Par and Half Pars

If you golfed at the turn of the last century, you might have found courses where more than one hole bore a par of 3½, 4½, or 5½. Dean Knuth (Pope of Slope) has done a great article on this at: http://popeofslope.com/courserating/par4.html

I don’t propose going back to half pars on the card but we need more ‘silent’ ones Golf’s attitude to par really needs to be revised. Long par 3s are out of fashion but hopefully this year US Open at Oakmont will bring a resistance of this hole. Short par 4 are considered weak and easy by some GCA’s (Golf Course Architects) and developers, but the only thing weak is their ability to think ‘outside the box’ at the possibility’s they offers. Long pars 4s are being extended. Short par 5’s are coming par 4’s and we are being told that ‘unreachable’ par 5’s are unfair. I excuse is used that technology was the catalyst for this but no one ever said we always had to shot ‘high’ scores, the best player will still win. To quote Ian Andrew:"I believe a golf course architect's job is not to define a series of difficult tasks, but to make the game as interesting and fun as he can."

There is always been a lot of criticism flying around golf clubs if the winning score on Tour has been too low or too high compared to par. Par is just an irrelevant number because in the end it does not effect the Winner of the competition, for a better way do what pros do and talk in numbers (i.e. 275 will win this week).

As I said in an earlier article Bobby Jones envisioned his course (Augusta National) as one of half pars. The best and most well known example of this is Augusta’s own “Amen Corner” pairing of 11th and 13th which are were originally and still are Par 4.5 even thought they are par 4 and 5 on the card respectively. According to PGATOUR.com the stoke average for 11 during the 07 Master was 4.55, If my maths stand me correct this rounds up to 5. Also Par is what a scratch players should shot and tour player play off the about +6! Although Augusta should be praised for maintaining ‘half par’s’ they are doing it for the wrong reasons, ie :To ‘Protect Par’

Other offenders of ‘Piping up’ their holes are: Quail Hallow, Pebble Beach, Doral, Bay Hill, all the TPCs and even the golfing saints at St Andrew's were the famous 17th is obviously a Par 5 not a par 4 as on the card.

Golf is supposed to be fun and if we wanted every thing to be a set distance we would play bowls, darts or shooting, but we choose golf. So for this sake of this amazing game we should forget Par and embrace the ‘Half-Pars’.

Another Take on a World Top 100 Ranking

I've did another take on a world ranking of coures at:http://www.golfclubatlas.com/opinionhunt.html

Hope you enjoy!