Chambers Bay is unknown by most, unproven to many, and undeniably a strange concoction. Why is it positioned to set so many U.S. Open records? The players have yet to tee off, but the 2015 U.S. Open, the first in the Pacific Northwest, is already making history. A decade ago the course, as improbable and unconventional as they come, didn't exist. Now it's hosting the U.S. Open? Inconceivable.
If it hasn't happened before in an Open, it's probably happening June 18-21 at Chambers Bay.
It's the first U.S. Open to be contested in a sand box. Chambers Bay lies in an old sand and gravel pit on the western edge of the Tacoma, Wash., suburb of University Place. It's a tilted bowl, open on the west, with railroad tracks and gorgeous Puget Sound beyond. To the east is a high, long cliff. Atop its rim is Grandview Drive, where rubberneckers can stand with binoculars and scout for Rory, Phil & Co. some 80 feet below. (...)
This will not be the first U.S. Open played on sandy soil. Shinnecock Hills on Long Island has been an Open site as far back as 1896, as recently as 2004 and will host again in 2018. But Shinnecock consists of holes that were staked along tree-dotted sand hills, following lines of least resistance. Chambers Bay was dotted with piles of mining spoils, free to be sifted, shifted and molded to creative whims. A sand box, in which 1.5 million cubic yards were pushed around. (...)
It's the first all-fescue U.S. Open Course. The fescue turf, ideal in a maritime climate, is common on the links of Scotland, Ireland and the English coastline, but not on courses in America.
Today, everything could be mowed at greens height if desired. For the Open, the highly contoured greens will be mowed at .18 inches, which will translate to a Stimpmeter reading of 12, and there will be noticeable grain. There will be a belt of fescue rough at about three to four inches (narrowing some of the widest fairways to 40 or 50 yards), then taller stuff farther out.
"The beauty of fine fescue, besides needing less water and less fertilization than other grasses, is that it's the least tacky grass I know of," Davis says. "You get a wonderful bounce on it." (...)
It's the first U.S. Open course to have holes that will alternate par. For the Open, Davis will convert the fourth, normally a par 5, into a par 4, so the course will play as a par 70. "It's a much more interesting drive zone when you move the tee up," he says.
Total yardage will vary every day. The maximum length is 7,940 yards, but for the Open, yardage will range from 7,200 to 7,700, depending on weather, wind conditions and tee and hole locations.
For a time, Davis toyed with the idea of playing the course as a par 71 on certain days and par 70 for other rounds because he was undecided on whether to play the first and 18th holes as long par 5s each day (par 71), or one of them as a par 4 (par 70). Then it occurred to him, because the two holes are parallel in opposite directions, he could alternate the par each day and still retain the overall par of 70.
"When we play the first hole as a par 4, 18 will be a par 5, and vice versa," Davis says. "Both holes are so neat architecturally, both as par 4s and par 5s. It speaks volumes for the incredible flexibility of the design."
The straightaway par-4 first hole becomes a dogleg-left par 5 from a new back tee, with different fairway slopes in separate landing areas. The 604-yard, par-5 18th has completely different fairway bunkering when played as a 525-yard par 4."I don't know which rounds we'll switch them," Davis says. "Would I rather have 18 as a par 4 or a par 5 on the final day? I don't know. If it's a par 5, there's a possibility of making history, making eagle or birdie to win the Open. That's never happened.
"But part of me says, Hey, this is the U.S. Open. It ought to be set up so a hard-earned par 4 wins it all. I've chewed on that over and over. I suspect we'll look at what the wind conditions will be the last couple of days, and decide then."
In recent years, Davis added a last-minute bunker on the 17th at Olympic in 2012 and turned the famed par-4 fifth at Pinehurst No. 2 into a par 5 last year. For Chambers Bay, he directed that a deep bunker be installed in the middle of the fairway about 120 yards short of the 18th green.
"When playing 18 as a par 5, there needed to be something in the lay-up area," he says. "The fairway was 85 yards wide in that second landing area. A guy could be blindfolded and couldn't miss the fairway. I didn't want to bastardize the hole by bringing in rough. So we suggested sticking something in the middle, so they'd have to play around, or short, or left, or right." A crew dug the six-foot-deep diagonal bunker where Davis wanted it, but he wanted something so deep even a great player couldn't reach the green. So the crew dug some more. The bunker is now 10 feet deep. Curiously, though Davis defends its placement and depth, he doesn't think it will see any action. "If there is one, single, solitary player in the U.S. Open in that bunker, I'll be amazed," he says. "But they're going to have to think about it. And that's the whole idea." Alfred Hitchcock called that sort of device a MacGuffin. Local caddies call it the Chambers Basement. [ed. I've also heard it called the "Whine Cellar".]
by Ron Whitten, Golf Digest | Read more:
Images: Chambers Bay and Golf Club Atlas
