Golf Talk Tuesdays 2015-2020

[jjquantz]

Yesterday I played the longer regular tees and played well. Had 4 birdies and 6 bogeys for a +2 round. One of my best rounds in a long time. Today.......no birdies and a crap load of bogeys. And played the shorter senior tees today. Golf can bring you back to reality pretty quick.

Wow! and then, ooh, wince. And finally, yup, I agree, that's what keeps me coming back.

 

[pb4uski]

Yesterday I played the longer regular tees and played well. Had 4 birdies and 6 bogeys for a +2 round. One of my best rounds in a long time. Today.......no birdies and a crap load of bogeys. And played the shorter senior tees today. Golf can bring you back to reality pretty quick.

Yup. 12 stroke difference between Friday and yesterday and Friday was on a longer course. How can that be? It seems I have a couple of good rounds and am on the verge of thinking I have the game figured out and then things go to hell in a handbasket.

 

[zinger1457]

At Hyatt Indian Wells. Playing the Celebrity and Players courses tomorrow and Thursday .

Would appreciate a mini review of both courses. I'll be heading to Palm Springs in May and those are two courses I haven't played yet, looking to try a couple new ones.

 

[Huston55]

Would appreciate a mini review of both courses. I'll be heading to Palm Springs in May and those are two courses I haven't played yet, looking to try a couple new ones.

+1

Been thinking about a cold weather trip to Palm Springs one of these days and would like some direct feedback on the courses.

 

[gcgang]

Players and Celebrity courses are both immaculate. Greens are fast, probably 10.5-11 stimp. Played with someone who plays many courses here who says these are her favorites.

Five sets of tees, so you could play 6100 to 7400. Celebrity greens are more undulating, but Players greens are slightly faster. Pace of play is excellent even though courses were packed, at 4:10-4:20 for our two rounds.

I'd definitely play either course again.

 

[Big_Hitter]

Pace of play is excellent even though courses were packed, at 4:10-4:20 for our two rounds.

that's not excellent, that's glacial

under 3:30 is acceptable, 3:00 is excellent

 

[gcgang]

that's not excellent, that's glacial

under 3:30 is acceptable, 3:00 is excellent

3:30 is about what we do on our home course.

You don't play much resort golf, I take it. 5:00 isn't unusual at many places.

 

[pb4uski]

Great day on the links today. Slowed down my backswing and it worked wonders.... was striking the ball well off the tee and grooving approach shots.... putting which is usually a strong suite wasn't working well other than draining a 12 footer for birdie on 18.

Improved 17 strokes from a dismal outing on Monday that tied my worst for the year. Round took 3:50 which is typical for this course when it is crowded.

 

[Big_Hitter]

You don't play much resort golf, I take it. 5:00 isn't unusual at many places.

No, I usually play at private clubs when I travel. I played fossil trace once in CO and I almost slit my wrists. We ended up quitting after 15 holes.

 

[zinger1457]

Players and Celebrity courses are both immaculate. Greens are fast, probably 10.5-11 stimp. Played with someone who plays many courses here who says these are her favorites.

Five sets of tees, so you could play 6100 to 7400. Celebrity greens are more undulating, but Players greens are slightly faster. Pace of play is excellent even though courses were packed, at 4:10-4:20 for our two rounds.

I'd definitely play either course again.

Thanks for the review! I agree, for a resort course that is packed anything under 4:30 is very good. Some courses do a better job than others at marshaling and moving things along.

 

[Dawg52]

3:30 is about what we do on our home course.

You don't play much resort golf, I take it. 5:00 isn't unusual at many places.

I would quit if it took anywhere near 5 hours. No, I don't play much resort golf anymore for that very reason. I'm spoiled....during the week our group plays in just under 3 hours(semi-private club). Weekend play is closer to 3 1/2 hours. I don't play much weekend golf because that seems slow to me.

 

[Huston55]

Players and Celebrity courses are both immaculate. Greens are fast, probably 10.5-11 stimp. Played with someone who plays many courses here who says these are her favorites.

Five sets of tees, so you could play 6100 to 7400. Celebrity greens are more undulating, but Players greens are slightly faster. Pace of play is excellent even though courses were packed, at 4:10-4:20 for our two rounds.

I'd definitely play either course again.

Thx much for the review. Hope to get down there one of these winters.

 

[Huston55]

Hiddenbrooke

Played Hiddenbrooke in Vallejo, CA for the first time yesterday. It's a beautiful course! Carved out of a valley with, yes, a brook running through it. Lots of elevation changes, forced carries and trouble to be found but, it rewards accurate shots.

They used to play an LPGA event here but, it seems they've not kept up to those standards. We saw a couple maintenance issues, like one set of bunkers marked GUR due to water but, I can't fault a course too much for that after the rain we've had in NorCal this winter. The staff & facilities are fantastic.

My golf buddies & I are planning to return. We got a great MooseGolf deal @ $29.50/golfer with cart; hard to beat that for this quality of course.

 

[Big_Hitter]

Some courses do a better job than others at marshaling and moving things along.

We don't have a marshal at our club, one isn't needed. If someone is slow playing, they get policed by the members.

A resort shouldn't have to marshal players either. People should understand they need to pick up and go to the next hole after 12 minutes.

And don't get me started on pre-shot routines. There is no excuse for a 15 handicapper to take more than 15 seconds to hit a shot.

 

[zinger1457]

We don't have a marshal at our club, one isn't needed. If someone is slow playing, they get policed by the members.

Most private clubs don't need or have a marshal but they are an asset at resort type courses if they do their job correctly. At resort courses you're often dealing with golfers who are playing the course for the first time who sometimes need a little guidance/push.

 

[Dawg52]

And don't get me started on pre-shot routines. There is no excuse for a 15 handicapper to take more than 15 seconds to hit a shot.

True. Drives me crazy to see someone try to emulate what a pro does in a pre-shot routine. Several practice strokes, throwing grass up in the air when there is no wind, etc etc. Just play the game.

 

[pb4uski]

.... And don't get me started on pre-shot routines. There is no excuse for a 15 handicapper to take more than 15 seconds to hit a shot.

I agree on the 15 seconds, but why should your pace of play vary depending on your handicap?

IME pace is more a function of whether the group is having trouble (difficult to find balls, etc) or not and not pre-shot routines though I concede that some peoples pre-shot routines are annoying.

 

[Huston55]

Pace of Play

Pace of play seems to always be an emotional subject among golfers; me included when it gets out of control (as it did on a 6+ hr round in St George) but, that's a whole story in itself.

High handicappers do play slower; primarily because they're looking for balls...and hitting more often. But, I've not seen anything demonstrating that pre-shot routine slows play; for high or low handicappers. In fact, if the group is playing 'ready golf' it shouldn't matter a bit.

Interestingly, walking is as fast as riding in a group, and riding cart path only slows play considerably.

Here's a good article by Dean Knuth. It's based on data, which should appeal to this E-R.org group. I think Big-Hitter originally introduced Knuth (known as The Pope of Slope) earlier in this thread.

PopeOfSlope.com - Pace of Play

 

[pb4uski]

The biggest problem in course management is overloading the course. This happens when tee-time intervals are less than 10 minutes apart. A course using six-minute intervals is guaranteed to get more goand guaranteed to create more angry golfers. Overloading causes backups on the first par 3 or a short par 5, where better golfers wait for the green to clear before they hit their second shots.

Good article, but I'm not sure I can recall the last time I played a course with 10 minute intervals. Most seem to be 8 minutes or less.

 

[zinger1457]

A lot of talk about the 'too slow' golfer, what about the 'too fast' golfer. I dislike playing with both types. The 'too fast' golfer measures a successful round of golf not by score but by how long it took them to play a round. They are typical discourteous to the fellow golfers in their group, grow extremely impatient and constantly complain when the group in front is slowing down their 'fast' round, occasionally will hit into the group in front to push them along.

 

[pb4uski]

We have a standing rule.... the first ball hit into we assume to be an innocent mistake... the second one gets hit back at them or into the woods. That said, have never had a problem.

One of the guys in my Thursday group got hit in the back on the fly one time... hurt like hell.

 

[Dawg52]

I have no problem with the fast golfer. When ever a faster group comes through, I gladly move over and let them play through. But that seldom happens as my group of guys are usually the ones that get invited to play through. Our group of guys are usually in the 12-16 number and we break up into groups of 4, sometimes groups of 3 if we have just six or nine golfers show up. We all play ready golf. Never seen any of ours hit into another group.

I played today which is out of the norm for me. I usually let the working stiffs have the course on weekends and I play M-F. But it's suppose to rain a good bit next week so I played with a couple of buddies. We quit after 14 holes as pace of play came to a crawl. I'm spoiled with wide open weekday play. Ha.

 

[jjquantz]

I've been hit twice, both times when I was a kid. One was on a course with nothing but (narrow) parallel fairways, caught a 250 yard drive square on the shoulder. Yes, it hurts like hell.

Our group is also one of the quick ones. We've never hit into anyone, but one member of our group has been known to lay up on a reachable par five instead of waiting for the green to clear. Probably the high percentage play for him, anyway, but he is just too impatient to wait when he can hit the ball RIGHT NOW.

Unfortunately at our club, the fast weekday rounds are coming to an end. Our club has some kind of fetish for organized leagues. So Monday afternoon is for outings, Tuesday morning is the 9 hole ladies, Wednesday morning is 18 hole ladies and Thursday is retirees. On the weekends the already congested tee sheet is also filled with an "A" team league, a "B" team, a senior "A" and a senior "B". And of course when people get organized they get serious and when they get serious they get slow.

Why can't people just play golf?

 

[OnTheBeach]

I have 5 more Tuesdays of work - then I expect to contribute to this thread..........

 

[Big_Hitter]

Good article, but I'm not sure I can recall the last time I played a course with 10 minute intervals. Most seem to be 8 minutes or less.

our club has 10 min tee intervals