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 […]
The 10 Toughest Greens at Augusta National
A better title for this article might be “The 18 Toughest Greens at Augusta National,” because the reality is that every putting surface on this storied course can give players fits. It all depends on where the hole is located and where a player is putting from. Long putts, short putts—it doesn’t matter. Twenty-footers can […]
Notable Golf Courses with a Draw or Fade Bias
There is a sacred stretch of days each year when golf fans park themselves on the sofa and are seduced once again by the azaleas, cathedral pines, and lightning-fast greens of Augusta National. As he/she does annually, the committed fan will bone up on their Masters history and, perhaps, read something new about a course […]
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 […]
The Most Resonating Courses in Golf
Some golf courses have a unique and unmistakable sense of place. The ancient Romans had an expression: genius loci, or sense of place. Their belief was that every city and town had its own spiritual identity, the way it was experienced, imagined, yearned for, and held in the heart and soul. Now, 3,000 years later, […]
Players’ Favorite Holes on the PGA Tour
Ask any avid golfer for their favorite hole on courses that they play regularly, and their answer—should they have one—will likely highlight a hole that they always (or at least most of the time) play well. Tour players aren’t immune to this train of thought, either. “My favorite hole on tour is No. 6 at […]
The Most Intimidating Shots on the PGA Tour
For all the ways in which tour players’ games are drastically superior to the average amateur’s, they’re often intimidated by some of the same daunting shots that trigger sweaty palms for the mid- to high-handicapper, too. This I learned while talking with many of the players during a practice round ahead of the Travelers Championship […]
9 Perilous Places You’d Be Excited to Play From
Some of the world’s most revered holes (and courses) are equally famous for exceptionally challenging predicaments and hazards that golfers are sometimes confronted with. Those perilous places are so well known—or, in some cases, so diabolical—they can even solicit excitement from players who are eager (and cautiously optimistic) to escape from them. Here, we’ve highlighted […]
The 10 Most Historic Clubs in the U.S.
As with few other sports, golf treasures tradition. Atop the history heap sit the greatest players, the most memorable championships, and the premier playing fields. In the United States, it was the golf and country clubs that fostered the growth of the game, beginning in the 1880s. Which are the most historic American clubs of […]