Geoff Shackelford: A Plea for the Wee Par Three
No hole in golf offers a richer combination of fun and fright for pros and amateurs alike than the short one-shotter The wee par three is having a moment. Surprising as it is to believe, the little knee-knocking, heart-stopping thrillers had fallen out of favor, one-shotters under 155-or-so yards becoming victims as developers and architects […]
Geoff Shackelford: Imitation at Augusta National is the Highest Form of Flattery
Augusta National, which has been the inspiration for many courses built since, was itself largely inspired by the game’s classic layouts. At least, that’s what they said at the time. Augusta National started out as a concept course. A greatest hits package in spirit. Co-founder Clifford Roberts bought into Alister MacKenzie’s vision and then sold […]
Geoff Shackelford: Why We Don’t Need Professional Golfers
The more pro golfers squabble over obscene amounts of money, the less the public will care. And that’s just fine. The verdict is in. A sport played in some form by 70 or so million around the globe does not hinge on the popularity of the few hundred or so professionals who believe they are […]
Geoff Shackelford: A Cup Half Empty
Courses on this side of the Atlantic have made for better Ryder Cup venues than those in Europe. One selection could change all that. Credit for the modern Ryder Cup’s revival starts with continental Europe’s inclusion in 1979 after Great Britain and Ireland grew tired of keeping calm and carrying on. Teams armed with Seves […]
Matching Golf’s Most Noteworthy Architects With Their Hollywood Equivalents
Visionaries, craftsmen, and taskmasters, golf course architects and movie directors share many of the same talents—and temperaments Amateur golf architect George Thomas never emerged from a barranca yelling “Cut!” And he never audaciously insisted on cutting up a marble floor to get his strategic angles just right, a bit of legendary assiduousness attributed to a […]
The 10 Most Significant Augusta National Course Changes
The home of the Masters has undergone annual changes of all kinds. This unscientific ranking takes into account the impact on the course and on tournaments. 10. Rae’s Creek tributary fronting the 13th green is allowed to fill with more running water in the late 1980s, only to be undone following criticism from the likes […]
What We Know About the New 13th Tee at Augusta National
Here’s what we know about Augusta National’s ambitious 13th tee: pretty much everything—minus one elusive detail Not long ago, players would turn up Masters week and get asked about course changes. Some reported phantom revisions, insisting the club had tweaked and tugged away at the design when no such thing occurred. The Lords of Augusta […]
Geoff Shackelford: The Tee Box Affair at Augusta National
A real-life, Grishamesque thriller is coming in April, full of high-stakes machinations, Southern charm, and unsuspecting protagonists How, you ask, could a closely mown rectangle become a non-coma-inducing potboiler? The intrigue centers around the forthcoming fuss over a tee at Augusta National debuting after years of speculation. Anyone with a golf pulse will opine on […]
Geoff Shackelford: Golf Architecture is Getting its Due
Golf architecture is having a moment. Finally! From the public-course world up to the elitest of the elite, golfers are bonding over a shared affinity for course design. To the small legion of geeks out there—guilty as charged—we’ve long wondered why the masses failed to share our passion even as architecture has long been golf’s […]
A Los Angeles Golf Getaway
If you’re willing to battle the notorious freeways, several fun and affordable golf courses in Los Angeles await you—and the weather is hard to beat Angelenos validate all of the worst clichés about this sprawling region. We arrive late and leave early. We travel down peculiar vanity and dietary excursions. But the golfers of SoCal? […]
