During 75-minute car rides to and from Rochester last weekend for the annual Golf Show, Mo Golf informed me that he’d posted an article I’d penned in fun and innocence about how the first few golf holes at a course should set up on a different network and it had caused a bit of negative reaction and discussion.
I’ll admit what the article proved, I don’t know jack about designing golf courses. I learned that in full during three full days with Mo Golf and Scrambler in Long Island last summer. They see features of golf holes I don’t notice. They can also tell you how said features impact the way players have to approach shots. In the world of golf course architecture, they are Einsteins and I am…well, not.
Still, just because I don’t see the “it” others see in regard to golf holes doesn’t mean I don’t see something. Sometimes I like the way a bunker looks around a green. Sometimes I think trees are purposely placed exactly where I tend to hit my golf shots. Other times I just think certain golf features are cool just because.
That kind of observance doesn’t make me an Einstein (maybe I should use Tillinghast considering the conversation) but it also doesn’t turn me into an imbecile. Perhaps, my innocence in regard to why golf-architect geniuses put trees and water and rises where they do actually enables me to enjoy the game more at times.
There are topics I can obsess about in detail that would drive others mad – fitness, running, Reggie Miller’s career – so I completely respect the love and passion those who value golf course architecture show and share. I just like to talk golf too…even if the conversation deals with how little I know about it.
All I know is that when I stand on first tees and 17th tees, I usually like the view. We all see the golf holes differently, but we all see something we like enough to keep us coming back, and that’s a bond I’m proud to share.
