the TPC Sawgrass
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 1: is an action packed round. It is an action movie,
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 1: you know, whereas whereas other courses might might belong to
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 1: other genres, they might be the historical.
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 3: I kind of I like that. Thinking of it as
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 3: a movie is like a type of movie. I like
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 3: that a lot.
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 1: Well, Tbczagra. Certainly you wouldn't. You wouldn't call it a
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 1: romantic comedy. No, you wouldn't. You wouldn't call it a western.
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 1: I think I think it's it's like diehard, you know, yeah,
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 1: or or you know, an identity.
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 2: In honor of ludicrous. I think it's maybe a fast
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 2: and furious movie that's perfect.
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, you found it, you found it PJ. All right.
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 1: So those are the six questions that you can ask
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 1: about how to about a course's routing, and that can
• 1:02:33
  Speaker 1: help you, you know, assess whether you think a routing
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 1: of a course is effective or ineffective. So we've talked about,
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 1: you know, how an architect approaches a routing. We've talked
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 1: about how a player can evaluate a routing. Any big
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 1: takeaways from all this, Any any moments during during this
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 1: episode that will stand out to you and that you'll
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 1: you'll take home with you.
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 3: Is there a question or an aspect of routing that
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 3: you feel is more important.
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 2: Than the others.
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 1: That's a great question, like.
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 3: If you're ranking these in waiting or priority, like does
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 3: something matter more to me?
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 1: They're all really important, But I have a pet peeve
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 1: about courses that don't have good green to tea transitions.
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 1: That is not the most important thing to me, but
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 1: I will mention that it's something that drives me crazy
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 1: when those aren't well worked out. I think that question
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 1: number two, if I were to pick a question in
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 1: those six that we covered, that is most important to me.
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 1: Question number two, do the holes have a variety of
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 1: topographical profiles? To me, that's incredibly, incredibly important just through
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 1: the course of the eighteen whole round, that the holes
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 1: use the land in different ways, And it's such a
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 1: clear indicator to me of a really quality golf course
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 1: as opposed to one that's kind of mediocre or not
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 1: as thought through from a design perspective, the courses where
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 1: the holes have a variety of relationships to the land
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 1: are the ones that are really well designed and that
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 1: I think tend to stand up on repeat plays more
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 1: than anything else. Sequencing also is you know, if I
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 1: were to choose a number two in order of importance.
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 1: The sequencing of the holes, the balance, variety and flow
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 1: of different hole types over the course of around also
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 1: a very very important factor in the pleasure that a
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 1: player might take in a round of golf, and flaws
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 1: in that respect really stand out to players. They can
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 1: really take you out of around. If you have three
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 1: holes back to back to back that are kind of
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 1: similar that it ruins it a little bit. And so
• 1:04:58
  Speaker 1: those those two I think I would pick out. What
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 1: about you, I mean, do you think are there any
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 1: that stand out to you as as more important than
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 1: the others?
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 3: I agree on the sequencing I think is probably the
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 3: most important, and it does if it gets too repetitive
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 3: too quick, like you said, it does kind of like
• 1:05:20
  Speaker 3: ruin the immersion because you just feel like you're going
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 3: back and forth too many, too many times in a row.
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 3: So I think that is the one that, at least
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 3: actively in the action of playing and walking and being
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 3: out there, is the one that I would be most
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 3: conscious of.
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 1: I think, yeah, I can definitely see that. Yeah, I
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 1: saw that the concept of sequencing resonated with you, And
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 1: that's a good indication of something to look for and
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 1: think more about as you're playing golf, because it clearly
• 1:05:53
  Speaker 1: has an effect on the enjoyment that you take in
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 1: a round of golf. And that's you know, for me,
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 1: in learning about golf architecture, your enjoyment and what you
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 1: find to be important to taking pleasure in a round
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 1: of golf is such a great guide for what to
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 1: learn about in golf architecture. Sequencing is one of those things,
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 1: and the act of sequencing and routing is so complicated
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 1: that really only the best architects are able to do
• 1:06:28
  Speaker 1: it well. And so that immediately guides you toward great
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 1: golf courses and allows you to identify great golf courses
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 1: just by thinking of the sequencing of the holes. So
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 1: that's definitely something to hang on to. All right. So
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 1: next time on designing Golf, we're going to have some
• 1:06:45
  Speaker 1: pre master's content for you. But after the masters, keep
• 1:06:50
  Speaker 1: an eye out for a special golf Architecture one oh
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 1: one video. PJ doesn't know about this yet, I'm announcing
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 1: it to him as well as to you. We'll record this.
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 1: We need to give PG a chance to get well
• 1:07:02
  Speaker 1: again and recover his voice, but we're going to talk
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 1: about five great golf course routings, and that will be
• 1:07:10
  Speaker 1: a video that we'll post on the YouTube channel and
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 1: will apply some of these principles that we talked about
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 1: in this episode. So everybody keep your eyes peeled for
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 1: that on the YouTube channel in a few weeks after
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 1: the Masters. We're going to do this after the Masters,
• 1:07:26
  Speaker 1: all right, PJ, thank you for joining me. Always a
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 1: pleasure to talk to you. That's another golf architecture one
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 1: on one in the books. This episode of Designing Golf
• 1:07:40
  Speaker 1: was produced by Will Balsam. Thank you Will. If you've
• 1:07:44
  Speaker 1: been liking Designing Golf, if you've been enjoying golf Architecture
• 1:07:48
  Speaker 1: one oh one, then make sure to see what we've
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 1: got going on in Friday Golf Club. Go to the
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 1: Frida Egg dot com slash membership to see what Frida
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 1: Egg Golf Club offers. But we've got lots of golf
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 1: architecture content happening in Friday Golf Club as well as
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 1: a new member forum that's been really fun to participate in.
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 1: Right now, some of our members are putting together and
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 1: a golf architecture family tree where they're tracing the links
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 1: between different golf architects over time. It's a really cool project,
• 1:08:20
  Speaker 1: and it's the example of the kind of stuff that
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 1: we get up to in Friday Golf Club. Pretty nerdy,
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 1: but very very fun, and we're creating a great community
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 1: in there. So check out Friday Golf Club, Thefrida egg
• 1:08:32
  Speaker 1: dot com slash membership. Thank you for listening, and we'll
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 1: be back again soon with another episode.