Where will the danger lie?

mulligan, 11 August 2004, Comments Off on Where will the danger lie?
Categories: Uncategorized

Last night was extended coverage on the Championship, including interviews with all the fovored players, and insight on the diobolical mind of Mr. Dye. But the most entertaining piece was Dave Pelz’s adventures on #18. In case you missed, he showed hom many players will have to play to the front of the green if their drive lands in the rough. From there, it is a 76 yard putt if the pin is tucked back. That’s right, a 220 foot putt. So Dave tried to show how difficult it was, left his first attempt 50 feet short, and then promptly sank his second attempt. I’ve never seen someone make a feet, but it was a sight. Anyway, the reason I bring this up, from Tiger’s interview, he claimed the course was not playing as a link-style course because the fairways fronting the greens were a different grass, and were not allowing the players to bump and run their shots onto the green (the shots were plugging or spinning back). No other player made this comment, and I did not find this to be the case when I played the course. I attribute this comment to the fact that the course was playing into a opposite wind than what is normal in this area. For example, on the 618 par 5, Els hit a good drive that left him 340 yards to the green. That means his drive only went 278 yards. Usually, this hole has a wind at your back, and may be reachable for some of the long hitters…but as yesterday’s wind played into the player’s face on many of the long holes, they were hitting long irons into many of the holes. With the wind in their faces, and with the height that the American pros hit their irons, a long iron will spin back on the fairways fronting the greens, and will make the bump-and-run shots ineffective. I saw several holes where European players hit stingers into the long holes, and the bump-and-run shot was effective. American players will need to adapt this shot for the tournament if the wind continues to blow in this direction, or they will face many of the putts that Pelz demonstrated when the pin is tucked in the back.



Comments

You must be logged in to post a comment.

Leave a Reply:

Name *

Mail (hidden) *

Website


Email: thegolfblog [@] gmail.com

Advertise Here

Archives