Cue the Billy Mac soundtrack, it's quite the year for linkage relating to the history of Augusta National Golf Club. Just when you think you know everything, something pops up that discredits that assumption.
First up, via the usual suspect we learn that Dr. Alister MacKenzie drew up detailed plans for an 18-hole short course at Augusta National. Josh Pettit details his discovery in a short Golf World piece and in a longer posting at mackenziearchive.org. Here's why the good Doctor indulged in his planning, and why the world is only now seeing this plan:
Initially Mr. Jones had planned to build two full-length golf courses, but after some preliminary surveying it became evident there would not be enough acreage for two courses as well as the lots set aside for future development. Compromises were discussed but ultimately the decision was made to build just one unabated course. Subsequently, it was decided a "little" course would be built to supplement the "big" course. Described as the most idyllic part of the former nursery, a twenty-two acre plot (just South of the Berckmans’ residence and East of Magnolia Drive) with a spring, pond and creek was designated for the development of a short course.
Stored away within an archive of work from the landscape architecture firm of Frederick Law Olmsted in Brookline, Massachusetts, sits the only known copy of Mackenzie's plan for the Augusta Approach & Putt Course -- a document that has remained unknown to the golf world for the past eight decades.
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| Mackenzie's 1932 rendering of a short course at ANGC. |
But this wasn't just any old wee course, as Pettit explains:
The concept for the Approach & Putt course is simple: replicate approach shots similar to those one would encounter while playing a normal course, for the purposes of practice and leisure. With its infinite flexibility, such a course could be played with just a few clubs and consume as much or as little time as desired. In correspondence with Wendell Miller, lead engineer for the Augusta National project, Mackenzie expressed his affinity for short courses: “There is, as far as I know, no interesting approach and putt courses in America. A really good one requires as much thought and planning as a full course. All those I have seen are terrible.”
Certainly Mackenzie’s design was not lacking in interest. The plan displays eighteen one-shot holes utilizing nine large putting surfaces, each approached from opposing angles, varying in size from 7,500 to almost 15,000 square feet, with an average size of 10,600 square feet. To put that in context, the original greens on the long course at Augusta averaged 9,600 square feet (currently 6,435). In contrast, the greens on the current par-three course (built by George Cobb in 1958) average just 2,400 square feet. Mackenzie built big, exhilarating greens. Noticeably absent are any bunkers or hazards other than the creek that bisects six of the holes. This was due to the notion that this course would be intended for enjoyment rather than frustration, and that the most riveting moments for any golfer are those following each shot while the ball is in motion. The larger the greens and the more short-grass surrounding them, the more opportunity for riveting golf shots.
Pettit's longer piece is well worth a full read, including a discussion of MacKenzie's design-build process and the relationship between MacKenzie and the notoriously-difficult Clifford Roberts. And then there are the great visuals:
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| The fourteenth green at MacKenzie's Pasatiempo Golf Club. Bottom, the seventh green at Pebble Beach in the 1929 U.S. Amateur. |
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| Anticipating Norman's coronation, instead photographer Jim Gund captured the consolation hug of Nick Faldo in 1996. |
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| An aerial view of the 18th hole, also from 1996. That long chute has subsequently been lengthened by some 60 yards, graphically demonstrating the difficulty of the tee shot. |
Our last Masters-related item of the day is a geezer chic Golf World piece by Bill Fields. We'll get to his premise in a sec, but this was my favorite bit:
Old Tom Morris, 46 when he won the 1867 British Open (and still its oldest champion), wasn't only fortunate to win that tournament but to be alive, given that average life expectancy was less than 45 at that time. Forty-six seemed much younger 119 years later when Nicklaus won the Masters at that age in 1986, but in golf terms, 46 in 1986 was a lot older than it is now. "I was playing a wood driver, playing a wound ball. It was a different game," Nicklaus said on the 25th anniversary of his sixth green jacket. "Things didn't go as far. You didn't reduce the golf course to nothing like you can today."
That's even better than shooting your age, no? Back to the subject at hand:
A dozen golfers 50 or older are in next week's field at Augusta. Most won't factor, but newly
Freddie dresses Bernhard after the latter's second Masters win in 1993. 50 Spaniard Miguel Angel Jiménez has to be taken seriously, as does Couples, now 54 but still plenty long enough to compete with golfers less than half his age. "If I can drive it close to these long hitters -- if they are hitting 9-irons and I'm hitting an 8, then I'm still right there and I can still do that," Couples said after shooting a second-round 67 and being one shot off Jason Day's 36-hole lead. "But when this course becomes middle to long irons every hole, you can forget it."
Surprisingly, Fields omits the strongest argument for his premise, that the Masters is without doubt the easiest of the majors to win, therefore if a geezer is going to win a major this would seem to be the place. The Masters field this year will be under 100 players, and that includes a host of former champions and amateurs. As much as we love it, the reality is that a Masters can be won by beating significantly fewer players than to win the Texas Valero Open.
That said, I'd need some extremely long odds to betting on the round bellies next week. History says players such as Freddie and Langer can stay close and show up on leader boards, but in the pressure cooker of a Masters Sunday putting strokes have a way of breaking down. And on those greens, any uncertainty or lack of conviction can make a player look like a 20-handicap.
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