I hope you found the first installment of Rick’s Renderings entertaining and educational. It is surprising to most people just how much even small changes to the greens can affect the play of a hole. Making minor elevation changes within the putting surface of only an inch or two, up or down, can completely change the way the green breaks. Typically, we are dealing with a small range of slopes on a green, somewhere between 1% - 5% slopes. I like to have several areas on each green that appear relatively flat as these will determine the best pin locations. By “flat”, I mean areas that slope between 1% - 2.5%. Transition slopes between these “flat” areas may reach 7% - 8%, but only for a very short distance. As a general rule, for greens that run above 10.5 – 11 feet on the Stimp meter, anything above 5% slope will not stop a ball from rolling away until it reaches longer grass or a flatter slope.

On the 2^nd green, we added about 1,250 sq. ft. to the existing 4,884 sq. ft., producing a green of 6,134 sq. ft. That size green is close to the size of greens on the Ridge and we made the 2^nd green set up more like a Ridge green. This green had small mounds behind each of the bunkers flanking the right and left front edges of the green. To create similarity between this green and those on the Ridge, we extended the slopes of the mounds into the putting surface so that these low ridges created by the mounds would provide the elevation changes that defined each level.

Using features outside the green to work their way into the putting surface is a characteristic of the Ridge greens. Being able to use this type of design style requires a green with enough area to allow for the transition slopes between the flat parts without getting too much going on. As you can see from the drawing, the high level (H) in the upper- left part of the green would have been very small without the addition of the new greens area. By extending the slopes of the existing mounds into the green until they met at an accent point (AP) near the center of the green, we created 3 distinct pin areas of high, medium and low elevation. Because the hole is a very short par 5, we put a premium on getting the approach to the right level of the green or be faced with a putt up or down a transition slope. The extension of the green outward on the right and back left resulted in some great tournament cup locations.

Installment #3 - coming soon!

Rick Robbins, ASGCA