Voyager EMH
Slipper Wearing Plucker of Pheasants
Thread Bump…
Was thinking again about this recently esp with the ‘golf expense’ thread…Conditioning vs Strategy vs Scenery
I think Conditioning has to be right up there in terms of importance. Especially with regard to greens and their surrounds…I think Scenery is also under-appreciated
I came to this realisation when I wondered what specifically made certain Par 3s ‘good’ — it’s only their level of difficulty and scenery that denote whether a Par 3 is considered ‘good’.
Everyone should be able, physically, to reach the green in 1 on a Par 3. There’s obvs a carry, and danger…no strategic element really. There are some incredibly hard Par 3s and there are some beautifully set par 3s in good scenery
Strategy is the ‘cool’ answer - we all like to think we like strategic courses but a lot of classic course design, asking players to come in from a certain angle etc, is now negated by modern golf balls and the ability to fly it and stop it over hazards..
As far as I’m aware, courses like Ganton and Lytham which are very strategic are rare. Most courses are fairly obvious how to play them.
IMO it’s the impeccable conditioning and scenery and difficulty with run-offs, swales etc and interesting greens that make the best courses worth spending the money on
Some of the very best courses…Dornoch, Turnberry, North Berwick, and Dunbar - if they didn’t the have superb views they do, they would be undermined for sure
Everyone should be able, physically, to reach the green in 1 on a Par 3.
At 12 years old had a handicap of 27. Longest shot was about 160 yards.
Only very short par 3s were reachable, as long as there were no bunkers in front of the green, yet I was playing good golf for someone of my physical capabilities at the time.