Athletes! Waialae Gets Last Minute Internal OB To Prevent Shortcut
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18th at Waialae From Google Earth
The jocks have come flying out of the gates early in the season, fresh off their wintertime speed work to make up for equipment that all leveled off years ago. Couple that with a missing 18th green Sony Open grandstand, and PGA Tour officials installed in-course out-of-bounds Wednesday evening at Waialae. The goal: stop players from driving down the 10th fairway and having a short iron into the green.
From Brian Wacker’s GolfDigest.com story:
The out-of-bounds stakes run from adjacent the 10th green all the way back up the hole to within 30 yards of the 18th green. Someone must have forgotten to tell Rory Sabbatini, though—or he simply hit a bad tee shot—because he ended up going out of bounds and made bogey on the hole.
A year ago, Brendan Steele was clinging to a one-shot lead on the final hole when he over-hooked his approach and his ball landed on the 10th. He got a free drop because the grandstand was in his line of play but could only make par. When Smith birdied the hole, it forced a playoff, with Smith taking the title on the first extra hole.
After seeing the stakes on Thursday, Steele believes his ball still would have been in bounds, although he thinks the stakes will be an appropriate deterrent.
“But if you know it's out-of-bounds, you probably don't hit it over there, either,” Steele said.
Internal OB is always a last resort. It’s particularly unusual when it has to be installed the Wednesday prior to a tournament starting Thursday and on a course the Tour has visited annually since 1965.
But this is life in the world of launch angle golf.
One other eyebrow-raiser from Wacker’s story involves the Redan-ish 17th, which was softened last year after Tom Doak’s restoration and is playing tougher this year for a different reason. From Cameron Smith, last year’ runner-up:
“I think 17 and 18 are the biggest ones,” Smith said. “With how firm [17] green gets, sometimes you can use that grandstand as a bit of a backboard to a back pin. So I think it makes the hole tougher definitely for sure.”
The notice posted regarding the 18th:
