Connect with us

Opinion & Analysis

New book suggests Hogan’s secret, how it can help you

Published

on

Did you ever wonder exactly what the greatest ball striker of all-time was doing in the endless hours of practice he put in? One golf coach thinks he knows, and he’s laid out his findings in a new book: Hogan’s Ghost.

Further, golf coach Ed Myers thinks he’s unearthed the secret Hogan dug out of the dirt. More specifically, he thinks he’s uncovered the secret golfers can most benefit from.

The secret has less to do with pronation of the wrist or having “three right hands” and more to do with the concept of deliberate practice; it has more to do with a pencil and a notebook than any club in the bag, any strengthening or weakening of the grip.

Now before you write this off as another baseless suggestion as to what Mr. Hogan’s secret was. Do yourself the favor of reading on.

Myers is a golf performance coach who has taken a circuitous route to teaching the game at Memphis National Club. After years as a consultant and director of the Guaranteed Success Institute, Myers took up the game in middle age, determined to see how good he could get (and he got pretty good, routinely shooting under par).

Working with pro Rob Akins, Myers observed that most of the students he was seeing regularly weren’t getting any better. Ditto tour pros who were passing through working with Akins. He figured there had to be a better way to practice.

Thus, he turned the greatest practicer of them all: Ben Hogan. An investigation into Ben Hogan’s life, a close reading of Five Lessons, an understanding of Anders Ericsson’s concept of deliberate practice and Malcolm Gladwell’s “10,000 hour rule” led Myers to this conclusion: the passage below from Five Lessons contains Hogan’s secret.

“I found out that it helps me immensely to bring along a notebook and pencil to the practice tee and to write down after each session just what it was I had been working on, exactly how it was coming, and precisely where it was that I should resume my testing the next time I went out to practice”

What exactly was Hogan writing down in his notebook? Myers believes Hogan was essentially applying the concept of deliberate practice to golf.

And just so we’re all on the same page, this is how Myers defines deliberate practice:

[quote_box_center]“An activity that’s explicitly intended to improve performance by reaching for objectives just beyond your level of competence, while providing objective feedback on results involving high levels of repetition.”[/quote_box_center]

And how does one use the above to improve his/her golf game? Through a series of progressively more difficult drills meticulously documented in your workbook. And while there’s a more complex formula for determining acceptable error and this may not be Myers preferred standard, a progressive drill looks something like this.

Stock pitching wedge: 5 times cumulative miss not more than 50 feet (that is, the total distance of all the balls from the target is less than 50 feet). After this drill is mastered, a player moves on to a smaller target area and so on. Myers also advocates setting both “preferred” and “acceptable” standards.

Myers’ claim is a bold one. In Hogan’s Ghost, he firmly maintains that if you aren’t working with a practice book, you aren’t really practicing, and you aren’t practicing the way Ben Hogan advocated.

And while there is something self-serving in his claim (Myers has developed and sells his own practice workbook), there’s certainly a ring of truth in what he suggests.

The search for Ben Hogan’s secret is a wild, highly subjective fool’s errand, ultimately. The literal truth of Myers’ claim — that this is how Ben Hogan practiced — ultimately can’t be determined and can certainly be debated. What is not up for debate, however, is that with his workbooks and Hogan’s Ghost Myers has laid out an application of the concept of deliberate practice to the game of golf in a singular way.

If one truly wants to practice like Ben Hogan and ultimately improve, Myers’ thinking—and his texts—are more than worthy of consideration as points of departure.

Your Reaction?
  • 144
  • LEGIT70
  • WOW13
  • LOL13
  • IDHT8
  • FLOP16
  • OB7
  • SHANK71

GolfWRX Editor-in-Chief

25 Comments

25 Comments

  1. Ronald Ross

    Aug 30, 2016 at 8:39 am

    I am happy to say this is another baseless suggestion.

    The answer has much to do with the hands (theory and practice), as revealed by golf instructor Sey,mour Dunn, on this site http://www.seymourdunn.com

  2. cody

    Feb 24, 2015 at 4:50 pm

    when the legend becomes fact print the legend. Qoute the man who shoot Liberty Valance

  3. Dlygrisse

    Feb 20, 2015 at 5:49 pm

    Just another guy trying to use some excerpt from one paragraph of 5 Lessons or some quick blurb in an interview with Hogan to write an entire book. The myth of Hogan is just too tempting for every wanna be teaching pro to resist. For goodness sakes when is it going to end? if you want to learn about Hogan he wrote 2 great books, read them. If you want to know what some guy that should be sued by the Hogan trust for using his name thinks then buy crap like this. Quite frankly I think books like this are disgusting at worst silly at best.

  4. Gorden

    Jan 25, 2015 at 1:16 am

    Hogan was no different then Moe Norman, what they did in their golf swing and how they did it was a mystery to both of them……bottom line, hand eye skill just like every pro golfer out there.

  5. Phil

    Jan 20, 2015 at 4:40 pm

    Guys, we covered this long ago. The secret’s in the Pantaloons.

  6. h4ck

    Jan 19, 2015 at 10:33 pm

    I posted an excerpt of a Ben Hogan interview. I had to chime in…

    Interviewer:Did you do any charting of the course — any note-taking? Or would you keep all of that in your head?
    Ben Hogan: I tried to keep it in my head.

    Interviewer: Didn’t you keep a notebook when you were practicing?
    Ben Hogan: No. I get credit for all this stuff, but I didn’t do it.

  7. Jim

    Jan 19, 2015 at 12:14 pm

    Bob – Thank you for the additional article, which I found most illuminating.

  8. Gary McCormick

    Jan 19, 2015 at 10:07 am

    Deliberate, directed practice is a good idea, but not exactly a new idea – and the use of Mr Hogan’s name and the mention of his “secret” is just a cheap ploy to garner attention for Myer’s book amidst the teeming mass of golf’s game-improvement books.

  9. MJ

    Jan 18, 2015 at 5:23 pm

    Hogan told his secret in Life Magazine If you would just read it and read it again about how it instantly changed his game overnight. If you say it didn’t then you didn’t read the article. Don’t say he lied in the article either

    • Bob

      Jan 19, 2015 at 10:29 am

      I read the Life article. I have a copy of it. I also read this post, A Very Revealing Hogan Letter, on Al Barkow’s web site: http://albarkow.com. You be the judge.

  10. Golfraven

    Jan 18, 2015 at 4:16 pm

    Well, there is a true piece of advise and just for free – write everything in a notebook. Take pictures, make a journal, read it over and over again. Knowledge is king. See how your score will crumble – hopefully in the right direction.

  11. No glove much love to the ball

    Jan 18, 2015 at 2:17 pm

    No glove, and an extra long, leather grip on the shaft, and not having to have to change his swing from the irons to the driver because the heads were so small on the old drivers that he could swing the same way and smash it off the low tee off the turf. Plus his lack of lower body movement but instead using a hip-bump to time his elbow tucking in on the right side and hinging that move into the ball as he hit it as hard as he could with the tightest grip imaginable.

  12. patrick

    Jan 18, 2015 at 1:20 pm

    I played professional squash for almost 20 years and played internationally for about 7 years in the 80’s. I always kept a journal of all my matches and training. To participate on the national team we had to surrender our journals for inspection to prove we had been trainng and playing all the relevant matches.
    What Hogan did was smart in that his career was a culmination of specific practice and then playing tournaments to see if he was practicing effectively. Today this is common amongst most pro sports. Somebody is always accumulating information to help improve their performance. Apparently Hogan was ahead of his time and realized his practice sessions were critical. If I were a pro golfer I’d do the same thing.

  13. Jeffcb

    Jan 18, 2015 at 9:13 am

    Wow that’s really bad.

    As far as I’ve read there’s only one teacher who figured it out and he explains it perfectly in one of his books. The “secret” won’t apply to every golfer but if you have a similar swing to Hogan, one plane, then it can be of benefit. Of course that’s if you were suffering from the same problem as Hogan, timing you’re release and fighting hooks.

  14. Steve

    Jan 18, 2015 at 8:46 am

    What helps one golfer, doesn’t help all golfers. There can be one thing said or shown to you that turns on a lightbulb. That same thing means nothing to the next golfer. Everyone pro or amateur has their own golf demons.

  15. RetiredCartBoy

    Jan 18, 2015 at 8:20 am

    Who knows – maybe the book is fantastic. It makes perfect sense to keep note about practice sessions as described. However, what would really make this work significant would be if he had access to the actual Hogan notebooks to learn the details of just HOW Hogan documented his practice sessions. For example, what sort of language did he use to describe how things felt. Otherwise, as others have said, this is just using Hogan’s name to sell a book.

    I used to keep a notebook where I would jot down notes about some of my practice sessions and rounds. It was amazing to look back through and see just how many times I FINALLY figured out my golf swing. A pattern wasn’t too hard to spot. I’d make some sort of change, and would start hitting it really well. After a short time I would end up overdoing that move, play bad, then discover a new move to fix the previous one, and would play well for a while. Repeat, repeat, repeat. Though I was improving during this period, after a few years I really plateaued, largely because I never zeroed in on just one swing.

  16. Larry

    Jan 18, 2015 at 4:03 am

    Hogan, Moe Norman, Tiger Woods (all Pros) have the same SECRET it is called hand/eye coordination linked with the ability to remember what you just did…How many of us hole out a sand shoot for a birdie on number 3 on Monday and on Friday have the same sand shoot and cannot remember how the heck we hit that same shot on Monday??? The Real SECRET to golf is frist be able to do it (275 yd drive) and second be able to do it over and over which is almost impossible for unskilled amatures…..how fast do we armatures forget how we swing??? How long does it take from the pratice tee to the first tee…..

  17. snowman

    Jan 17, 2015 at 8:01 pm

    I totally agree that is good to practice/document status/repeat, but agree with others — this is just another guy trying to grab attention/book buyers by using Hogans name.

  18. slimeone

    Jan 17, 2015 at 6:15 pm

    Interesting read, but it can’t be Hogan’s secret because he suggests doing this in 5 Lessons. His secret is supposed to be something that he omitted from his book deliberately. However having read his book many times, I have never actually taken a notebook during practice and often I think I probably should. The thing about Hogan’s instruction is that he expects the reader to follow it to the letter because that was how he played.

  19. Todd H

    Jan 17, 2015 at 6:13 pm

    Great article, this will be a great help, I personally need more specific practice, and less mindless hitting shots

  20. William Gilbert

    Jan 17, 2015 at 4:17 pm

    If you don’t believe that the identification of specific goals during your practice time is not beneficial, then I would be interested in joining you for a round or two.

  21. Jon

    Jan 17, 2015 at 3:22 pm

    There is only one authentic Hogan swing, the rest are mere imitations.

  22. Can't you see I'm eating my lunch?

    Jan 17, 2015 at 12:48 pm

    Ben Hogan’s REAL secret wouldn’t help anybody but him. It was probably just a random thing he “felt” in his swing that helped him repeat and to get in to a good rhythm. Trying to be Ben Hogan will only hurt you.
    Furthermore, you can’t say Hogan practiced more than Lee Trevino, Moe Norman, Gary Player or Tiger Woods.
    Moe didn’t have a wife or a life outside of golf. Didn’t smoke. Didn’t drink. Didn’t date. For years he would get up, hit balls for hours upon hours, and then play 36 or more.
    The “10,000” rule does NOT mean that if you practice something for 10,000 hours you will be an expert, it is a guess as to what the average is. For some people it could be 3,000 hours, and some people could put 25,000 hours and not see any real gains.
    Will practicing better make you a better golfer? Probably. But at the end of the day, this is a man trying to sell a book. If Ben Hogan was alive, would he authorize this man to use his name? People who knew Mr. Hogan know the answer to that question. Haha

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Opinion & Analysis

Ryan: Why the race to get better at golf might be doing more harm than good

Published

on

B.F. Skinner was one of the most important psychologists of the 20th century, developing the foundation of the development of reinforcement, and in doing so, creating the concept of behaviorism. In simple terms, this means that we are conditioned by our habits. In practical terms, it explains the divide between the few and far between elite instructors and college coaches.

To understand the application, let’s quickly review one of B.F. Skinner’s most important experiments; superstitions in the formation of behavior by pigeons. In this experiment, food was dispensed to pigeons at random intervals. Soon, according to Skinner, the pigeons began to associate whatever action they were doing at the time of the food being dispensed. According to Skinner, this conditioned that response and soon, they simply haphazardly repeated the action, failing to distinguish between cause and correlation (and in the meantime, looking really funny!).

Now, this is simply the best way to describe the actions of most every women’s college golf coach and too many instructors in America. They see something work, get positive feedback and then become conditioned to give the feedback, more and more, regardless of if it works (this is also why tips from your buddies never work!).

Go to a college event, particularly a women’s one, and you will see coaches running all over the place. Like the pigeons in the experiment, they have been conditioned into a codependent relationship with their players in which they believe their words and actions, can transform a round of golf. It is simply hilarious while being equally perturbing

In junior golf, it’s everywhere. Junior golf academies make a living selling parents that a hysterical coach and over-coaching are essential ingredients in your child’s success.

Let’s be clear, no one of any intellect has any real interest in golf — because it’s not that interesting. The people left, including most coaches and instructors, carve out a small fiefdom, usually on the corner of the range, where they use the illusion of competency to pray on people. In simple terms, they baffle people with the bullshit of pseudo-science that they can make you better, after just one more lesson.

The reality is that life is an impromptu game. The world of golf, business, and school have a message that the goal is being right. This, of course, is bad advice, being right in your own mind is easy, trying to push your ideas on others is hard. As a result, it is not surprising that the divorce rate among golf professionals and their instructors is 100 percent. The transfer rate among college players continues to soar, and too many courses have a guy peddling nefarious science to good people. In fact, we do at my course!

The question is, what impact does all this have on college-age and younger kids? At this point, we honestly don’t know. However, I am going to go out on a limb and say it isn’t good.

Soren Kierkegaard once quipped “I saw it for what it is, and I laughed.” The actions of most coaches and instructors in America are laughable. The problem is that I am not laughing because they are doing damage to kids, as well as driving good people away from this game.

The fact is that golfers don’t need more tips, secrets, or lessons. They need to be presented with a better understanding of the key elements of golf. With this understanding, they can then start to frame which information makes sense and what doesn’t. This will emancipate them and allow them to take charge of their own development.

Your Reaction?
  • 12
  • LEGIT3
  • WOW1
  • LOL2
  • IDHT0
  • FLOP1
  • OB0
  • SHANK10

Continue Reading

19th Hole

Vincenzi’s 2024 Valspar Championship betting preview: Elite ballstrikers to thrive at Copperhead

Published

on

The PGA TOUR will stay in Florida this week for the 2024 Valspar Championship.

The Copperhead Course at Innisbrook Resort is a par 71 measuring 7,340 yards and features Bermudagrass greens overseeded with POA. Infamous for its difficulty, the track will be a tough test for golfers as trouble lurks all over the place. Holes 16, 17 and 18 — also known as the “Snake Pit” — make up one of the toughest three-hole stretches in golf and should lead to a captivating finish on Sunday.

The field is comprised of 156 golfers teeing it up. The field this week is solid and is a major improvement over last year’s field that felt the impact of players skipping due to a handful of “signature events” in a short span of time. 

Past Winners at Valspar Championship

  • 2023: Taylor Moore (-10)
  • 2022: Sam Burns (-17)
  • 2021: Sam Burns (-17)
  • 2019: Paul Casey (-8)
  • 2018: Paul Casey (-10)
  • 2017: Adam Hadwin (-14)
  • 2016: Charl Schwartzel (-7)
  • 2015: Jordan Spieth (-10)

In this article and going forward, I’ll be using the Rabbit Hole by Betsperts Golf data engine to develop my custom model. If you want to build your own model or check out all of the detailed stats, you can sign up using promo code: MATTVIN for 25% off any subscription package (yearly is best value). 

Key Stats For Copperhead

1. Strokes Gained: Approach

Strokes Gained: Approach grades out as the most important statistic once again this week. Copperhead really can’t be overpowered and is a second-shot golf course.

Total SG: Approach Over Past 24 Rounds (per round)

  1. Tony Finau (+.90)
  2. Nick Taylor (+.81)
  3. Justin Thomas (+.77)
  4. Greyson Sigg (+.69)
  5. Christiaan Bezuidenhout (+.67)

2. Good Drive %

The long hitters can be a bit limited here due to the tree-lined fairways and penal rough. Playing from the fairways will be important, but laying back too far will cause some difficult approaches with firm greens that may not hold shots from long irons.

Golfers who have a good balance of distance and accuracy have the best chance this week.

Good Drive % Over Past 24 Rounds

  1. Brice Garnett (+91.3%) 
  2. Zach Johnson (+91.1%)
  3. Sam Ryder (+90.5%)
  4. Ryan Moore (+90.4%)
  5. Aaron Rai (+89.7%)

3. Strokes Gained: Ball Striking

Adding ball-striking puts even more of a premium on tee-to-green prowess in the statistical model this week. Golfers who rank highly in ball-striking are in total control of the golf ball which is exceedingly important at Copperhead.

SG: Ball Striking Over Past 24 Rounds:

  1. Xander Schauffele (+1.32)
  2. Keith Mitchell (+1.29)
  3. Tony Finau (+1.24)
  4. Cameron Young (+1.17) 
  5. Doug Ghim (+.95)

4. Bogey Avoidance

With the conditions likely to be difficult, avoiding bogeys will be crucial this week. In a challenging event like the Valspar, oftentimes the golfer who is best at avoiding mistakes ends up on top.

Gritty golfers who can grind out difficult pars have a much better chance in an event like this than a low-scoring birdie-fest.

Bogey Avoidance Over Past 24 Rounds

  1. Brice Garnett (+9.0)
  2. Xander Schauffele (+9.3)
  3. Austin Cook (+9.7) 
  4. Chesson Hadley (+10.0)
  5. Greyson Sigg (+10.2)

5. Strokes Gained: Total in Difficult Conditions

Conditions will be tough this week at Copperhead. I am looking for golfers who can rise to the occasion if the course plays as difficult as it has in the past.

Strokes Gained: Total in Difficult Conditions Over Past 24 rounds

  1. Xander Schauffele (+1,71) 
  2. Min Woo Lee (+1.39)
  3. Cameron Young (+1.27)
  4. Jordan Spieth (+1.08)
  5. Justin Suh (+.94)

6. Course History

That statistic will tell us which players have played well at Copperhead in the past.

Course History Over Past 24 rounds

  1. Patrick Cantlay (+3.75) 
  2. Sam Burns (+2.49)
  3. Davis Riley (+2.33)
  4. Matt NeSmith (+2.22)
  5. Jordan Spieth (+2.04)

The Valspar Championship Model Rankings

Below, I’ve compiled overall model rankings using a combination of the five key statistical categories previously discussed — SG: Approach (27%), Good Drive % (15%), SG: BS (20%), Bogeys Avoided (13%), Course History (13%) Strokes Gained: Total in Difficult Conditions (12%).

  1. Xander Schauffele
  2. Doug Ghim
  3. Victor Perez
  4. Greyson Sigg
  5. Ryan Moore
  6. Tony Finau
  7. Justin Thomas
  8. Sam Ryder
  9. Sam Burns
  10. Lucas Glover

2024 Valspar Championship Picks

Justin Thomas +1400 (DraftKings)

Justin Thomas will be disappointed with his finish at last week’s PLAYERS Championship, as the past champion missed the cut despite being in some decent form heading into the event. Despite the missed cut, JT hit the ball really well. In his two rounds, the two-time major champion led the field in Strokes Gained: Approach per round.

Thomas has been up and down this season. He’s missed the cut in two “signature events” but also has finishes of T12 at the Arnold Palmer Invitational, T12 at the Waste Management Phoenix Open, T6 at the Pebble Beach AT&T Pro-Am and T3 at the American Express. In his past 24 rounds, he ranks 3rd in the field in Strokes Gained: Approach and 6th in Strokes Gained: Ball Striking in the field.

Thomas loves Copperhead. In his last three tries at the course, he’s finished T13, T3 and T10. Thomas would have loved to get a win at a big event early in the season, but avoidable mistakes and a balky putter have cost him dearly. I believe a trip to a course he loves in a field he should be able to capitalize on is the right recipe for JT to right the ship.

Christiaan Bezuidenhout +6000 (FanDuel)

Christiaan Bezuidenhout is playing spectacular golf in the 2024 season. He finished 2nd at the American Express, T20 at Pebble Beach and T24 at the Genesis Invitational before finishing T13 at last week’s PLAYERS Championship.

In his past 24 rounds, the South African ranks 3rd in the field in Strokes Gained: Approach and 26th in Strokes Gained: Ball Striking. Bezuidenhout managed to work his way around TPC Sawgrass last week with minimal damage. He only made five bogeys in the entire week, which is a great sign heading into a difficult Copperhead this week.

Bezuidenhout is winless in his PGA Tour career, but certainly has the talent to win on Tour. His recent iron play tells me that this week could be a breakthrough for the 35-year-old who has eyes on the President’s Cup.

Doug Ghim +8000 (FanDuel)

Doug Ghim has finished in the top-16 of his past five starts. Most recently, Ghim finished T16 at The PLAYERS Championship in a loaded field.

In his past 24 rounds, Ghim ranks 8th in Strokes Gained: Approach and 5th in Strokes Gained: Ball Striking. In terms of his fit for Copperhead, the 27-year-old ranks 12th in Bogey Avoidance and 7th in Strokes Gained: Total in Difficult Conditions, making him a great fit for the course.

Ghim has yet to win on Tour, but at one point he was the top ranked Amateur golfer in the world and played in the 2017 Arnold Palmer Cup and 2017 Walker Cup. He then won the Ben Hogan award for the best male college golfer in 2018. He certainly has the talent, and there are signals aplenty that his talent in ready to take him to the winner’s circle on the PGA Tour.

Sepp Straka +8000 (BetRivers)

Sepp Straka is a player who’s shown he has the type of game that can translate to a difficult Florida golf course. The former Presidents Cup participant won the 2022 Honda Classic in tough conditions and should thrive with a similar test at Copperhead.

It’s been a slow 2024 for Straka, but his performance last week at the PLAYERS Championship surely provides some optimism. He gained 5.4 strokes on approach as well as 1.88 strokes off the tee. The tee-to-green game Straka showed on a course with plenty of danger demonstrates that he can stay in control of his golf ball this week.

It’s possible that the strong performance last week was an outlier, but I’m willing to bet on a proven winner in a weaker field at a great number.

Victor Perez +12000 (FanDuel)

Victor Perez is no stranger to success in professional golf. The Frenchman has three DP World Tour wins including a Rolex Series event. He won the 2019 Alfred Dunhill Links Championship, as well as the 2023 Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship, which are some big events.

Perez earned his PGA Tour card this season and enters the week playing some fantastic golf. He finished in a tie for 16th in Florida at the Cognizant Classic and then tied for third in his most recent start at the Puerto Rico Open.

In his past 24 rounds in the field, Perez ranks 11th in Strokes Gained: Approach, 1oth in Strokes Gained: Ball Striking, 6th in Good Drive % and 15th in Bogey Avoidance.

Perez comes in as a perfect fit for Copperhead and offers serious value at triple-digit odds.

Your Reaction?
  • 16
  • LEGIT3
  • WOW2
  • LOL1
  • IDHT0
  • FLOP1
  • OB2
  • SHANK6

Continue Reading

Opinion & Analysis

Myrtle Beach, Explored: February in South Carolina

Published

on

As I gain in experience and age, and familiarity breeds neither contempt nor disdain, I understand why people return to a place. A destination like Myrtle Beach offers a sizable supply and diversity of restaurants, entertainment venues, and shops that are predicated on the tenets of the service industry. Greet your customers with a smile and a kind word, and they will find comfort and assurance. Provide them with a memorable experience and they will suggest your place of business to others.

My first tour of Myrtle Beach took place in the mid-1980s, and consisted of one course: Gator Hole. I don’t remember much from that day, and since Gator Hole closed a decade later, I cannot revisit it to recollect what I’d lost. Since then, I’ve come to the Grand Strand a few times, and been fortunate to never place a course more than once. I’ve seen the Strantz courses to the south and dipped my toe in the North Carolina courses of Calabash. I’ve been to many in the middle, including Dunes, Pine Lakes, Grande Dunes among them.

2024 brought a quartet of new courses, including two at the Barefoot Resort. I’d heard about the North Myrtle Beach four-pack of courses that highlight the Barefoot property, including layouts from Pete Dye, Tom Fazio, Davis Love III, and Greg Norman. I had the opportunity to play and shoot the Dye and Fazio tracks, which means that I’ll have to return to see the other two. Sandwiched between them were the TPC-Myrtle Beach course, also from Tom Fazio, and the Pawley’s Plantation trace, by the hand of Jack Nicklaus. I anticipated a bit of the heroic, and bit of the strategic, and plenty of eye candy. None of those architects would ever be considered a minimalist, so there would be plenty of in-play and out-of-play bunkers and mounds to tantalize the senses.

My nephew arrived a few days early, to screen a few more courses. As a result, you the reader will have an extra quarter of mini-reviews, bringing the total of courses in this piece to eight. It was inconceivable that CJR would play four courses that I had never played nor photographed, but that was the case. His words appear at the end of this piece. We hope that you enjoy the tour.

Main Feature: Two Barefoots, a TPC, and Pawley’s Plantation

Barefoot Dye

What Paul “Pete” Dye brought back from his trips to the United Kingdom, hearkened back to what C.B. MacDonal did, some 65 years prior. There is a way of finding bunkers and fairways, and even green sites, that does not require major industrial work. The Dye course at Barefoot Resorts takes you on a journey over the rumpled terrain of distant places. If there’s one element missing, it’s the creased and turbulent fairways, so often found in England and Ireland. The one tenet of playing a Dye course, is to always aim away from temptation, from where your eyes draw you. Find the safe side of the target, and you’ll probably find your ball. It then stands that you will have a shot for your next attempt. Cut the corner, and you might have need to reload. The Barefoot course begins gently, in terms of distance, but challenges with visual deception. After two brief 4s and a 3, the real work begins. The course is exposed enough, to allow the coastal winds to dance along the fairways. Be ready to keep the ball low and take an extra club or two.

TPC-Myrtle Beach

If memory serves, TPCMB is my first trek around a TPC-branded course. It had all the trappings of a tour course, from the welcome, through the clubhouse, to the practice facilities and, of course, the course. TPC-Myrtle Beach is a Tom Fazio design, and if you never visit Augusta National, you’ll now have an idea of what it is like. You play Augusta’s 16th hole twice at TPCMB, and you enjoy it both times. Fazio really likes the pond-left, green-angle-around par three hole, and his two iterations of it are memorable.

You’ll also see those Augusta bunkers, the ones with the manicured edges that drop into a modestly-circular form. What distinguishes these sand pits is the manner in which they rise from the surrounding ground. They are unique in that they don’t resemble the geometric bunkering of a Seth Raynor, nor the organic pits found in origin courses. They are built, make no mistake, and recovery from them is manageable for all levels of bunker wizardry.

Barefoot Fazio

If you have the opportunity to play the two Tom Fazio courses back to back, you’ll notice a marked difference in styling. Let me digress for a moment, then circle back with an explanation. It was written that the NLE World Woods course designed by Fazio, Pine Barrens, was an homage to Pine Valley, the legendary, New Jersey club where Fazio is both a member and the architect on retainer. The Pine Barrens course was plowed under in 2022, so the homage no longer exists. At least, I didn’t think that it existed, until I played his Barefoot Resort course in North Myrtle Beach.

Pine Valley might be described as an aesthetic of scrub and sand. There are mighty, forced carries to travers, along with sempiternal, sandy lairs to avoid. Barefoot Fazio is quite similar. If you’re not faced with a forced carry, you’ll certainly contend with a fairway border or greenside necklace of sand. When you reach the 13th tee, you’ll face a drive into a fairway, and you might see a distant green, with a notable absence: flagstick. The 13th is the icing on the homage cake, a callout of the 8th hole at Pine Valley. Numero Ocho at the OG has two greens, side by side, and they change the manner in which the hole plays (so they say.) At Barefoot Fazio, the right-side green is a traditional approach, with an unimpeded run of fairway to putting surface. The left-side green (the one that I was fortunate to play) demands a pitch shot over a wasteland. It’s a fitting tribute for the rest of us to play.

Be certain to parrot the starter, Leon’s, advice, and play up a deck of tees. Barefoot Fazio offers five par-three holes, so the fours and fives play that much longer. Remember, too, that you are on vacation. Why not treat yourself to some birdie looks?

Pawley’s Plantation

The Jack Nicklaus course at Pawley’s Plantation emerged from a period of hibernation in 2024. The greens were torn up and their original contours were restored. Work was overseen by Troy Vincent, a member of the Nicklaus Architecture team. In addition, the putting corridors were reseeded with a hardier, dwarf bermuda that has experienced great success, all along the Grand Strand that is Myrtle Beach.

My visit allowed me to see the inward half first, and I understand why the resort wishes to conclude your day on those holes. The front nine of Pawley’s Plantation works its way through familiar, low country trees and wetlands. The back nine begins in similar fashion, then makes its way east, toward the marsh that separates mainland from Pawley’s Island. Recalling the powerful sun of that Wednesday morning, any round beginning on the second nine would face collateral damage from the warming star. Much better to hit holes 11 to close when the sun is higher in the sky.

The marshland holes (12 through 17) are spectacular in their raw, unprotected nature. The winds off the Atlantic are unrelenting and unforgiving, and the twin, par-three holes will remain in your memory banks for time’s march. In typical Golden Bear fashion, a majority of his putting targets are smallish in nature, reflecting his appreciation for accurate approach shots. Be sure to find the forgiving side of each green, and err to that portion. You’ll be grateful.

Bonus Coverage: Myrtlewood, Beechwood, Arrowhead, and King’s North

Arrowhead (Raymond Floyd and Tom Jackson)

A course built in the middle of a community, water threatens on most every hole. The Cypress 9 provides a few holes forcing a carried drive then challenge you with water surrounding the green. On Waterway, a drivable 2nd hole will tempt most, so make sure the group ahead has cleared the green.

Myrtlewood (Edmund Alt and Arthur Hills) and Beechwood (Gene Hamm)

A middle of the winter New Englander’s paradise. Wide open fairways, zero blind shots and light rough allow for shaking off the rust and plenty of forgiveness. A plethora of dog legs cause one to be cautious with every tee shot. Won’t break the bank nor the scorecard.

King’s North @ Myrtle Beach National (Arnold Palmer)

A signature Arnold Palmer course, waste areas, island greens and daring tee shots. Highlighted by the 4th hole Par 5 Gambler hole, if you can hit the smaller fairway on the left you are rewarded with a short approach to get to the green in 2. The back 9 is highlighted by an island green par 3 and a finisher with over 40 bunkers spread throughout. A challenge for any golfer.
Your Reaction?
  • 2
  • LEGIT0
  • WOW0
  • LOL0
  • IDHT0
  • FLOP1
  • OB0
  • SHANK1

Continue Reading

WITB

Facebook

Trending