Applying modern conditioning to extreme throwback greens

[me05501]

This post is inspired by comments from friends who have played the recently-renovated Lookout Mountain Golf Club.

 

The course was restored using a lot of template holes along with maps, drawings and photos from the original design and construction in the 1920's or 30's. Here's an article about the project: This neglected Seth Raynor design is finally getting the investment it deserves | Courses | Golf Digest

 

Everyone I know who has played LMGC has come away shaken. The greens are very extreme and very fast. Putting is reportedly very frustrating and the greens reject shots that would be expected to hold. It's easy to chip or putt across a green and be faced with the same sort of shot from the other direction. Sounds like a very frustrating setup. 

 

My question is whether it even makes sense to build greens with 1930's contours when we know they'll be running at 2030's speeds. Does doing so honor the original design, or pervert it? 

 

These kinds of conditions have proven acceptable to visitors to Pinehurst #2 for an example. That's a destination course and not many of us would want to play the majority of our rounds there. A members' course can be very challenging but it ought to be playable and enjoyable for your typical 10-20 handicapper. 

 

I don't have a dog in the fight but I think it's an interesting question to ponder. Seems like if you want the original design you should be ready to live with the original conditions too. Either that or water down the classic designs to work the way they were intended to work instead of a somewhat goofy modern mutation of what was intended. 

 

Thoughts? 

 

 

 

 

..

Edited October 3 by me05501

[jvincent]

For a renovation to greens which had very large contours, it makes no sense.

 

My home course has two greens which are perfectly fine at speeds of 9 or lower. Any higher and the number of pinnable locations is vastly reduced.

 

A famous example is Pasatiempo. The greens are quite large, but there are several which at today's speed are largely unplayable. I know they are renovating it right now, but I'd be curious if they are softening some of the slopes.

[me05501]

12 minutes ago, jvincent said:

For a renovation to greens which had very large contours, it makes no sense.

 

My home course has two greens which are perfectly fine at speeds of 9 or lower. Any higher and the number of pinnable locations is vastly reduced.

 

A famous example is Pasatiempo. The greens are quite large, but there are several which at today's speed are largely unplayable. I know they are renovating it right now, but I'd be curious if they are softening some of the slopes.

 

There's another local course designed by Brian Silva that includes a lot of template holes. I remember playing it in the first few seasons it was open and a lot of the contours seemed very extreme at that time. After 30 years of conditioning a lot of those features are more subdued now. Maybe that's what is expected to happen with some of the greens being put in place now. 

 

[ChipNRun]

13 minutes ago, me05501 said:

My question is whether it even makes sense to build greens with 1930's contours when we know they'll be running at 2030's speeds. Does doing so honor the original design, or pervert it?

 

Maybe 10 years ago, one of the golf magazines had a thorough and interesting article on classic courses trying modern turf grass on the greens.

 

One such course was in the Pinehurst zone. The owners decided to redo the greens with an experimental fine-bladed greens turf from Florida. Results were not good. Due to heavy contouring, putts from the back of the green to the front rolled 20 yards back down fairway. Even cut shots with LWs were difficult to stop. Certain sidehill lies got similar fates.

 

At the end of the article, the owners were trying to decide whether to replant the old turf grass - which had a lot more body - or reduce contouring on half the greens so they would hold shots. (Sorry, I never did find out their solution.)

[hollabachgt]

Could this just be a situation where new Bermuda greens are both very firm and typically kept very fast until they mature?
Its not uncommon for new greens to be crazy hard until they get a full year of grow in and begin to become more playable.

[doctor220]

15 hours ago, me05501 said:

This post is inspired by comments from friends who have played the recently-renovated Lookout Mountain Golf Club.

 

The course was restored using a lot of template holes along with maps, drawings and photos from the original design and construction in the 1920's or 30's. Here's an article about the project: This neglected Seth Raynor design is finally getting the investment it deserves | Courses | Golf Digest

 

Everyone I know who has played LMGC has come away shaken. The greens are very extreme and very fast. Putting is reportedly very frustrating and the greens reject shots that would be expected to hold. It's easy to chip or putt across a green and be faced with the same sort of shot from the other direction. Sounds like a very frustrating setup. 

 

My question is whether it even makes sense to build greens with 1930's contours when we know they'll be running at 2030's speeds. Does doing so honor the original design, or pervert it? 

 

These kinds of conditions have proven acceptable to visitors to Pinehurst #2 for an example. That's a destination course and not many of us would want to play the majority of our rounds there. A members' course can be very challenging but it ought to be playable and enjoyable for your typical 10-20 handicapper. 

 

I don't have a dog in the fight but I think it's an interesting question to ponder. Seems like if you want the original design you should be ready to live with the original conditions too. Either that or water down the classic designs to work the way they were intended to work instead of a somewhat goofy modern mutation of what was intended. 

 

Thoughts? 

 

 

 

 

..

Def is an issue with modern green speeds. A lot of older designs are simply made for a different time with far slower greens. It does get frustrating in times for tournaments when you have a 20 footer downhill and know that if you miss and hit the ball absolutely as soft as possible that you have no chance to stop it anywhere within 10-15 feet of hole. 
 

think it will become more of an issue as agronomy/ maintenance stuff continues to improve and more courses inevitably have faster greens. There has to be a balance between slope and speed and I think quite a few high end courses have lost it. As a + handicap I don’t know how more casual golfers enjoy these layouts where they are inevitably 3 and 4 putting over and over. 

[caniac6]

Our course was built in 1954, and we still are using the original greens. We have many greens that only have 2 useable hole locations because of the slope, but we have modern speeds. It is not uncommon to have a 6 foot downhill putt miss, and have a 15 footer coming back. Our greens will be rebuilt next year, and some of the slopes are supposed to be softened.

[me05501]

3 hours ago, doctor220 said:

Def is an issue with modern green speeds. A lot of older designs are simply made for a different time with far slower greens. It does get frustrating in times for tournaments when you have a 20 footer downhill and know that if you miss and hit the ball absolutely as soft as possible that you have no chance to stop it anywhere within 10-15 feet of hole. 
 

think it will become more of an issue as agronomy/ maintenance stuff continues to improve and more courses inevitably have faster greens. There has to be a balance between slope and speed and I think quite a few high end courses have lost it. As a + handicap I don’t know how more casual golfers enjoy these layouts where they are inevitably 3 and 4 putting over and over. 

 

One complicating factor is that most of us associate fast greens with good or expensive courses. If someone shows up to a country club and the greens are only running at 8 they assume they haven’t been maintained to a high standard. It reflects poorly on the course. This is wrong headed imo and many courses would be better off keeping greens at the speed the designer intended. 

Edited October 4 by me05501

[doctor220]

1 hour ago, me05501 said:

 

One complicating factor is that most of us associate fast greens with good or expensive courses. If someone shows up to a country club and the greens are only running at 8 they assume that the greens haven’t been maintained to a high standard. It reflects poorly on the course. This is wrong headed imo and many courses would be better off keeping greens at the speed the designer intended. 

I guess for me the slopes can be much subtler design wise and still function as intended with faster green speeds but this isn’t as visually impressive/intimidating. 
 

I would personally rather have the greens be flatter (relatively ) and greens quicker and think this generally makes a harder challenge than slower greens with bigger slopes. But def not crazy sloping greens running 11 haha 

 

I feel like it’s rare greens run 8 but are really smooth. 

[hollabachgt]

1 hour ago, me05501 said:

 

One complicating factor is that most of us associate fast greens with good or expensive courses. If someone shows up to a country club and the greens are only running at 8 they assume that the greens haven’t been maintained to a high standard. It reflects poorly on the course. This is wrong headed imo and many courses would be better off keeping greens at the speed the designer intended. 

 

Rivermont is the perfect antithesis of this. Very sloped greens that probably only roll to an 8, but good luck finding a flat stretch of green long enough to confirm they even roll an 8. They do a great job balancing the slope and grass height to make the greens appear to play much faster than they are.

[me05501]

3 minutes ago, hollabachgt said:

 

Rivermont is the perfect antithesis of this. Very sloped greens that probably only roll to an 8, but good luck finding a flat stretch of green long enough to confirm they even roll an 8. They do a great job balancing the slope and grass height to make the greens appear to play much faster than they are.

 

If you're talking about the course in Atlanta I agree completely. I played there last month and really enjoyed it. I never once wished the greens were faster, that's for sure. Plenty of challenge. 

 

Having the fastest greens possible is kind of a macho thing for a lot of clubs and supers. Not sure it makes the game better or more enjoyable. 

[ND2005]

2 minutes ago, me05501 said:

 

Having the fastest greens possible is kind of a macho thing for a lot of clubs and supers. Not sure it makes the game better or more enjoyable. 

 

Yeah I don't get it. My favorite is the last day of a member guest when you walk out and see the super with a s*** eating grin talking about how they double cut and rolled them this morning. Then after the tournament is over everyone in the bar is just complaining about the greens. 

 

[me05501]

16 hours ago, hollabachgt said:

Could this just be a situation where new Bermuda greens are both very firm and typically kept very fast until they mature?
Its not uncommon for new greens to be crazy hard until they get a full year of grow in and begin to become more playable.

 

Probably? 

 

I also wonder if the modern Bermuda hybrid greens have a narrower range of possible speeds, especially if they're only cut and not rolled. I'm not sure how slow Tif Eagle greens can get unless you just let them grow for a week or two. 

[hollabachgt]

50 minutes ago, me05501 said:

 

Probably? 

 

I also wonder if the modern Bermuda hybrid greens have a narrower range of possible speeds, especially if they're only cut and not rolled. I'm not sure how slow Tif Eagle greens can get unless you just let them grow for a week or two. 

They do typically have a higher speed floor, but you can still have healthy smooth dwarf Bermuda rolling around 8 or 9. Often as the green ages, the speed range drops a bit. So new greens will have a higher narrower speed band while mature greens will have a broader speed band that may not cap out as fast.

 

One question to ask in regard to a place like LM, If your goal is to restore the play-ability of the original course, do you try to achieve that on day 1 post renovation, knowing that the course will naturally change, or try to achieve it at the end of year 1, 2, 3, etc, knowing that will give you the longest window of optimal play?

[Bonneville85308]

1 hour ago, ND2005 said:

 

Yeah I don't get it. My favorite is the last day of a member guest when you walk out and see the super with a s*** eating grin talking about how they double cut and rolled them this morning. Then after the tournament is over everyone in the bar is just complaining about the greens. 

 

 

And at an old club of mine, you could count on the greens burning out and going to crap a week after the tournament (which was usually in the middle of the summer) because of how overstressed they got from being shaved down and rolled for the tournament. 

[me05501]

3 minutes ago, hollabachgt said:

One question to ask in regard to a place like LM, If your goal is to restore the play-ability of the original course, do you try to achieve that on day 1 post renovation, knowing that the course will naturally change, or try to achieve it at the end of year 1, 2, 3, etc, knowing that will give you the longest window of optimal play?

 

 

I think a good architect is probably executing a long-term plan similar to the way an orthopedic surgeon treats a joint replacement. Everything is going to be a little tight for a while but it should loosen up and fall into the right range as the  patient heals. 

 

With a course like Lookout I think there are a few things at play. One, the members were without a course for a long time so allowing play ASAP was a priority. Two, the prior greens weren't easy by any means and the members mostly liked it that way. Three, as the greens soften and are conditioned in over time the members might enjoy a feeling of satisfaction as they come to feel like they've learned the greens. 

[me05501]

3 minutes ago, Bonneville85308 said:

 

And at an old club of mine, you could count on the greens burning out and going to crap a week after the tournament (which was usually in the middle of the summer) because of how overstressed they got from being shaved down and rolled for the tournament. 

 

I hate the concept that overly penal conditions are considered "showing off the course at its best." More macho B.S.

[Louis_Posture]

19 hours ago, me05501 said:

 

 

 

 

 

..

Most of the 100 year old course greens have subtle breaks. Modern equipment has allowed players to strike longer shots so heavily sloped greens is now thought of by architects as the only remaining "defense of the course".

My thoughts are that this strategy makes sense as fast sloping greens are more challenging on which to leave approach shots, chips, pitches, bunker shots etc... close to the hole.

However the transformation of a moderate sloped greens to heavily slopes ones is somewhat negated by the other trend, which is to eliminate 20% to 80% of golf course trees. I believe the "added defense" of sloped greens is counter balanced by the removal of trees, essentially creating a "no change to scoring" condition.

* the reason for the trend of removing trees is that course maintenance annual costs are reduced.

 

[me05501]

10 minutes ago, Louis_Posture said:

Most of the 100 year old course greens have subtle breaks. Modern equipment has allowed players to strike longer shots so heavily sloped greens is now thought of by architects as the only remaining "defense of the course".

My thoughts are that this strategy makes sense as fast sloping greens are more challenging on which to leave approach shots, chips, pitches, bunker shots etc... close to the hole.

However the transformation of a moderate sloped greens to heavily slopes ones is somewhat negated by the other trend, which is to eliminate 20% to 80% of golf course trees. I believe the "added defense" of sloped greens is counter balanced by the removal of trees, essentially creating a "no change to scoring" condition.

* the reason for the trend of removing trees is that course maintenance annual costs are reduced.

 

 

That all makes sense. I do believe that greens should be designed and maintained such that there are multiple pin locations that an expert player can access in two or three putts from any other part of the green. If that is impossible something is amiss. 

 

I get that some greens are going to be effectively bigger or smaller than their mown dimensions due to overall course contouring. Most courses have a few greens like that. No course needs 18 of them. 

 

.

 

Edited October 4 by me05501

[Louis_Posture]

47 minutes ago, me05501 said:

 

That all makes sense. I do believe that greens should be designed and maintained such that there are multiple pin locations that an expert player can access in two or three putts from any other part of the green. If that is impossible something is amiss. 

 

I get that some greens are going to be effectively bigger or smaller than their mown dimensions due to overall course contouring. Most courses have a few greens like that. No course needs 18 of them. 

 

.

 

From 100 years ago traditional course design is :

 

long par 4 holes to have large relatively flat , unprotected greens 

par 5 holes and short par 4 holes to have relatively small, sloping, well protected greens

long par 3 holes to have large greens

short par 3 holes to have small, sloping, well protected greens

 

I believe current course architects redesigning courses/greens are sticking with the above traditional concept,  however owners want their course scorecard to read 7,000 yards, which (sadly) results in the elimination of short par 3 and short par 4 holes .

[jkody]

There are a lot of clubs that have green speeds that are unreasonably fast for people unfamiliar with those greens. In my experience, many of the members take real pride in the difficulty/speed of their greens and do, in fact, learn to play them. So what may seem "unfair" to a guest is in fact a point of pride for the club/membership.

[vallygolf]

I like all the variations of golf greens speeds and slopes.  I love huge undulating greens (landmand and Streamsong Black), but  a flatish right to left cup outside the hole from 20 feet on a 12-13 stimp green that rolls pure is so fun.  I think faster greens have historically been truer greens.  That is where the fun comes in.  On the 20 foot putt described above, it can be read and struck properly and it will go in nearly 100% of the time.  Below 10 on the stimp and I feel like that number goes way down due to variability in the true roll.  If a course goes from 4 pinable spots to two or one pinable spots due to increased speed it has no business speeding up the greens.  Has to have a good balance, and that requires an extremely knowledgeable staff.

[vandyfan]

On the actual topic, yes I think the improvements in grass types and mowing now grants us the power to ruin slopey greens by making them unplayably fast. 

 

On the fast greens topic (if they are not super slopey) I used to be against fast greens because I thought it was just macho BS to talk about how fast your greens are. But as some have pointed out, they do tend to roll very true and you can make a ton of putts when you are rolling it well vs the slower, bumpier munis. I still want to strike a balance but I do like the subtle, speedy private greens now more than I used to just because of how true they are. 

[TheBiles]

I feel like this is exactly what has happened at Augusta over the years.  Those greens were never designed to roll a 14+, and it ruins a lot of potential hole locations and effectively makes the greens much smaller. 

[jholz]

An RTJ course that I played a great deal many years ago decided to replace their bent greens with championship bermuda. 

 

When they made the switch, they also drastically softened the contours on the greens.  

 

There's no way some of those greens would have been playable after the switch.

[mallrat]

IMO, green speeds and that conversation have become the biggest joke in golf. That conversation needs to die and Supers who engage in that thinking need to change. The conversation should be do the green speeds match the slope? 
 

We are a public course that hosts more play than 90% of the courses in our area. From spring through fall we average 7 shotguns a week. We are down this year and I believe we will be around 61k rounds. We only push our greens for 6 or 7 days a year, no point. We generally keep them around the 9 to 10 range. Any faster and our rounds go from a 4:10 average to almost 4:40 and that’s on a good day. 
 

As for grass types, I always thought Bent was the gold standard over Bermuda. We are Poa which is kind of a blessing  with the shorter root structure we need to keep a little more moisture in the greens. The fescue greens I have played I have really enjoyed as well. They generally seem to play a little slower and handle greens with a lot of slope very well. 

[CDM]

I think if done right they can be left alone and be amazing.  It comes down to the "sum" of the parts.

 

I play a 1930's course which is renowned for its greens.

 

The greens were updated to a modern seed / more current strain which helps in changing weather conditions. It gives a much better thickness and makes them roll so smooth.  Additionally after a few years to make them even better they installed XGD systems.

The part that most may or may not know is old greens were actually designed to hold some moisture why they have the slopes / bowling so they could survive properly over a course of year.  Mainly because in the 1930's /40's irrigation systems on courses were not even 5%-10% of what we have today. 

 

If done right and as a whole it works perfectly....!! 

 

This year I finally played a course with SUB AIR Greens.   WOW....!   The were soooo smooth but soooooo DAMN fast it was crazy.  The club dialed it up for the Masters this year for fun and it was so hard to putt on them 🤣  *Honestly was not fun at times

 

SUB AIR systems control temps soooo well  it helps keep moisture as good as you can. They can keep the greens within 5-10% the same every day, year round if they want! 

 

Amazing cost per greens too  HAHAHA   

 

*I think it was around 20K per green and its a 27 hole course

 

 

Edited October 7 by CDM

[TexasTurf]

10 minutes ago, CDM said:

I think if done right they can be left alone and be amazing.  It comes down to the "sum" of the parts.

 

I play a 1930's course which is renowned for its greens.

 

The greens were updated to a modern seed / more current strain which helps in changing weather conditions. It gives a much better thickness and makes them roll so smooth.  Additionally after a few years to make them even better they installed an XGD systems.

The part that most may or may not know is old greens were actually designed to hold some moisture why they have the slopes / bowling so they could survive properly over a course of year.  Mainly because in the 1930's /40's irrigation systems on courses were not even 5%-10% of what we have today. 

 

If done right and as a whole it works perfectly....!! 

 

This year I finally played a course with SUB AIR Greens.   WOW....!   The were soooo smooth but soooooo DAMN fast it was crazy.  The club dialed it up for the Masters this year for fun and it was so hard to putt on them 🤣  *Honestly was not fun at times

 

SUB AIR systems control temps soooo well  it helps keep moisture as good as you can. They can keep the greens within 5-10% the same every day, year round if they want! 

 

Amazing cost per greens too  HAHAHA   

 

*I think it was around 20K per green and its a 27 hole course

 

 

Sub Air doesn't actually help that much, and does relatively nothing to control temperature. You just played on some good greens.

[me05501]

When I was younger all the courses around here had bent greens but also huge noisy fans that circulated the air over them during the hottest months. Swapping over to Bermuda strains was the right call in this climate. The greens are better overall and more consistent year-round. 

[mallrat]

7 hours ago, me05501 said:

When I was younger all the courses around here had bent greens but also huge noisy fans that circulated the air over them during the hottest months. Swapping over to Bermuda strains was the right call in this climate. The greens are better overall and more consistent year-round. 

I wonder if that is because Pythium is a a HUGE worry (and often a death sentence for greens). From my understanding bent is still incredibly susceptible to Pythium. Where Bermuda actually has some Pythium resistant strains and bent doesn’t.