Welcome back to another edition of the Fridagg Podcast. Today's episode is brought to you by ourselves. Hey, I just wanted to take a quick minute to talk about our print shop. We have my photography somem of Garrett Morrison's photography in our pro shop at proshop dot Thefridagg dot com. There you will find a photography tab. We have paper prints, we have frame paper prints, and we also have metal
prints just to give you an idea. Those metal prints are really unique, bright prints that will spruce up any room as well as your traditional paper print and frame paper print. So we have a ton of courses including this week's Ryder Cup Venue, Whistling Straits on there. Others included Ballyneil, Kingsley Club, Sand Valley, pas Tempo Prairie Dunes,
among many other stream song. We have a ton of courses up there, a ton of different prints, a ton of op If you're looking for something else that you may have seen us post, feel free to reach out on the contact us page. We are doing twenty percent off. That's not an insignificant amount of money off and use the code RC twenty twenty. That's our C twenty twenty
for twenty percent off. Today's episode is a conversation about Whistling Straits between myself and Garrett Morrison, our managing editor. So we talk all things Whistling Straits, the venue for this year's Ryder Cup, and we get in the nitty gritty there and it's a good conversation. Later this week we will have another episode that is a five Things episode where I will host a colleague in the media space.
I think I've got an irishman coming on. He can be a little surly and hasn't given me really a straight answer. So I think I have an irishman coming on. He's been on the pod before. We'll see if he uh, if he follows through with that. But without further ado, here is Garrett and I's conversation on Whistling straight I.
Missed a green, for example, I'm already upset when I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset.
And when I find my ball in a bright egg Friday, egg Frida, egg Frida, egg fridagg bride egg Lie, I'm about ready to run off of the course. All right, So Andy, you were just at Whistling Straights.
Uh, yes, yeah, it was there. Quick trip, just just there to shoot the course. I didn't didn't play, but walked walk both nines and uh, good to see it again. I've been there a few times in my lifetime, so you know, it's always been a big u big drag grown up, I mean, Coler the Cohler Resort was like the destination place, the one that you always dreamed of going to when you were a kid, because it was
like the nice the real nice course. Being a Midwestern like that was the resort of the Midwest growing.
Up, Chicago's riviera maybe you could call it.
I don't know.
I mean, you got you got Lake, you got Lake Chadiva areas, a big Chicago land and then you got
the new Buffaloes like the Hamptons of Chicago land. But Cohler was this just like five star lux resort that popped up, and you know, from a golfing sense, you know, they were hosting at black Wolf, they hosted that US Women's Open in ninety seven, and then all of a sudden, the PGA started to go to Whistling Straits after they built that, and it was you know, that was right when I was getting into golf those years, and you know,
it became an aspirational place. So it's a h you know, for any kid that grew up in the Midwest around my age, it's a it's a place that you always dreamed of playing. And I've been lucky to get out there a few times in my lifetime, and you know, I still have pictures from the first time I went out there with my family, and you know, I think, like you know, when you look at the whole place architecturally,
there's some things that you him and haw about. But at the same time, this is a place historically that will always be remembered for putting Wisconsin on the map as a golf tourism place and really starting this renaissance of golf tourism in the Midwest, in the Upper Midwest specifically with with obviously it and now there's Sand Valley
and Aaron Hills, all of the states. So, you know, Whistling Straits, but more so black Wolf Run was the start of that with with Herb Cohler's kind of vision for this place.
Right, Yeah, the Straights course at Whistling Straits was the second course at Coohler I believe, right, I think well, I think.
Well, black Wolf Run has two courses okay, and they had the there. Originally it was one course, but then they split the course into two when they expanded it. Okay, then they built straights on this which isn't It's not connected, Like you know, black Wolf Fronds really tied in close to cole Is in Coaler and is tied into the resort really closely. But then Whistling Straits is a good ten to fifteen minutes from the resort in Haven I think is actually technically the town.
So the Straights course was built in nineteen ninety eight or opened in nineteen ninety eight, I guess I should say. It hosted the PGA Championship in two thousand and four, twenty ten, in twenty fifteen. But obviously the reason we're talking about it today is that it is going to host the Ryder Cup coming up here in a couple of weeks. And you were up there to photograph it. You definitely saw some infrastructure, some healthy buildouts.
Yeah.
You know, I haven't been to a Ryder Cup since in twenty twelve, and having been to numerous major championships in the last few years, there's just really nothing like a Ryder Cup build out. The infrastructure I remember when I said Kiwa this winter talking with one of the tournament directors down there, I was like, why doesnt Kia ever host a Ryder Cup And he was like, they can't.
They don't have the space.
You know, the infrastructure needs for a Ryder Cup are insane and the buildout is extraordinary. You just look at it, I mean the amount of time, and it just reminds you how much money is on the line with the Ryder Cup and why it was not played last year.
So they are ready for the crowds. You mentioned Whistling Straits's importance in the history of Wisconsin golf. Now people
know Wisconsin as a premium golf destination. It is one of the places to go in America for outstanding golf, and Whistling Straits really stands as one of the found moments of that Black Wolf run also very important, but I feel like Whistling Straits's debut was even more high profile than Blackwolf runs, partly because of this incredible location that the Straits course has.
Yeah, I mean it's right on Lake Michigan. The one thing I will say is like, there's some really interesting ground along Lake Michigan in different parts of Illinois and Wisconsin. At this part of the Wisconsin it is dead flat. It's just dead flat up to Bluff, you know. So everything there is created, everything's artificial. And when you think about when you see the adjacent land to the golf course, it's amazing what's there. You just look at it and
you say, Jesus Christ, like, how did this happen? And the golf course, though is completely artificially made, is right on Lake Michigan. I think one of the things that I was thinking about just recently, you know, when I was up there was just about how much coastline, like it's not ocean coast, but Lake Michigan. A lot of people come to Chicago and it is like what ocean
is that? You know, that's a common thing for out of town or to say, which is kind of funny, but Lake Michigan is kind of like, you know, an
ocean in a sense of how it looks. You can't see the other side of the lake, and the amount of coastline that it occupies is tremendous and I'm not sure how it would compare to a lot of places, but there's more coastline than pebble and definitely more coastline than most of the courses abandoned Sheep Branch might be able to contend with it in terms of pure coastline, but there's a lot of holes right on Lake Michigan,
which obviously gives stunning views throughout. It is a it's a place that like, no matter how many times you've been there, you kind of walk like with like this like turn like you're always kind of angled a little bit because you're looking at the lake to your left or right, depending on which way you're walking.
I believe there are eight holes along the coast, but in addition to those, the holes that are inland have views of the ocean because of the way that the course was kind of built on stair steps, right, Yeah, so the fairways inland are higher, so you tend to be able to see I said ocean before. I think you can see the lake. Yeah, I lived next to Lake Michigan at one point. It really does look like an ocean. But in any case, you can. You can.
You can see the lake at a lot of different points on the course, and part of that's because of how that site was reshaped. I believe when Die arrived that it was more of a sheer cliff right next to the lake, and he moved a lot of that dirt from the top of the cliffs inland so that the holes that are on the lake are lower.
You see that, especially on the front nine, like the par threes jump to mind, those kind of sit down, and especially like the seventh hole sits into like a little cavity that's cut out. It's the lowest hole in terms of like proximity to the shoreline. A lot of the back nine plays a little bit higher, but that definitely is the case for some of the par three's
or where he set those in. And now that you mention it, you think about it, and it kind of makes sense, like you scrape out stuff and that's a perfect spot to just nook in a little par three, you know. And and the par three's all play along the coast, and that obviously is a big thing that the Kaiser's stress with with you know, their ocean front courses is if you go to Sheep Branch, there's it's no coincidence that every part three plays either directly at
the ocean or along the ocean like that. That's uh, that's not by coincidence. And Whistling Straits has you know, the all four part threes right on Lake Michigan. So you know, it was pretty clever routing how he did it because he has all this coastline right and all the interest. You know, there's not a lot of interest to be gained in inland because the land was dead flat and the coast was really the star of the show. That's probably why Herb Kohler bought the property, was just
because of the coastline on on Lake Michigan. So it's it's interesting how he built the course. Obviously, the clubhouse sits back from the lake significantly, and that's where eighteen ends and one t's off like just like any traditional course, but one gets you out there. And the way he oriented both the back and the front nine, so ten and eighteen and one and nine are holes that go out to the coast and back from the coast, you know, and everything else there is oriented in a figure eight.
So there's two figure eights on each side. You know, on the south side you got the front nine, on the north side you got the back nine, and each is a figure eight. So what it does is you play in the case of the front nine, you play above the holes that are along the coast, but then you cross over at a par three, which is the third hole, and then you get on the coast for four. Five lines back, and then six plays above the coast, and then seven, another par three gets you back on
the coast. So it's a really cool kind of figure eight when you think about it. And then eight is obviously right along the coast, beautiful par four, and then nine plays back to the clubhouse, but then ten same thing.
Ten you play out, eleven plays above the coast, and then twelve brings you onto the coast for thirteen and then fourteen fifteen play above and then sixteen a par five gets you back on but fifteen kind of next in to right by twelve, and that's that crossing point of the of the figure eight.
There's an interesting comparison to the Kiowa routing.
Yes, yes, I was thinking about that while I was out there.
Because Kioa is two loops, and so there are sequences of holes that all run along on the back, nine all run along the beach, and they're kind of all on one side at Whistling Straits. The lake front holes are distributed out across the nines in different ways, and so you visit the lakefront at different points during the nine instead of visiting it all at once.
It's almost like, you know, obviously Whistling Straits was built after Kiowa, and it's almost like an evolution because it is, in a way a little bit more sophisticated because it becomes it becomes more of a treat, and then you leave, you come back like you. It creates these gathering points, which for anybody that are going, you know, ryder Cups are a zoo. It's really hard to get around. You
kind of have to pick your spot. There are two gathering points right at the cross sections of these figure eights, where it's the sixth green, the second green, the third green, and the seventh green are all in the same spot. There's a grand stand. I was thinking the best spot might be up in the top of that grand stand
because you'd be able to see everything from there. But that figure eight creates a concentration of energy and a place where everything's going to be happening when they're playing
the front nine. So if I was spectating, I might think about going out there if I'm going to catch the front nine and then booking my way over to the back nine and getting to that same figure eight point where everything crosses because there you have twelve, eleven, fifteen, and sixteen right there where you can watch a lot of action and getting a good high perch right there where you're gonna be able to see a lot of shots.
So in that sense, it's advantageous if you know what you're looking and where you're trying to get for the Ryder Cup. But like those figure eights make those really concentrated pockets of the golf course because going out to
either end is a real haul. But those figure eates are really cool because they, you know, they kind of give you you get to look ahead when you're playing and then also look back when you're coming back at you know, you get to think about, hey, what happened on that short par three twelve, Like when you're on fifteen, like I can't believe I hit it in the water there or something. You know.
Yeah, you mentioned the par three's earlier. All of them are along the lake. So does that mean that they're sort of repetitive or are there ways that Die managed to distinguish them from each other?
Yeah, So two play in one direction to play in the other direction to play south, to play north. The first Part three you encounter is the third hole. It's got a really big green and it angles you're playing south, and it's right on the ocean or on the cheese, on the lake.
And lifelong Chicago in right here exactly.
It's a middle length Part four, so they vary in distance. You know, you've got two middle length Part four are Part three's and three and seven three being a little bit shorter than seven, and then you've got a long part three and seventeen and twelve is a short part three, very short part three. So you have good variety in
terms of the distances. They're all relatively flat. None of them plays significantly uphill or downhill, but they all have unique kind of green complexes and green surrounds that very them. So the third has a really beautiful, like wavy green that has contours that kind of cut in on diagonals throughout the green which create a lot of very cool pin positions, and it opens from right to left going back. You know, the seventh a little bit longer of a
par three that is bench right. I mean, it's so intimidating right along the lake, and that one opens from left to right, so opens to the kind of the opposite shot shape, so the first you know third hole. They look they're very similar in the sense that they're both mid length par threes. One opens from the right to right to left, the other opens from left to right and then you go to the back.
Nine.
Twelve is a wild green. It is a very cool, unique short par three. I think in terms of the golf course, probably my favorite hole on the golf course, right on the lake, and it's mainly because of the green. It's a green that I haven't ever seen a green like it. Maybe a hoopies a hole green might be the only thing that I've seen that has a similar even flare to it.
It's law.
It's kind of very narrow, and it kind of along these bunkers, so you have like a front left side that's short left and then it kind of runs on a diagonal and then goes serpentines all the way back to back. Little pin that's like sits out on the peninsula and they better put the pin there, is all I'm gonna say. Like, I'm going to be extremely disappointed if there's not a pin back there. But in it it has the boldest contours of any green, which you
would expect with a short part three. Like, one of the things you can do with short part three's is you can push the contours and make it a little bit more extreme because it's not as big of a journey to get there. So this green has a lot of very sharp contours, and if you're not in the right section of it, it's gonna be a really hard
two put. And then furthermore, the way it angles, with it being long right short left, that's really tough for right handers because your missus are short right or long left, which are both in both cases.
Truck, have you told me about seventeen?
Oh, last one? I mean, so you get like a gettabull par five sixteen right before it, and then seventeen and eighteen are complete bears. I mean, I think it's about two twenty two thirty from the back, and this hole is pushed up on the edge of the of the lake, very steep drop off to the left. There's space left, but it's nowhere you want to be. It's almost like you know, if the pin's left, you miss left,
it's almost guaranteed bogie. Very severe penalty for missing over there on the right, there's a big towering bunker that kind of obscures the right half of the green, and the only way to get anywhere near that pin is with a high fade from you know to twenty two thirty. It's a really tough shot to hit. I mean, most people are just gonna be aiming for the middle of
the green, trying to hit the green. But you know, it's a longer, narrower, but it's got that little right kind of pocket where you can put a middle pin right. So you've got really interesting pins everywhere that you look on that green. If it's short left, they have te's on the right and left sides, so you could it could be a little bit more right, which when you use that right pin, a lot of people would automatically assume the left t is a little bit harder because
you're right on the lake there. But that right ta what it does is it brings your where you're gonna miss long left becomes the lake, you know, as opposed to like you can shade from that tea that's pressed on the on the lake. It's easier shot to just bail right. It becomes harder to bail right when they have the t right, which I think they're gonna use that right tea most of the time, and it brings that the lake much more into your your shot pattern.
So front left obviously you have to deal with the with the left side and the lake. Back left you have to deal with the left side, and then middle right you have to deal with that really really gnarly volcano bunker.
Short right.
So we've talked about the part threes. What are some other holes that you think people should watch out for at the Ryder Cup.
Yeah, so you know this is a rarity. Pete Die was like, not a big drivable par four guy. No, he was a short part four necessarily like that. It was like one of the things you noticed at a lot of his course is very few drivable par four.
Yeah. And in fact, quick story here when they built a drivable par four at TPC Sawgrass on the twelfth hole, when the PGA Tour decided to make that a drivable par four. This was before Pete Die had passed away, but he wasn't in public much at that point. Alice Dye, his wife, was still speaking occasionally in public, and what she said bluntly was my husband did not like short par fours that much. He didn't really like drivable par fours.
This is not really representative of something that he would want to do. She said that about the new twelfth hole at TPC Sawgrass. But we do see a couple of instances of short par fours at Whistling Straits, which is interesting.
Yeah, And I think like one of them, like ten, is shorter than it would be because of some hospitality. You know, I think that tea is going to be up a little because of hospitality.
You know.
It's an enticing drivable par four for somebody like Bryson, the really long hitters. But then like the predominant drivable part four is the sixth. It's a really cool hole because of the green. The green has like two very distinct sections, like and I think everybody that's watched tournament
golf out there has probably seen it. But it's almost like it's almost like a pair of glasses right with your right and left eye, and then there's a bunker that cuts in and is like your nose piece of your glasses, and the left side's very inviting, has kind of a slope that kicks things in there that is a very inviting pin to go for the green because you can miss to the left and you've got a really easy chip. Things get a little bit more difficult when the pin's over on the right side because you
know there's no option. There's no way you could carry it there, fly it there and have it stop. You know, the question is will these guys prefer hitting that bunker shot from just right around the green or are they gonna lay up back into the layup area. I hit a wedge because it's a really small target, like it's not necessarily an easy wed shot to that right pin and left the left. I think when the pin's over the left, you're gonna see everybody go for that because it's not a long hole.
I think almost.
Everybody in this Ryder Cup will be able to hit to get close to it. So that's a really compelling hole, and obviously, in the cadence of things, it comes after a part five, so it's part of the section of the golf course that you really expect to score. The tenth hole I previously mentioned, but that'll be played up
a couple teas. Again, if you lay up, it's not easy because you never have a visible shot unless you get up by the green because the green sits so high up that you're never really gonna get close enough that you can see the green, So then it brings in this kind of awkward wedge where everybody struggles a little bit when they can't see what they're hitting it at. You can see the pin, but you have no depth perception and there's nothing good left there. So that's the
thing with the hitting driver. If you hit it left, you could be in a really bad spot. And then the final one is the fourteenth hole. Everybody probably forgets about the fourteenth hole. I think it's a really nice little hole and really like maybe one of the most slept on holes out. There's a blind t shot and you can play out right or you can take on a big swath of bunkers on the left, and if you take on that, you could definitely hit the green,
like you know, as the crow flies. It's much shorter than the yardage on the card, and I would expect a lot of guys to be trying to go for that green off the tee and you can't see it from the tee, so it's completely blind. But you can lay up out to the right and it winds around the bunker, but it leaves you with like a webshot from probably not the flattest lye. The fairway banks pretty hard right to left to green that you know, it's
not it's shallow and wide. It's not the easiest green to hit a wedge into.
So you've described a couple of greens so far. It seems like one of the most memorable characteristics of this course is that the greens are really varied, and some of them have pretty wild shapes. So what are some patterns that you noticed among the whistling straight screens.
Yeah, so I think one of the things that di did really well for his era was build really compelling greens that had variety in them, you know that. I think that's one of the things you see in that era of architecture was the greens were a little bit dumbed down and bland compared to Golden Age, and I think Die had kind of the most spunk out of everybody then. And with what you see as nonlinear contours. So what I mean by that is this era was so line oriented, right, so if you built a tier,
it was a straight tier. All of dies kind of go on diagonals and they have ups and downs, kind of like you'd see of a Maxwell roll. It's not just like an up and flat. They all have like kind of backsides and front sides to the slopes. And I think that's what makes them really fun is they create these really small sections. Whether it's a big green or a smaller green, all of them have very distinct sections and you have to hit a really good shot
to get in those sections. And if you're not in those sections, it becomes like how do I two putt? Not how do I make this putt? So it really rewards great iron play.
So one of the ideas going into this Ryder Cup that seems to be popular right now is that this course is going to strongly prioritize distance. What do you think about that?
I agree with that.
I mean distance and irons.
Uh yeah, I mean when you hit it further, you get shorter irons, which really helps your proximity, you know, especially when you're talking about the best players in the world. So, as Joe Lamannia said this podcast a couple of weeks ago, one of the things is why distance is so important is some of the faraways get wider the further you go. This is a resort golf course. So there's some really generous spots on it, not necessarily fairway, if we could
talk about that later. But corridor wise, it's pretty wide in spots, and there's certain areas where they pinch, and I think when it was designed, the areas that that they pinch are where the best players in the world hit it, and now that's where they could hit it past, and it does show its age a little in that in that sense, right is where all the trouble is.
The longest hitters hit it past it now, which is and that's also why some of these holes are drivable part fours or close to drivable part fours that weren't when they were designed.
Yeah. One of the things that stood out to me when I was reading the chapter in Pete Dye's book Bury Me in a Pop Punker that had a few pages about the building of Whistling Straits is that he and the people who are building the course the rest of the people were very much thinking about the distance explosion that was happening at that time. This course was
built in the late nineties. It opened in nineteen ninety eight, and so this was right when the pros were getting longer and longer, and some of those advances that have really defined this next era of golf were first coming in, you know, the solid core balls that everybody was playing, the metal woods. You know, the game was changing and die knew that, and on many holes on this course you can see him trying to respond to that in various ways, you know, going back to the prevalence of
short par fours on this course. I don't have anything in particular to support this theory, but I suspect that those holes were ones where die was thinking, well, the longer players are not necessarily going to have a big advantage on this.
Hole, Yeah, I think, But I think also like, but the web shot into that six, for example, when the pens are the right, that's not an easy shot. You know, sure, if you're dialed in, you can hit it. And one of the things that I think about a lot is when the pin's over there on that side and it's public play, how how do people even play that? Like? How do you know there's gotta be some serious ping pong that happens?
The rounds are slow out there, right, oh, glacial.
That's one of the things about this course is it's it is a resort course, and there is some accounting for the average player, but it is still an incredibly hard course for the average golfer to play.
Yeah, I mean I would agree. I would agree with that.
It'll be interesting to see how they play some of these holes, particularly an alternate shot when the when the stakes are a little bit higher and there's less you know, you don't have the insurance of your partner. I think, like in best Ball, you'll see guys bombs away because one of the two of them isn't going to probably make worse than par if they both hit it up there, Like one might get a bad break and a bad line in the bunker, but both of them won't.
So one of the things that really stands out about this course is the shaping style. You know, there's a lot of really bold shaping out there. There are many, many, many bunkers. I believe Ron Whitten of Golf Digest once counted them and which which must have taken a while, and his conclusion was that the eighth hole alone has one hundred and two bunkers, and that there are about nine hundred and sixty seven bunkers on the course in total.
They're just all over the place, and a lot of them have these kind of you know, bold lips to them that there's some of those volcano bunkers that that you saw a lot of ended up seeing a lot of it dies French Lick course, and so what does have them? Yeah, the fewer of them at Whistling Straits. They have they have made it and multiplied. They are all over the place. So what are some of your thoughts about the style of shaping that was used at this course.
I mean you could clearly tell that the attempt here was to create Ireland golf in Wiscon.
Yeah, and Cohler was specific about that. He said to Pete Dye, I want this to look like Baalibunian. I don't know if this looks anything like Baalibunian, but that was certainly the intention to create a Irish Dune's look.
At this course, you know there's some of that. I think it's a little sharp for that. It doesn't look natural because of how sharp some of the lines are. That being said, I do like sympathize slightly because you look, especially with the drone you're flying around, you can see the land right next door, or if you're driving out of the property, turn right or left. How flat it is?
I mean there's nothing, there was nothing. Yeah, so you know, like he went from nothing to what it is and this is a remarkable feat of engineering just to do that. But I would say, yeah, they're abrupt, it's overdone, and a lot of places over the top and a lot of places. But it does like you do play it and you you know, as somebody who grew up in the Midwest going to Lake Michigan, it's unlike anything else you've seen, which you know, it does have intrinsic value.
I mean, this is extreme maximalism. This is as maximal as you can get isleistly. I mean, I don't know how many more places had more maximal projects of this place. You know, in something there is something about the feel of departing, like there's obviously sense of place, but there is also a form of art of departing the world as you know it and going to different place. And that's more of what this is than Hey, this is
not the Sheboyk in Wisconsin Coast. It's not that it's it's just it's avake believe place.
So what are some other courses that are kind of like this? That take that approach to place. I guess Shadow Creek is the ultimate example.
Arcadia Bluff has some of this going on, which is, you know, just on the other side of Lake Michigan.
And do you do you think that's the right approach on these kinds of properties.
I mean, I don't know how compelling of a golf course you could have built without moving much earth there. It's dead flat, you know, like it would have been cool because you would have been staring at the lake. You know, that's always a good thing. But I think one of the things that it does so effectively for a resort course, people are only going to play Whistling straits. You know, most people will only play Whistling Streets once in their life if they get there. You know, that's
the reality. And one of the things that it does is it will give you a lasting memory, no matter who you are, no matter how many golf courses you've seen, the place will make you feel something some you know. I have a lot of qualms about some of the things out there, with the stuff that people don't want to talk about, which is drained touch. But I remember the first time I played it when I was in I think I was in college. You know, you're just taking a back that the place exists. I don't know
what the right place is for it. It's obviously destroyed a landscape that was there. I don't think the landscape that was there was really that special. It's like almost like amusement mark park golf in the sense of that. But you know, I think the design's really good in a lot of ways, Like the routing's really clever. There are a lot of like really cool holes, and you know, they created this landscape, so there's you know, you go
back and forth. Yeah, My biggest issue with it centers around the way the golf course is presented, given what the intention and the vision for the golf course was. You know, I think it's it's over watered.
You know.
The fairway withs are a joke.
You know, they haven't pushed them back out since they hosted the first PGA, So you get a lot of what you had a kiwa where you have these wider corridors but narrow fairways, you know, And I think that's that's one of the things. It's a resort, so that's why the way it's maintained, which isn't necessarily right or wrong, Like banded dunes are a resort and it's maintained one way. In Whistling Straight Straits is a very different resort and it's maintained this way.
You can imagine that Pete Die would prefer this course to play faster than it does.
Yeah, it plays very slow, and that's the complete opposite of the way it should play if it wants to be an Irish links course.
Yeah. In terms of course, is that emulate a sand dune environment. It feels a little bit dated because we have examples like Kingsbarnes where the effort to emulate links Land was quite a bit more successful if you're trying to come up with an imitation Stewart, something that really feels like it Castle Stewart. At the same time, I'm not sure if it's better to try to fool people into thinking that they're on a piece of links Land or if it's better to just create something weird and
wonderful and theme park like, which Whistling Straits is. You know, if it was unsuccessful in imitating Ballibanion, Whistling Straits isn't necessarily a failure because of that it has done something else and it's pretty unique.
Yeah, I mean it is completely unique. There's nothing else like it. In a way, it's like it's a piece of art because it was completely created.
Everything there was created.
Yeah, you know, it's not necessarily by cup of tea of architecture. But like, I think another thing that's kind of underrated about it just in general is how easy the walk is given how much space they can like have for infrastructure, Like the Green to Tea walks are really really intimate, but yet like they can build out this infrastructure unlike anything else. And I know I know from anecdotally, like the tour really advocates for courses to have long walks from green to Tea so they can
put grand stands in. Yeah, like this place like doesn't have long walks green to Tea and it still has all this space for grand stands. And that's something that Die. You know, he understood building tournament golf, like big scale tournament golf, maybe better than any architect that we've ever seen.
Yeah, his way of figuring out where people would stand, where they would watch the action from, how they could have sightlines on different shots is pretty much unparalleled.
But also his designs because his designs have really endured pretty well and stood up fairly well to you know, advances.
How do you think this is going to compare it to a place like Kiowa or even a course like TPC Sawgrass in terms of the way that it's going to challenge the best players in the world.
It's totally different, obviously, because I think it gives you way more space off the tea. Yeah, this is a golf course that just visually cripples average players, Like they just can't get over the fact of all those bunkers that's all they see. They don't see the like sixty yard wide corridor that they have. I've you know, having played it with my father. It just threw them into fits, like you know, like the that's the thing is like, if you're a good player, it's significantly easier than an
average player because just the visual intimidation. So it's wider, there's way more space, which for these guys is they aren't scared of the bunkers, so it's it's a little gentler off the tee.
It's longer.
I guess it's not longer than Kiwa anymore because of those new te's, but.
It's it's bigger.
It's a bigger ballpark in a way, and I think the greens are a little bit more interesting at Whistling Straits than And one of the things I will say, and this is an important point, is that the penalty for missing fairways at Whistling Straits is huge, and that is something to watch at the Ryder Cup, especially in match play, because if you miss a fairway, say like
the eighteenth hole is a great example of this. Matches that get to eighteen, it is pivotal to hit a good T shot there because if you don't hit a good T shot there, you're likely laying up back at like one hundred and sixty yards, you know, like you're not laying up to fifty yards. It's not like one of those spots you hack it out and you get it up close to the green and it's a relatively easy up and down for four. Like you're making probably
a bogie if you miss the fairway there. And I think that's the case with the par fives out here too, that there's a really high degree of missus out here, and I think all the par fives do it pretty well too. Obviously, eleven is converted to par four for this competition. But two, if you miss the fairway, you're probably not getting home. And then it's not an easy layup, Like it's not easy to get to a place you really want to get to if you miss the fairway.
The same.
I mean, five's like maybe the worst hole is definitely the worst hole on property and doesn't fit the golf course at all. Like five alone knocks the golf course down from being like really great because of how bad five is.
Why is it so bad?
Oh, it's just a horrendous golf hole.
It's like a s fairaway and it doesn't work because if you're a long hitter, you just hit it over the s. That hole separates a scratch player from a twenty handicap better than maybe any hole in America. I mean, you'll see these guys. They're just gonna hit it over everything. Yeah, and it just renders the hole, Like that's a distance rendering a hole completely obsolete.
Well, I mean that might be one of those holes where Pete Die thought in nineteen ninety eight. Yeah, Hey, this is going to kind of blunt the advantage of the players who can hit it three hundred yards. But now that we have players who can hit it three hundred and fifty yards.
It has been de Yeah, exactly exactly, especially if they catch it down wind. You know, it might be different if they get like a north wind, which would make it pretty cold there. And then obviously eleven's converted, but there's huge penalty for miss there, and same with sixteen sixteen.
And one of the things he did with the par fives is there's these like little extremely penal bunkers in layup areas, like little gnarly bunkers, Like on the second hold, there's this like almost principal nosy looking thing, and I'd love if a ball got in the top of it somehow. I hope that happens. That's something I'm really hoping for. And then, uh yeah, So I think that's the thing
is like with the par fours. In the par fives more so, you know, obviously like Kiwa has large penalties for hitting it into the water, but this place has a huge penalty for missing without losing your golf ball.
So what is the number one thing that you think is great about Whistling Straits.
I mean, you're just staring at Lake Michigan all day. Great, I mean, it's incredible like if you haven't, if you haven't been out there. I mean, it's just like it's hard to have a bad day when you're just like walking looking at a giant body of water on a beautiful day. I say that, but like it's true. You know, everybody always wants to say, oh, if pebble wasn't on Pacific Ocean, it wouldn't be a top ten course.
Well, let me tell you. It's on the Pacific oce.
Right there, and it's pretty great.
Exactly, Like you know, there's like a there's like a threshold of like how bad can your day go if you're staring at the lake all day? Like it's such a beautiful place, you know, and obviously like the catch basins are so awful, like and and those are drainage things, and I don't you know, I always look at the lake and wonder there had to be environmental restrictions how they had to drain it. They probably can't drain it and drain a golf course into Lake Michigan.
That probably would.
So for the people who haven't yet gone down the rabbit hole with you about styles of drainage and catch basins, what are you talking about? What is a catch basin.
Catch basins are are drainage basins, and that basically throws it into drainage. You know, drainage that you don't think about is golf course plumbing and that plumbing then takes the water somewhere else. And like think about water on a golf course is human waste or whatever you want to do?
You know, so you want you want to get you want.
To get it off the golf course and in another place. So what you'll see, like if you see aeriols, if you watch, we're gonna put a video together, you'll see these catch basins lining the fairways. Now, if your are if you're constructing a golf course from scratch, what I don't understand they've thought about all this stuff, how they're going to build it. How do you not just do like drainage, surface drainage. The best architects drain stuff without you seeing.
The Yeah, and that's the problem with catch basins is that they show you how the course is being drained.
You know what catch basins do. They collect water and they collect golf balls. Yeah, and you'll see these catch basins in front of hazards. So what it does is it stops the ball from going into a bunker and throws it into this catch basin where a lot of balls get into and then you get all these divots
in them. You know, most people don't understand about the real brilliance of say Bill Core or Tom Doak or Gil is how much time they spend thinking about drainage and getting the water off the hole in ways that you wouldn't see the water get off the hole, and using their resources they're building, they're shaping, they shape stuff to get water to surface drain yeah, as opposed to using catch basins.
And then they have to disguise it. They have to tie it in with the rest of the stuff that's there. And that's where the real art comes in, because drainage has to be functional, like it has to make gravity work on the water, but that doesn't always match up with trying to make it look like it belongs there. And that's where catch basins often fall short, is that
you can see them. There's just this hollow. You're like, that's obviously not naturally occurring, and it kind of takes you out of this illusion that you're experiencing the game in a natural kind of environment or something that just occurred and was not man made.
And a lot of like you know, naturally interesting golf sites have drained one way for a number of years. And when you move earth, what you do is you disrupt it, and that's when you need the drainage.
And sand helps too. Sand helps a lot. Whistling Straits is not built naturally on sand. They imported a lot of sand, but that's not really what this site is.
And as well, like sometimes catch basins are one hundred percent necessary, this is something that sometimes is needed. And Pete Die built a lot of golf courses in places where you shouldn't have golf courses, and catch basins were one hundred percent sent necessary to build those courses. So but this is one where if you're moving that much dirt, I think you could have been a little They could have been much more artistic and resourceful when figuring out
how to drain the golf course. Yeah, and keeping like the basins affect the play like water obviously on that you want to get it, you have to get it off the golf course. But you know, the basins also create an eyesore and create these areas like instead of a ball rolling into one place, it almost removes the randomness of where a ball rolls because it collects it just like it would collect water.
Well, all that said, I'm pretty excited to see a Ryder Cup here.
You know, we're ended on such a negative note.
I know something that we have to bring it back around here. Most of this podcast has been devoted to all the ways in which whistling straits is fun. I think keep an eye on the greens at this course. I bet you'll see some interesting shots around there. And then of course Pete Dye's courses strategically have always has been quite interesting, and so I think we'll see all of those things come out at this Ryder Cup.
Yeah, there's definitely, like you know, lines of charm out there, and the corridors are wide wide where the advantage of being on certain halves is pretty large, especially with the length of approaches that people will have in And it should just be. It should be a really aesthetically a great watch on TV, and it should be. I think it'll translate better as a matchplay course than it does as a championship stroke play course. Today's episode was edited
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