The only course that will remain difficult under all conditions will be one that is designed and kept for golf of a stereotyped, monotonous character, and this makes a most uninteresting proposition. BOBBY JONES
Available via Amazon (US): Golf Architecture For Normal People
Barnes And Noble (online and in stores)
Bookshop.org option to support local independent bookstores.
Reviews:
"Golf Architecture for Normal People . . . should be required reading for those who are not ashamed to admit they know little about the subject, and for those who think they do . . . . Golf course architecture geeks have trouble slimming their thoughts down to bite-sized chunks, but Shackelford has achieved a remarkable success here." —Independent (Ireland)
"From the relative newcomer who’s slowly getting hooked to those that have played the game for most of their lives and think they know a thing or two, Golf Architecture for Normal People provides a solid and sober perspective that will help everyone recognize why some golf courses are worth playing more than once while a single trip around others is all you’re ever likely to want or need." —Links Magazine.
“It’s a wonderful book. An easy read that arrives just in time for your summer reading list. If you’ve never thought about how an appreciation for course design could heighten your enjoyment of the game, you must check this out.”—The Peterborough Examiner
"As in his prior publications, in his newest book Shackelford shows a deep appreciation for what can be done to create a golf course that appeals to the broadest possible golfing audience…Shackelford’s prose is succinct, often witty, and accessible."—Cape Gazette
"Author, blogger and golf architecture expert Geoff Shackelford, who helped Gil Hanse design Rustic Canyon and restore 2023 U.S. Open host Los Angeles Country Club, taps into his passion by creating a guide that helps every golfer understand the nuances of course design. Published by Tatra Press, the 164-page hardcover book is a must-read for every golfer to better understand the game they love." —Golf Pass
"Shackelford provides an informative picture [and]...sprinkles in history lessons about those who planted the game's architectural roots, defines common terms and helps you hone your eyes when it comes to identifying some of the tricks of the trade."—FORE Magazine
"This new book does a great job demystifying golf course design ideas for average players, but can also be a beneficial read fro PGA Professionals and other golf course employees to get a better understanding of their home courses." —PGA Magazine
Highlights From Tiger's Hero Press Conference
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Tiger Woods discusses his World Challenge WD, calls for Greg Norman to be fired, criticizes the OWGR, and discusses his year in the majors.
A better than most Hero World Challenge presser!
Major(s) News & Notes, November 24rd, 2022
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This week the year-end OWGR state of play comes into focus, Augusta National's new 13th tee is in play, Bryson DeChambeau's (not) stunning diet reveal, the Open qualifying series features a new twist and a bunch of Reads.
Greg Norman Calls On The Five Families To "Grow Up"
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Plus, WSJ's look at the "secretive" OWGR and another McKellar pod.
"LIV Golf faces hurdles in applying for world ranking points"
/In his weekly notes column, AP’s Doug Ferguson details the issues facing the LIV golf quest to get world ranking points for players, vital for its younger stars to earn access to major championships.
While there are currently conflicting reports on whether an application has been submitted by LIV and received by the OWGR, Ferguson notes all of the ways the 54-hole, limited field size schedule will not qualify.
One is that every tournament be contested over at least 54 holes with a 36-hole cut or be in line with eligible formats. LIV Golf has no cut.
The OWGR guidelines indicate a standard format of 72 holes, with 54 holes acceptable “for those tournaments earnings fewer than 12 minimum first-place points.” In other words, a steady diet of 54-hole events is typically for developmental tours or offseason series, such as the Vodacom Origins of Golf in South Africa.
Guidelines also state that tournaments must average a 75-man field over the course of the season.
Other than that…
LIV can expand and tweak if this is of importance to its players. Given how many still have major exemptions or are simply taking the easy money, perhaps OWGR status will never matter to the league.
Silly Season: Two Stroke Penalties For Spieth, Stenson After Using Wrong Tee Box
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You know it’s the end of the year when two players you’d consider among the more detail-oriented tee off from the wrong box. Playing first out and undoubtedly taking as little time as necessary, Jordan Spieth and Henrik Stenson teed off from the 17th tee on The Albany’s 9th.
By all accounts the Tour staff had made clear of this possibility and gigantic tee signs were on each box, meaning the caddies also had a chance to intervene. So this one was on the players, as the video explanation from Shane Bacon and Notah Begay covers it all, followed by Spieth and Stenson talking to the press after the round:
To get an idea how zoned out the two were…
Q. What was your reaction when the official told you?
JORDAN SPIETH: I actually didn't think we were going to get penalized because it's a charity event, but then I realized there's world ranking involved and all that. I think the frustrating part for us now is that every other group's going to be -- they're making sure to tell them, but for us they didn't. It obviously didn't matter for us, which is fortunate I think for those guys.
HENRIK STENSON: My question was if we could just finish 19th and 20th and leave after 9, but that wasn't an option, either.
JORDAN SPIETH: Yeah, he did. He asked them if we could just go to the airport and I said I'm down.
In normal times this would be quite humorous particularly given how meticulous these two and their bagmen usually are. But with all of the disruptive tension and importance of world ranking points, even the above antics get noticed when the field in a 20-player even has checked before the conclusion.
OWGR To See "Enhancements" A Year From Now
/After must moaning from the PGA Tour, the Official World Golf Ranking governing board has announced a planned update for August 2022. Details are vague but will not give points for all players making a cut to provide “greater differentiation of performances” and a “Field Rating” calculation.
Exciting stuff, I know. But more vital to carrying on with your day: the Players now gets 80 points to the winner, while the majors award 100.
For Immediate Release:
Official World Golf Ranking Governing Board announces updates to the Ranking System
Modified system for the 23 Eligible Golf Tours to go into effect Week Ending 14th August 2022.
London, United Kingdom – The Governing Board of Official World Golf Ranking (OWGR) today announces enhancements to the Official World Golf Ranking. The updated system will incorporate modern statistical techniques which will allow all eligible players and events to be more accurately evaluated relative to each other.
Over the last three years, OWGR has coordinated an independent analysis of the Ranking and its system to ensure it is meeting its key objectives of publishing a transparent, credible and accurate ranking based on the relative performances of participating players. The results of this analysis have led to the changes announced today, including distribution of Ranking Points to all players making the cut to provide greater differentiation of performances; and use of a Field Rating calculation based on a statistical evaluation of every player in the field, rather than just those in the field among the current Top-200 of the Ranking.
Major Championships will continue to award 100 First Place Points, while THE PLAYERS Championship will award 80. All other tournaments will award Ranking Points according to the strength and depth of their fields, with a maximum of 80 First Place Points.
“The Official World Golf Ranking owes a massive debt of gratitude to founders Mark H McCormack and Tony Greer, whose vision has done so much to shape the competitive landscape of men’s professional golf over the past 35 years”, said Official World Golf Ranking Chairman Peter Dawson. “Since 1986, the Tours eligible for inclusion have grown in number from 6 to 23 and the rankings have been continuously modified to accommodate this expansion and to improve accuracy. We are confident the further enhancements announced today will best position OWGR for the years ahead.”
Following a 12-month notice period, implementation is set for Week Ending 14th August 2022 at which point all future eligible tournaments will utilise the updated system. There will be no recalculation of past events, meaning the impact of the new methodology will be gradual.
Golf Digest Ranking Runs Incorrect Numbers After Touting Commitment To "Objective Data"
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The top 25 based on published data before the numbers were removed from GolfDigest.com
With the release of their latest top 100 ranking Golf Digest featured the usual oddball emphasis on theatrics beyond golf architecture.
There is also the matter than you can pay to join the panel here for $1300.
Not great.
But that’s their business.
For the sport of golf, the elements consistently rewarded by Golf Digest tend to lean expensive, unsatisfying to play and obnoxious for the planet. There’s a case to be made that the ranking has been one of the worst influences on course development since its 1966 inception. But they bill it as the “oldest and most respected list in golf.”
Thankfully, the golf world is trying to move away from the values endorsed by Golf Digest, with fun and low key atmosphere’s revered, but that doesn’t mean the 2021-22 ranking improprieties should be laughed off.
In the latest ranking rollout, Derek Duncan touts how Digest’s “commitment to emphasizing objective data in an inherently subjective endeavor has only intensified.” He lays out a system to get course votes more timely and to no longer count votes after for a course since modified significantly, plus other ways to keep the list relevant.
Then Duncan writes how close things get among the Top 100 courses.
The space between those fractions of a point might not seem like much, but they matter. Though acknowledging that it’s hard to do, we ask panelists to sweat the details and carry their 1 to 10 scores to two or even three decimal places. This is to delineate between contenders because the scores become increasingly compact the farther down the ranking one travels. What separates No. 114 (Mayacama in Santa Rosa, Calif.) and No. 115 (Stone Eagle in Palm Desert, Calif.) is miniscule: .0003. The difference between being comfortably inside the 100 Greatest (Pete Dye Golf Club in West Virginia, No. 87) and outside (Baltimore Country Club East, No. 102) is only five-tenths of a point. This means a club could elevate its numbers across each category by .07 and potentially improve position a dozen or more places.
That attention to math seems excessive at best and might explain why the panelists are focusing on analytics instead of artistry. But the number crunching looks downright absurd after a former panelist noticed the 2021-22 posted data was not matching up with its revamped category and scoring system.
Jason Jones initially posted on GolfClubAtlas.com about the discrepancy featuring No. 1 Pine Valley:
So, what is interesting about this list is that if you take the methodology described, and the data that is provided, their math is wrong.
For example, their described methodology is to take (2x Shot Options) plus (the other 6 categories).
For Pine Valley, their published total score using this methodology is: 72.1554
However, if you take the published categories and enter them into their formula, Pine Valley's total score is: 71.8386.
Given that most of these scores are within tenths (or less) of each other, some rankings are different mathematically than their published ranking.
Those numbers were taken off the website and an updated version now appears.
It’s unclear if the published ranking was off the data since removed or an accurate counting of the numbers or some other combination. No editor’s note or asterisk was attached to the updated page, casting even more doubt about the legitimacy of the process.
On top of the compromised data, the magazine is also not taking criticism well from its own.
Pat Craig posted on GolfClubAtlas of his dismay at dreary Butler National landing above the magical Shoreacres, hardly a controversial sentiment. Craig also posted an emoji after writing simply: “Spring Hill at #100….sure………….”
Craig said he received a note from panel leaders Duncan and Stephen Hennessey with “a screenshot of my comment above which they understandably not happy with.”
Craig then posted he had resigned from the Golf Digest panel and questioned its direction after the installation of a $1300 entry fee that seems to allow anyone to join.
So they are attempting to squelch panelist opinions after publishing incorrect numbers, all while touting the data. What a mess. And even more reason to discount a profit-focused ranking that has rarely bettered the art of golf architecture.
A Palate Cleanser: Golf Magazine's Top 100 You Can Play
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After Golf Digest unfurled another odd ranking living about three decadent decades ago, Golf came to the rescue with the Top 100 Courses You Can Play.
The list is put together by a small panel not squeezed for dues that appears to genuinely focus on golf architecture. The list has been expanded to include Canada, Mexico, Bermuda and the Caribbean. I’m not sure that was necessary nor am I buying that this helps you “find courses in prime condition at any time of year.”
But the bigger takeaway should be the focus on rewarding the elements that should be emphasized if you want to see courses rewarded for fun, nuance and day-to-day enjoyment.
Golf Digest Course Ranking 2021: You Get What You Charge For?
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I got several fine laughs reading Golf Digest’s “2021-2022 ranking of America's 100 Greatest Golf Courses”, which was touted as being “ready for its close-up” by authors Derek Duncan and Stephen Hennessey.
A close look shows not much has changed except that it’s a for-profit model now, where you can try to sign up and pay the $1300 to join here and you better like your courses exclusive and difficult.
Tom Fazio remains a panelist favorite the way Michael Bay is big with teenage moviegoers and not many others, delivering thirteen top 100 courses to Donald Ross’s ten, followed by Tillinghast’s eight, Pete Dye’es eight, Tom Doak’s five, Alister MacKenzie’s five, Seth Raynor’s five, Coore and Crenshaw’s four, William’s Flynn’s three and Gil Hanse’s single inclusion on the list.
The best laugh may be Muirfield Village landing 15th even as Jack Nicklaus has taken a bulldozer to it. Pinehurst No. 2 at 29th would suggest maybe it’s time for the resort to realize Digest panelists won’t ever get that whole strategy/nuance thing.
On that strategy topic, the panelists already have been told they focus too much on theatrics instead of pure design values. How do I know this? Why, the panel head Duncan eviscerated panelists for not paying attention to what matters in a March 2, 2021 email forwarded to me by multiple raters.
After hitting the panel up for their $300/1300 (depending on returning or new status) and explaining a sign-up system for courses in demand, some scolding for “checklisting” ballots on some other websites was delivered before the fun began.
As always, this is an exciting time and an important institution for Golf Digest. I’m very proud of the effort everyone puts into creating the America’s 100 Greatest Courses list, and you should be, too—your hard work and keen eyes and analyses make it happen.
Greasing ‘em up before a good old fashioned slapping!
I will, however, take this opportunity to make a comment on our scoring:
I did an exercise while compiling the final rankings to list, along with the total score, the highest individual category score each course received. I thought it would be interesting to see in what category each of the 100 courses was strongest—for instance, Winged Foot West’s highest score, 8.62, came in the Character category. About 20 courses in, I realized I couldn’t send the results out for publication.
Oh?
The highest score for almost every course came in either Character or Aesthetics. Here’s the breakdown:
CHARACTER: 42
AESTHETICS: 19
CONDITIONING: 15
CHALLENGE: 14
DISTINCTIVENESS: 6
LAYOUT VARIETY: 4
SHOT OPTIONS: 0
In other words, according to the majority of the panel, the greatest strength of two-thirds of the 100 Greatest courses in the U.S. has to do with aspects other than how the course actually plays.
This is like scolding Oscar voters for judging movies by the theater seating, Emmy voters for how well their remote control worked, and Tony panelists for emphasizing the playbill’s paper stock.
But please, keep scolding…
That not a single course in our top 100 distinguished itself above all other measures in Shot Options is stunning—this is the most fundamental aspect to architecture and thus our rankings. It’s why we afford it double points.
Maybe not flood the panel for profit? I’m wrecklessly brainstorming here, I know, so continue…
We are placing too much emphasis on intangibles like character and aesthetics and not enough on architecture, strategy and layout.
Come on, that shallowness is a Digest staple! How else could so many forgettable Fazio’s rank so well!
Yes, ambiance, history and sense of place are all important to the golf experience—they are major reasons why we all play. But your job as course-ranking panelists is to study the golf holes and the architecture and not be overwhelmed by beauty and reputation.
But if they have a killer bar and the owner personally signs a thank you card, we totally get that.
We can all appreciate the totality of a golf experience—it’s unrealistic to think that won’t have an impact on your impressions—but golf is about hitting the ball across a landscape that presents a variety of obstacles and enticements, trying to get it into the hole in as few as strokes possible. We are there to analyze how effectively and with what amount of entertainment a course achieves that.
Pssssst…Derek, this is Golf Digest, not Golf or Golfweek. Ranking courses based on everything but architecture is how so many ads were sold before it became all about house ads.
Please consider how much you are weighing the importance of different categories. Please re-read the category definitions. And make efforts to distinguish each category from each other—our best panelists earn high marks for doing so.
Do they get a dues rebate for being Best In Panelist?
Lastly, I’ve had several private email exchanges with individual panelists about their scoring habits and techniques. We do not intend to tell you how to score courses and categories, as long as you can rationally justify your evaluations. But we do want you all to be discerning and understand what your scores and numbers mean. This ties back to the predominance of high Character scores: a sizable portion of the panel might consider approaching their evaluations with a more discriminating eye.
What fun that would be? Never stopped Golf Digest panelists before.
In some of the cases I reviewed, panelists were overscoring courses, awarding points that would have placed a course barely making the Best in State list in the top 15 of America’s 100 Greatest Courses ranking.
Hey, top 5 in Kansas, top 15 in the USA…what’s the big difference?
Ok that’s enough fun at the expense of Golf Digest’s panel for one blog post. There will be more to laugh at as the explanation’s pour out from Digest. But I just want to return back to the idea that the leading course with “Character” in the United States is Winged Foot West.
A fine test for sure. And home club to the last two Golf Digest editors. Plus the West also hosted last year’s U.S. Open and will host many more down the road. It’s brilliant at times and has loads of character.
But the design with the most character in the United States?
Heck, if you polled the Winged Foot membership, I’m fairly certain the neighboring East Course would easily win the character debate. Like, 7&6.
But we all have different definitions of character. Particularly the Golf Digest panel.
Sheep Ranch Takes Digest's Best New, Golf Posts State-By-State Rankings
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2020 saw the opening of fifteen courses eligible for Golf Digest’s “Best New” award in what appears more like the new normal than an aberration, as Derek Duncan writes of the three courses singled out this year:
It’s humorous now to think that the 40 or so new courses that opened in 2010 didn’t form a critical mass large enough to merit the magazine’s full attention and thus an award. The course-construction recession was considered a temporary squall, but course openings have remained maddeningly scarce over the past 10 years, and this year’s class consists of just 15 graduates. But feeling that new course openings are now more newsworthy than ever, we’ve decided to proceed with the prize—though because of travel difficulties and the extenuating circumstances of the moment we gave each facility that opened in late 2019 or 2020 the option to postpone its candidacy until 2021. (A number of courses took us up on the offer; wait for them next year.)
The Sheep Ranch by Coore and Crenshaw won, with some comically-artificial Tom Fazio real estate play called Troubadour finishing second. Nothing says natural like a creek atop a mountain guarding six tee boxes:
Over at Golf Magazine they’ve posted their top 100 already and now add a state-by-state list. I have no profound or even mundane observations about the lists. But I will apologize to all of California’s high-end clubs (and their stocked comfort stations) for getting beat by little daily fee Rustic Canyon (16th in the Golden State).
Enjoy…
Northeast: Connecticut | Maine | Massachusetts | New Hampshire | New Jersey | New York | Pennsylvania | Rhode Island | Vermont
Midwest: Illinois | Indiana | Iowa | Kansas | Michigan | Minnesota | Missouri | Nebraska | North Dakota | Ohio | South Dakota | Wisconsin
South: Alabama | Arkansas | Delaware | Florida | Georgia | Kentucky | Louisiana | Maryland | Mississippi | North Carolina | Oklahoma | South Carolina | Tennessee | Texas | Virginia | West Virginia
West: Alaska | Arizona | California | Colorado | Hawaii | Idaho | Montana | Nevada | New Mexico | Oregon | Utah | Washington | Wyoming
New Golf Magazine U.S. Top 100 Sees Augusta National, Pebble Beach, Olympic And Muirfield Village Drop
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The best of the existing course rankings—Golf Magazine’s World Top 100 came out strong last year under Ran Morrissett’s fine-tuning to present a strong international list rewarding architecture over some obvious oddball inclusions.
The new U.S. Top 100 is coming out any day now and they’re already discussing it on GolfClubAtlas.com and is eye-opening.
The obvious theme of panelists from my first glimpse: restorations rooted in historical accuracy and fun are sending courses up the rankings, while half-hearted-or-worse-redos took big hits with the elite panel.
At first glimpse it’s hard not to notice the fall of name-brand, legendary layouts that present the golfer a mixed bag of design changes.
Since the last Golf U.S. list in 2018:
No. 6 Augusta National fell three spots.
No. 10 Pebble Beach fell three spots.
No. 51 Muirfield Village fell 22 spots.
No. 54 Olympic Club (Lake) fell 21 spots.
The one outlier: No. 20 Seminole falling six spots despite the loving hand of Coore and Crenshaw.
While three spots might not seem like a big deal to Augusta National and Pebble Beach, it’s telling that America’s two most iconic courses have resisted pure (or even modified) restoration and are falling behind.
Maybe even more newsworthy for longtime rankings watchers, the following have fallen out of the top 100 altogether: Medinah, Spyglass, Yale, East Lake, Erin Hills, Interlachen, Congressional, Scioto, Torrey Pines, Colonial and Hazeltine.
On the new course front, congrats to Ohoopee Match Club (No. 32) and new entrants Gamble Sands, Congaree, Sheep Ranch, Prairie Club (Dunes), Wolf Point, Pinehurst #4, and Sand Valley (Mammoth Dunes) on joining the list.
Ranking For The Wee Ones: Golf Magazine Lists Best Par-3 Courses, Nine-Holers And Under-6000 Yarders
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Welshpool
Rankings have become redundant, or worse, the last profit centers for some publications. The sheen is all but gone from most listings, though Golf is sticking to a small panel of experts and now, three lists that will only hopefully inspire more non-18-hole, non-elitist recognition of what matters: fun places to play.
Ran Morrissett sets up this new “top 100” this way:
The earliest tracks were 5-, 6-, 7-, 9- and 12-hole affairs. The locals looked for land that drained well, with interesting natural obstacles. If the property only supported six holes, so be it. The sport wasn’t meant to soak up half the day. Work beckoned. The Industrial Age eventually created the chance for more of the population to pursue leisure activities, and golf expanded. Move the clock forward 150-odd years and courses of all shapes and sizes now exist.
The top 50 nine-hole courses features so many nifty places you’d love to play, leading off with Tom Dunn’s Royal Worlington and Newmarket, dating to 1895. While I love everything about the Winter Park 9, seeing it next to Musselburgh was a bit strange. The Cradle of Golf it is not. But we’ll let that slide for the overall grandeur of this stellar list.
Golf also put together 25 “exemplary” sub-6000 yard courses listed from shortest to longest. This highlights a class of course totally underappreciated by rankings and hopefully bolsters travel itineraries with some of the most enjoyable rounds you’ll ever play. Places like Shiskin, Kilspindie and Welshpool (above) get much-needed attention, as do so many other “gems”. The only bummer: just six reside in the United States, but that’s more of a statement about us than architects or developers.
The final and most exciting list of all highlights the world’s 25 best par-3’s in alphabetical order. It’s easy to imagine this growing to 50 or 100 in a few years given not making this iteration, including Turnberry’s revamped pitch and putt, the Spieth Lower 40 in Texas and some of Tiger Woods’s efforts.
I loved this summation of the renewed interest in par-3’s:
“The growing popularity of par-3 courses is a wonderful anomaly in a game often obsessed with distance,” says Adam Messix, a head PGA professional in Cashiers, N.C. “From one perspective, par-3 courses are a test of precision. More important, I think, they’re a joy to play for golfers of every caliber. Par-3 courses lack the formality you see at quote-unquote real courses, where you have to follow golf’s various conventions, like four players maximum to a group. They’re all about fun, families, friends and inclusiveness. Their ability to include all players make them the ideal place to enjoy the game no matter one’s age or ability.”
Naturally it was a treat to see our Horse Course effort at the Prairie Club make the cut alongside some of the planet’s neatest one-shotter classics.
