Modern bunkers Pro events

rgs

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Having watched the WGC at Doral i feel its time changes were made to bunkers on the pro tour. Fairway & greenside bunkers should be a hazard not a safety valve.

I suggest two proposals:

1 Bunkers are not raked from Thursday morning till close of play, players can use their feet to smooth footprints after their shot.

or


2. Bunkers should have a minimum depth.


Whats everyone view?
 

SammmeBee

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I know nothing about course design but I sense a flaw in your second idea.....the first is utter tosh though....

TBH....I don't really want to see Pros leaving it in bunkers on a regular basis because they have been 'tricked' up....courses are made 'easy' for Pros but I would rather see the courses become par 70s so the scores become -10ish to win but I don't really want to see them chopping it about unless the weather is really bad and then it's great fun!!!
 

HomerJSimpson

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I seem to remember that at the Nicklaus event on the USPGA (can't remember what its called) he has old fashion rakes that leave a distinct ridge and wider spaces between the prongs which allows the ball to sit down more making it a tad harder to play.

I don't think not raking is the way to go. What happens to the late starters on day one who have to contend with poor quality bunkers and footprints. They'd get penalised which doesn't seem overly fair.
 

Atticus_Finch

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This is the answer.

mistwood-bunker-360x239.jpg


You get in a bunker at my place you have to be pretty good from 100-150yds to make your par.
At some tour events it's actually preferrable to land in the bunker and that's not what bunkers are about.
 

shanker

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RGS
I like your second proposal. The big shallow bunkers are too easy for the good players. The Greenkeeper (a poster on here now and again) said that he preferred small, deep bunkers with a large catching area. They are cheaper to maintain and easier to rake. It also means that lazy b******s have no excuse for not raking.
Your first suggestion....No, I don't think so.
 

fastmover2

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Having watched the WGC at Doral i feel its time changes were made to bunkers on the pro tour. Fairway & greenside bunkers should be a hazard not a safety valve.

I suggest two proposals:

1 Bunkers are not raked from Thursday morning till close of play, players can use their feet to smooth footprints after their shot.

or


2. Bunkers should have a minimum depth.


Whats everyone view?

Sorry mate cannot agree with you on this.

1.No, just no!
2.Bunkers are put in as part of a design for several reasons not just as a "penalty". It would not be possible to set a minimum depth for a bunker for pro's as the course is generally played 51 weeks a year by the likes of you and I and the designer has to take this into account.

The thing you have to remember is just how good the Tour Pros are,which is a lot better than ANY amateur, that is why they make it look so easy and can use a bunker as a bail out.

Tricking up courses is not the way forward.
 

USER1999

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But one of the reasons they are so good out of bunkers is how standardised they are. When they played the Grove, it took 6 months to get the bunkers right, half inch of compacted sand, half inch of fluffy stuff. Trust me, even I could be quite good out of that.

What we have is some with sand, some without, some with stones, some compacted, some with the worlds supply right up the face so every thing plugs 6ft off the ground, some full of water etc. We have builders sand, fine sand, you name it we have it. How are we ever going to get any good, if every bunker is different?

I don't think the pro's treat bunkers as a hazard, and that is wrong. When someone would rather be in the sand than the rough, that is wrong. Maybe the bounce on sandwedges needs to be limited? I like the idea of the graded rake too.
 

CarpeDiem

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the course is generally played 51 weeks a year by the likes of you and I and the designer has to take this into account.

This is the big factor in why bunkers are the way they are, if they were so hard that tour pros would have a job getting out of them the course would lose its income because people won't play because it will be to hard.
 

Vincent

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I seem to remember that one Tour pro (Darren Clarke?) complained when the greenside bunker was raked the wrong way because the furrows went across the line rather than towards the hole!!! A bit pampered, me thinks!
 

rgs

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Some interesting comments--my main complaint is that bunkers are meant to be a hazard not an easy bail out for the pros.

Mybe the graded rake introduced by Nicklaus at the memorial is the way to go.
 

USER1999

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They do seem to remain a hazard from further out. The 70 yard bunker shot remains one of the hardest in golf, but the greenside ones are giving an easy ride to those lucky enough to be in them.

What purpose does a greenside bunker serve if it isn't a hazard?

Maybe what we need is pot ponds around the green?
 

viscount17

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If you can't go down because they'll flood, why not go up for major comps. Build the front face with sandbags (or a nice designer frontage - marketing oportunity) and you have the same effect on the surface as Atticus' bunker. Nice and level on the entry but a challenge on the exit.
 

muttleee

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Forget not raking bunkers from Thursday to Sunday...don't rake them at all! Who was it who said he would have a herd of elephants stampede through bunkers on a regular basis to keep them interesting..? I think it might have been Peter Aliss or someone.

At least never raking the bunkers would stop the unfairness of those playing early in a tournament having the bunkers in better condition than those playing later. :p
 

Herbie

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I made this point at another club I was a member at, purely because of the number of people who dont rake bunkers after use. My suggestion was to take the rakes away and leave them at least then everyone would have equal chance of landing in a lousy spot in an unraked bunker. It does make interesting play sometimes though.

I do agree with the concensus that bunkers should pose a hazard and not be a safe haven for an errant shot, which on many courses and to many pro's is exactly that. I myself on some holes I have played have been grateful for landing in the sand. Building them up is the way forward I think, maybe not as severe as some of the famous scottish ones but at least made challenging.
 

USER1999

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The hazard of a pot bunker is more to do with having the room to swing the club in the intended direction, than the actual depth. Therefore I can’t see raising the face as making it any different for the Pro’s, who can easily hit a high ball out of the sand.

May be it would be better to sink the bunkers by say 8”, (easy and cheap), but have sharp vertical edges, so that you can easily roll up against the edge, and have to play out side ways, backwards, where ever you can get a club on it. Certainly at the moment, except on certain links courses, you can pretty much guarantee a decent lie, and the option of being able to fire at the pin. Make the bunker edges more defined, and sure, if you are in the middle you will be ok, but around the edges there would be that chance of not being able to have a shot at it. More in the traditions of the older links courses, with their pot bunkers. Bunkers were never meant to be scrapes, where the ball runs into the middle every time, and leaves you a shot out.

On the other hand, we only see the spectacular bunker shots on the telly, and not the 40 or so which proceeded it, which weren’t quite so good. Sand saves as a stat aren’t that impressive for most of them.
 

Herbie

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Having a steep route out is what I mean by building them up and maybe even filling part in to limit space.

Having to loft the ball very sharply and control line and distance requires that little bit extra skill, right now most bunkers on the tour dont have ANY challenge for tour pro's, in fact they often give an advantage around greens as opposed to chipping from the light rough.

The game on some tour courses would be made marginally more difficult if they filled all greenside bunkers in and grassed them over.
 
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