Road Hazard

You tee off over a 30-foot high green shed and try not to slice your ball into a luxury hotel that Henry Longhurst once said looked like “a chest with all the drawers pulled out.” After you avoid bunkers dubbed “Cheape’s” and ‘Scholars,” you then endeavor to land a long-iron approach shot onto a crowned green that often won’t hold a deft lob shot.

And that’s just the beginning of the 461-yard 17th at St. Andrews’ Old Course. The Road Hole is without question the most feared and difficult in major championship golf because of what lies beyond.

Directly behind St. Andrews’ infamous 17th green sit not one, but two roads. The first is a narrow crushed-dirt walking path, the second a much wider paved road. Beyond the larger road is a buffer of grass, then an ancient stone wall that countless innocent shots have rolled up against. No, this is not a backyard hole or even bad miniature golf. The Road Hole is the most compelling, thought-provoking hole in the world and every five years or so, a spectator’s dream come true.

Architect Tom Simpson put it best when he said, “This is the magic hole which causes such dreadful palpitations to the spectators as the player waits to consider whether he shall chance a heroic effort and try to get his four or whether he thinks his score is good enough and a safe five is the thing to go for. We who are watching share the anxieties of his predicament. What is he going to do?”

Jack Nicklaus summed up the Road Hole’s madness when he accurately labeled it a “par four and a half.” Indeed it was a par five until 1964, and statistics bear this out. During the 1984 British Open the Road Hole’s scoring average was 4.79, ranking it the toughest for the championship. During the last three British Open Championships in 1984, 1990 and 1995, the hole yielded only 39 birdies.

Many agree with J.H. Taylor, the great early 20th century English golfer who took to designing courses after his retirement. “It’s the worst golf hole in the world,” Taylor said on more than one occasion, always preaching that the hole was unfair and in need of a redesign (presumably by Taylor).

Surveying the Road Hole on paper, you can hardly disagree with Taylor. The blind tee shot plays over a wooden shed just 40 yards in front of the tee. The sheds were once railway storage buildings but were torn down and then replaced years later by the existing sheds to create the original effect. For years prior to the sheds’ dismantling, players aimed at the small “d” in “D. Anderson,” but now the Open contestants must aim at a letter from the more commercial “Old Course, St. Andrews Golf Resort and Spa.”

Out-of-bounds runs down the entire right side, which happens to be the optimum flank to place your drive even though you can’t see the right-hand landing area. The farther left you go off the tee, the harder the second shot is and the more likely a ball will find some of the only substantial rough on the course.

The real beauty of the Road Hole lies in the green complex and the tempting decision players face on their approach. The putting surface is a 45-yard long, diagonally angled crowned green perched six feet above the fairway. There is only 20 yards of putting surface on top of the crown to land your ball, otherwise shots going long bound over the green where an almost certain bogey awaits. Higher scores are likely if you received a harsh bounce off the road and head toward the base of the old wall, as Tom Watson did in 1984 in coming close but failing to win his record-tying sixth British Open championship.

Laying up short of the green is no bargain either. The Road Hole bunker wedged into the left center of the green is a deep, tiny hazard that makes back-center and left hole locations virtually inaccessible. Players laying up short and right of the green have been known to chip or even putt their approaches up the tier, only to have them turn hard left into the bunker.

Of all the hazards at St. Andrews, the Road Hole bunker may be the cruelest. Last summer, the St. Andrews Links Trust made the bunker even smaller and deeper. They also eliminated much of the lower-front tier of the green to tempt players into flying their approach shots onto the unreceptive upper crown, instead of laying up.

Two other significant alterations have been made to the Road Hole since the 1995 British Open, and this week will bear out whether they are significant or even unreasonable changes to the already complex hole. A three-story structure of hotel suites was erected next to the 17th tee, but the Royal and Ancient Golf Club refuses to believe it will impact Open play. However, noted St. Andrews historian Malcolm Campbell denounced the addition as “sheer vandalism” and insists that it forces players to hit too far left.

The other change is to the stone road behind the green. Consisting of stonework and crushed gravel for as long as anyone could remember, the road recently was paved over to create a smoother surface. This should make the quirky recovery shot from over the green a bit easier. However, Old Course regulars believe that approach shots carrying the green will now bounce directly off the new surface, over the stone wall, and out-of-bounds into the gallery bleachers. Whereas before, the uneven nature of the road could send balls any direction, sometimes even back toward the green.

The recent changes will give this week’s Open contestants a few more things to think about as they battle the Road Hole. As if there weren’t already enough.