Looks Are Everything Around Here

They can add five football fields of length and take away a constellation’s worth of golfing stars, but they can’t change the essence of the Masters.

I approached my first trip to Augusta National with a mixture of excitement and concern, worried that the experience at the most cherished site in golf might be diminished now that honorary starters Gene Sarazen and Sam Snead have passed away and legends Jack Nicklaus and Arnold Palmer aren’t competing, not to mention the incessant griping that lengthening the course has irrevocably altered the venue.

Then I walked around. To the gathering place outside the clubhouse. Past the putting green. Down the lengthened 10th hole, around Amen Corner and back across the 14th and 15th fairways, and finally up 18. And the sights, smells and sounds drove the lesson home like an authoritative Tiger Woods tee shot.

It’s not about the names or the history or the catchphrase of the week, “shot values.” It’s the place. The absorbing, visually stunning, reverence-inspiring place.

“It’s still the Masters,” three-time winner Nick Faldo said.

He had just walked out of golf’s most exclusive club, the Champions Room, and now stood in the shade of the century-and-a-half-old oak outside the clubhouse.

“The tree there, the whole feel of the place, the atmosphere, they can’t change that,” Faldo said. “You can’t put your finger on atmosphere. Here and St. Andrews, they have it in abundance.”

And even though its connection to the past is one of the elements that makes this tournament so revered, the fact is change is just as big a part of its history.

For one thing, if it never evolved, the Masters wouldn’t even be called the Masters. It would be the Augusta National Invitation Tournament, the name used for the first five years because co-founder Bobby Jones thought “Masters” sounded too pretentious.

They would still be putting on Bermuda greens instead of the more challenging bent grass that was planted 26 years ago.

Oh, and the only way people with skin as dark as Woods and Vijay Singh would be on the premises was if they were carrying another player’s bag, a broom or a serving tray.

No, today’s players aren’t playing the same course as Snead and Ben Hogan. They aren’t using the same equipment either. The folks at Augusta National felt the only way to protect their course from the onslaught of titanium and graphite and 425cc driver heads was to move tee boxes and plant trees, and with the latest round of changes they’ve added 520 yards to the course in the last eight years. Now they just need a defense from the detractors.

In the newest Golf Digest, Nicklaus said: “I think they’ve ruined it from a tournament standpoint.” And Palmer said: “I love the place, just love everything that happens there. But now, I’m not so sure.”

Although the new shot angles on the 11th hole and the club selection for the now 240-yard, par-three fourth have the competitors worried, it doesn’t change the place for the fans.

Plus, as Rocco Mediate said: “Major layouts are supposed to be difficult. This isn’t for everybody. It never was for everybody.”

And most important, the 12th hole still looks the same.

The walk to the far side of the club to get to No. 12 feels like a pilgrimage, and then there’s the par-three hole in all of its glory, the three stark white bunkers, the table-top green and the sloping front ready to deposit any short shots into Rae’s Creek. It’s almost as much fun to watch people’s initial reaction to the hole as it is to gaze at the hole itself. They all have that same facial expression you see in a Steven Spielberg movie when people get their first look at the aliens/dinosaurs/Lost Ark of the Covenant.

Two guys from Birmingham, Ala., named Skip and Joe were planted behind the tee box, smoking cigars, relaxing in the sunshine, soaking it all in. They set up their chairs at 7:45 a.m., took a break to wander around the course for a while, and returned to their view, even though the final practice round was long over.

“This picture right here,” is what drew them, Skip said, gesturing at the postcard view.

Nearby, three generations of Californians -- grandparents Jeff and Nancy Werner, daughter Jennifer Atteridge, her husband, Michael, and grandson Mason -- gazed at the view. Michael Atteridge had gone through the lottery for practice-session tickets for 15 years before finally hitting the right number, and this was their last day before heading home.

For them it wasn’t even about watching the 70th tournament begin today. It was a trip to see the golfing equivalent of the Great Wall of China or the Sydney Opera House. It has to be seen, because even the high-definition broadcasts don’t provide the full experience.

As Atteridge noted, the course looks different in three dimensions, with more changes in elevation, slopes and undulating fairways. The key thing is, it doesn’t disappoint. This is how Augusta National should look. It reminds me of the instructions I once received on how to get to Harvard from Copley Place: Walk along the Charles River and when it starts to look like Harvard, make a right.

It looks like Augusta National. And it produces comments unique to Augusta National.

Overheard Wednesday, as a crowd of big shots, little kids and old women in wheelchairs made their way around the course:

“It is different in person.”

“There are many greens that are not this pure.” (While crossing the 14th fairway.)

“It’s as good as it gets.”

Fans left the merchandise store clutching two bags. They snapped photos at every turn. One man scooped up a handful of pine needles for his collection.

And Augusta National, this place unlike anywhere else on the planet, prepared for its next story to unfold. It still feels as if the tale is uninterrupted.

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J.A. Adande can be reached at j.a.adande@latimes.com. To read more by Adande, go to latimes.com/adandeblog.