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Ocean Course Offers New Challenges and Fond Memories
By : Reid Nelson
When the 68th Senior PGA Championship is played at Kiawah Island's famed Ocean Course May 22-27, it will have been nearly 16 years since the equally famed "War by the Shore" was fought.
For nearly a dozen now-senior professionals who battled in the 1991 Ryder Cup, the Senior PGA will be their first competitive rounds over the part-sandcastle/part-torture-chamber Ocean Course since those dramatic matches. But subtract 16 years from the careers of veteran players like Hale Irwin, Ray Floyd, Lanny Wadkins and Dave Stockton and they would still be, well, veterans.
Go back that same 16 years, and The Ocean Course was a literal newborn, having opened just 12 weeks before the Ryder Cup teed off. A completely different Ocean Course—a modified and matured one—awaits the players this time. In addition to the maturity that comes with age, the course has undergone two extensive renovations since the Americans squeaked out a narrow one-point victory.
And for that reason alone, the 2007 Senior PGA could be a championship where the venue, itself, proves to be as much a part of the storyline as all the players combined.
Regardless, it will be interesting to see as many as 10 players who were part of the Ryder Cup matches take their first swings at The Ocean Course since 1991. In addition to the four players mentioned above, Wayne Levi, Chip Beck, Sam Torrance and Mark James turned 50 prior to this year. Mark O'Meara and Seve Ballesteros joined the 50-and-over ranks this year, just in time for the 68th Senior PGA.
"In '91, the course was hard and fast," said Brian Gerard, head professional at The Ocean Course for 11 years before being named director of golf for all of Kiawah Island Resort's five courses last September.
Gerard recalled how the three-month-old turf offered little cushion from the firm sand that is the base for the entire course. Adding to the severity of the layout was the grassing scheme of the original design. Tees and fairways were grassed with 419 Hybrid Bermuda, just as they are today. But designer Pete Dye chose to grass the entire green complexes with Tifdwarf Bermuda, one of the finest ultra-dwarfs of its time. That meant that areas 20-30 yards or more from the green played just as firm and fast as the putting surfaces.
"If you watch the tape (of the matches) or look at old photographs, the approaches went down from the green and stopped on an abrupt angle. So if your ball hit on the green and rolled off, it rolled into the dunes," Gerard said, explaining renovation work done in 1996.
"We stripped out all the approaches and bowled them. Then, we put in 419 through all the approaches, then collared the edges. So if your ball rolled off the green, it was collected before it rolled into the dunes."
That change alone, Gerard said, made The Ocean Course a much fairer course.
"You have more room to play around the greens," he explained. "Now, if you do miss greens, you have the opportunity to get it up and down, whereas in '91, if you missed a green, you could be unplayable. I think that's the biggest difference."
At the same time, many fairway landing areas were expanded so that marginal drives were contained in grass hollows, not sandy pits. Obviously, an errant shot deserves a severe penalty, but a shot that misses its target by only inches doesn't deserve the same fate, as was often the case with the original design.
In 2003, Seashore Paspalum replaced the Bermuda on the greens. The fine-bladed, salt-tolerant grass has thrived at The Ocean Course, dramatically improving the quality of the putting surfaces.
How will all these changes affect the outcome of the Senior PGA? Certainly Mother Nature will have a stake in that answer. But Gerard didn't shy away from a prediction.
"I think 4- or 5-under will be pretty good, if we get a couple of days with wind and a couple of days without," he said. "Now, if you turn the wind on for four days, I think even par would be pretty stout."
seniorpga2007.com
Book your trip today! Visit www.aa.com, call American/American Eagle reservations at 1-800-433-7300, or call your travel agent for more information.
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