The Sheen of Augusta

On holes, 5, 6, and 14, the diversely contoured greens require exacting approach play and recovery. There is also immense variety from day-to-day, with the movement of the pin affecting strategy, angles of attack, and club selection like few other places. The 5th green is characterised by a strong landform that extends from the front left, through the middle, creating a two-tiered target with a bunker hiding at its back left. The 6th, on the other hand, is more softly contoured, but tilted heavily from back to front. In my second tournament round, I hit what I thought was a perfect shot to a rear right pin, only to miss my landing point by about 3 feet. This left me with a massive lag putt from off the front edge, while 3 feet further would have resulted in a makeable birdie putt. The 14th, like the 5th, has bolder internal contouring that follows the natural grade of the land from left to right. A cascading series of interesting pin positions flow down from the back left to back right of the green. While being challenging greens to putt on, they also place emphasis on approach play and recovery like almost no other course I can think of (Royal Melbourne may be the closest comparison).

But for all the ways that I better understood and appreciated the course with repeat play, the second and competing perspective that emerged over time was a slight dulling of the Augusta National lustre. This was a glossy coating that had built up in my mind over the 20 years of my golfing life. Every year’s flawless Masters coverage, the shots of its immaculate conditioning, the words of acclaim from golfers’ whose opinions I held in highest regard, had created a lustrous varnish across all 18 of those rollicking fairways. But with every footstep I took on property, that varnish got rubbed back a little, and I was able to see the course more and more for what it is.

The course at Augusta National is not perfect. It is not the first on my list that I want to return to play – and it might not even be in the top 10. And in its current form, I don’t believe it sets a good example for our sport on its biggest stage. But none of these statements mean that I do not think it is a fantastic venue to host the most famous event in golf – it absolutely is. 

For me, the complicating factor for Augusta National is that last sentence – ‘hosting the most famous event in golf’.

On my first visit to Augusta National I was toured around the whole property by the head pro. The clubhouse, pro shop, and dining spaces could be mistaken for any other top club. But not everything else. We drove past building after building, which formed a compound reminiscent of a wealthy American suburb-themed movie set. Clearly running golf’s biggest event is a massive undertaking, and with that comes its challenges. 

For one, the course is tasked with providing a good test for the best players in the world, which is becoming increasingly difficult. MacKenzie and Jones couldn’t have predicted the distances that modern players hit the ball when they set out to design the course in the early 1930s. In fact, MacKenzie wrote about designing to allow for lengthening as one of his 13 Principles of Golf Architecture.

“…the course should be arranged so that in the first instance there is always a slight walk forwards from the green to the next tee, then the holes are sufficiently elastic to be lengthened in the future if necessary.” 

Dr. Alister MacKenzie, 1930

With nowhere further to take the tees back, Augusta has resorted to buying up neighbouring property to move tees back far enough for the modern game. When the club opened, it tipped out at about 6800 yards – long for its time. Today it’s been stretched to 7500 yards – an increase of approximately 10%. By comparison, over the same time period the driving distance of elite players has increased from approximately 240 to 295 yards – a greater than 20% increase.

So, despite the club’s best efforts to lengthen the course, its scale has been distorted by modern driving distances. To combat this, the committee has taken other measures to increase the difficulty of the golf course for the players. There are far too many changes to go through individually (and this Golf Digest article does a great job at summarising them all). However, in short: holes have gotten longer; fairways have gotten narrower; and greens have gotten smaller.

Additionally, maintenance practices have also evolved. One such change was to the bermudagrass fairway turf, which is now oversewn with rye grass and mown towards the tee. Both factors reduce the amount of bounce and roll of the ball and were practices introduced in the 1960s. Another change is green speed which, with the conversion to bentgrass greens in the 1980s, has increased the difficulty of the dramatically contoured surfaces. There has also been the addition of rough and increased vegetation (trees and bushes) which has added further penalty for errant shots.

Overall, the character of the golf course has been drastically altered in the fight to keep up with advances in the way the modern game is played. But with the objective of hosting a tournament like the Masters, is it even possible to present a course that tests the modern player, but remains true to the vision of its famous architect? Is it even important? 

In a recent episode of The Fried Egg podcast hosted by Andy Johnson, Tom Doak posits that ‘…there should be a handful of any designer’s best work that you don’t mess with too much’. Given the conflicting objectives at play here, I don’t think it’s reasonable for Augusta National to reverse course and faithfully restore the holes to be a living example of MacKenzie’s work (Alwoodley, The Valley Club, Cypress Point, Royal Melbourne, and Pasatiempo will have to carry the torch here).

I see room for the greatest improvement in the presentation and aesthetic of the golf course. Augusta has formed a reputation for its perfect conditioning. Quite literally, it’s difficult to find a stray pine cone, or crooked blade of grass amongst the sprawling 345 acre property – trust me, I’ve looked! It certainly is incredible to witness first hand, and TV does a great job at showing this level of perfection to its audience. However, I wonder if this is really a positive thing for golf? Does the perfection of Augusta set unrealistic expectations for golf courses around the world?

If it was simply expectations for the way the golf course plays (generally firm, fast, and true), this wouldn’t be such a bad thing. But unfortunately, it’s the visuals of bright green oversewn fairways, the highly curated flowering gardens, and blinding white bunker sand that are most prominent to the golfing audience. As for non-golfers tuning in, is this really what we want to be showing off to our largest viewership? In a world increasingly focused on sustainability and reductions in chemical and water use, such displays of extreme resource extravagance only do further harm to golf’s poor image.

What then, if Augusta skipped the oversew, cut the fairways tighter, and burned them out, promoting the ground game? Yes, we’d see more rollout on some tee shots, but it would also make several drives more challenging. For holes like 9, 11, and 14, balls could run away from the ideal line rather than settling safely near it after they land. Some of the original width of the course could even be restored, as the effective width of certain fairways play much narrower under these conditions.

I’d also move away from the delineation between pine straw and maintained rough, creating a more organic and natural transition from fairway edge out. Additionally, fluffy and dry bermudagrass rough would make for a thrillingly inconsistent penalty for the game’s top players. This type of rough is known to be extremely difficult, due to the looming risk of fliers.

Finally, restoring the bunkers to the shapes and style of MacKenzie’s originals would be an admirable nod to arguably the greatest architect of all time. MacKenzie was probably best known for the character of his bunkers, and believed that “…artificial features should have so natural an appearance that a stranger is unable to distinguish them from nature itself”. 

Clearly the above suggestions would go some way towards creating a course that is indistinguishable from nature.

There’s a fine line between modernising golf and honouring the vision of those who have shaped the game along the way. No organisation in golf is better positioned than the universally admired Augusta National to shepherd the game into its future. Importantly, it could set a healthy and sustainable example for courses around the world, showing that a course doesn’t have to be bright green, enclosed by flowers, or be manicured to millimetre perfection to provide an interesting and thrilling test of this great game. Indeed, in this case, I would argue that the best way forward is to look back to those who came before.