ShreveFrog
Full Member
@Putt4Purple - Sorry, my baseball comment was tangential. I just thought you'd have harsher criticism of what's happened at Colonial for the general fan.
OT - Colonial GC
- Thread starter Limp Lizard
- Start date
Horned Toad
Active Member
Colonial really sucked this year for the GA fans. I’m giving them a break on too much criticism as they did a great job in getting the course open but man we wondered around so much trying to follow Hoge and ran into so many dead ends and had to turn around and cross the fairways plenty of times just to follow him. I remember thinking this is all they got for that much money? I haven’t played enough to recognize the subtlety of the changes. I was under impressed with the course redesign and hopefully Mira Vista will do better with theirs. I remain skeptical that they can pull it off any better. Time will tell for both courses.
ShreveFrog
Full Member
To get to 10 you had to walk through the bleachers behind the 9th green (unless you used the crosswalk on 9.) Were those bleachers free to sit on for grounds pass visitors, or was there an upcharge? They also had some food and beverage there, iirc.
hometown frog
Active Member
The stands between 9 green and 1 tee box were open to the public. and anytime I walked thru there to get across I never saw anybody sitting in them. There were folks sitting on the picnic tables near the concession stand up there having drinks.
FrogBall09
Active Member
prepare to be underwhelmed with Mira Vista if you think "all Colonial got for the money" was the result....it would cost $50-70+ mil to fix Mira Vista beyond the core infrastructure that creates the primary issues there because their footprint is 2x what Colonial had to deal with. So what is that assessment - $100k per member?
75% of the money for a truly great course renovation is under ground and in the turf - you don't reroute great golf course designs. if you need a lot of holes changed on the surface - your course sucked to begin with...look at Oakmont, Pinehurst 2, Baltusrol and Southern Hills renovations. Lots of trees got removed but no holes were materially moved.
Pinehurst 7 is probably one of the few large layout redesigns that has occurred on a once great course and resulted in a better layout - most of the time you get what Colonial had with our old 8th - a poor substitute for the original.
At Colonial, every green complex was rebuilt and has sub-surface watering and cooling, every bunker was rebuilt, the entire drainage and irrigation systems are new, most of the hardscape was removed and what remains was rebuilt, ALL of the turf is new... forget the changes in 8th hole or the creek drainage - the important place for money on a renovation is making sure the course is in great condition all year not just for a few weeks after Texas winter and before Texas summer.
Its funny how the initial discussion here on the course were people saying they were unimpressed with the redesign because they thought it would be easier. That seems to have moved on to now complaining about access....I guess the highest average score in the last 20 years and only one guy in double digits under par shut the "it will be easier" portion of the crowd up.
wonder what you guys would have thought had the club decided to not allow a crowd at all - at one time that was a discussion since the course turf is new and we leveled the old club storage/teen room building that sits between 1 and 18 late last year so we had a rubble pile construction site to work around.
I think the largest problem the club has with future crowd flow and seating will be the area around 5th green, 6th tee, 7th green, 8th tee. There used to be 2 different GA seating areas plus one of the larger concessions - there really is not a way to get crowds back there now at all. Everywhere else on the course has a plan for GA access in the future - but as others have said, as players expect larger purses and costs of putting on an event sky rocket, expect to see much more in the way of "specialty" access and inclusive ticket options. Especially at a course that needs to limit public traffic to around 30k/day due to the size of the land Colonial sits on.
I’m personally just underwhelmed by the renovation. That’s just me. Not to say every change was bad, or not necessary. I think it’s telling that members are having to explain why everything is so much better.
Were I a member and got a big assessment and the course was shut down for a year, I would have expected better, that’s all.
FrogBall09
Active Member
well I guess we could just let the poorly educated remain so....I was trying to help since I was one of only 60 that actually got to play it.
But think whatever - you were wrong before and you are wrong now - however since you are not a member you don't really need to be worried about it.
JogginFrog
Active Member
@FrogBall09, I'll admit to having been wrong on scoring. I think the green substructure will be a well-spent investment, and losing the hardscape is a win, even if the barranca concept doesn't pan out over time.
As a member, how do you assess the value that Hanse brought, and how his contribution differed from Keith Foster's?
Horned Toad
Active Member
I think you missed the gist of my comments. The course sucked for the GA fan, not the ones in suites and stands. It was hard to navigate if you wanted to follow a player. I mentioned I was giving it a pass for this year as I know the focus was to get the course open and ready for the tournament. That was a monumental task. I assume all that will be taken care of in the following year. As I said, I haven’t played it enough in the past, or the new layout since it reopened so I can’t really speak to its playability. Mira Vista’s redesign is concerning to me as our assessment and budget was several dollars under Colonial’s and the redesign, while extensive, is nowhere near as extensive as Colonial’s. MV is really a fun course and hopefully will remain so after the redo.
gohornedfrogs
Tier 1
Man, you really should sit this one out. I don't typically go there, but with each post, you just dig yourself in deeper. FrogBall09 did a great job of telling us where the money -- and where the value is -- in this renovation. It's going to be in turf conditions. They're going to be exponentially better in the summer and early fall months for the members, which will carry over for the other seven or so months.
All this will begin to take shape in time for the tournament next year. The new strains of bermuda for the fairways are superior to the previous versions, and the new bentgrass on the greens with the hydroponic cooling system will be a huge game-changer for member play. They'll be able to get much better green speeds in the summer, and the ball will sit better on the fairways with this strain. The bermuda is likely more drought and disease tolerant as well, meaning fewer splotches in the fairways during the summer.
Colonial (and courses in the south in general) will always struggle to keep up with their northern counterparts in turf conditions. But this renovation will certainly help bridge that gap. A lot of money has been invested over the years in new strains of bermuda and bent specifically for the southern region.
Dogfrog
Active Member
You are entitled to your opinion, just curious if you were on the course or watched on TV? The club did what they felt needed to be done. I’m not a member but know many. They are not bitching.
FrogBall09
Active Member
Ok - well this will be my last long response - the tourneys over and I am just waiting until Fathers day when we open back for member play to go enjoy the course
To be honest about the previous renovation, it may be the only thing I have ever agreed with FIGJAM about - I think it was not successful. Mickelson said it took the driver out of his hand but really it should have made him hit it every hole because there was little penalty for misses after the changes. The course had to have wind before or it was a pitch and putt. As you could see Sunday this year, we will have to be careful now because not only does it not need much wind to hold up- if we setup the pins wrong and get a lot of wind, the course could potentially play too hard.
I think Foster added some "popular at the time" features to the course in what he deemed an attempt to make it harder for pros - raised greens, bermuda grain against the golfer around the green, more and smaller roundish bunkers, interior corner bunkers on dog legs, etc- that had the exact opposite affect over time (only made it harder for members) and increased the cost to maintain the course substantially.
Plus his green complexes were state of the art 20 years ago but assumed at the time we would be rebuilding them every 10 years - not something that the membership knew at the time. Thus they were way beyond end of life and could not support bent grass anymore - and for anyone that knows the history of Colonial, bent is the reason the club exists. The old super and his team had gotten into a habit of working all year for the course to peak 1 week in May and then spent the rest of the year trying to get it to recover. If we got a couple of weeks in the fall where the course looked and played as well as it did for the Invitational - we were lucky.
We had a huge exodus of members a few years ago when an internal fight broke out about keeping bent for tradition vs going with one of the new bermuda hybrids for better putting surfaces. Thankfully, we really made no decision at that time other than we were not going to Bermuda just because others had - so we waited it out and found a designer that knew how to make modern bent work in Texas.
If Hanse did nothing else but create a renovated course that allowed Colonial to keep bent and also have great putting surfaces into the heat of the summer - then it was worth every penny we spent. Obviously we won't know for sure for a few years however the subsurface air and watering systems seems to be performing as advertised and as I have said earlier - the greens putt like glass at this point, which is not common in new surfaces with other grasses.
Over the years because of flood control, building regulations and the last renovation - the club also added way too much concrete. The old creek flood control system down 16, 17, 18 and then in a pipe across 10 to a clogged up creek past 11 and the old 8, the ugly bridges with the 3 ft rails in your sight lines, the concrete paths on 2/3rd of holes all gave Colonial a high end public course feel. Most of that being gone is probably the best surface physical change in the course.
I think the removal of many bunkers in the fairways and around the greens pretty much spoke for itself during the tournament. 3-4" of Bermuda 419 seeding out is 5x harder to hit out of with any control than a bunker - especially ours that were always "perfect". Even with our members - 2" of rough will be harder to advance than the bunkers and create a lot of potential fliers even for better golfers.
And lowering all the green complexes actually made controlling a ball with less spin even more difficult vs the raised complexes that would slow down the ball on the way in plus had more back to front slope to stop it even more. The new greens have a consistent 1-2 degree slope vs the old ones that had 3-4" slopes between large flat sections. For whatever reason, the last 10 years of green design has proven it is harder for to read a longer and lower break slope - people always under read it because it feels "flat" but isnt and miss it low side.
The new 8th is so much better than the old hole - it was honestly the worst hole on the golf course by a long stretch. The farther you move back, the better the new hole gets.
I think moving the green back at 7 has made the hole considerably more difficult - added 30 yds, the approach angle and brought the Trinity into play for members. Same with 12 but it is only 15 yds and the lake on 13 that is now in play.
Removing the inside bunker on 14 and moving the left side bunker 15th 30 yds toward the green seems to have been brilliant - even the pros were pressing their luck early on both and ending up in the rough a lot - struggling to find the green afterward.
Will be interesting to see what we do with the slope on the left side of 16 between the green and the creek. It was thick for the tournament and held several shots. if they leave it that way, the creek is probably less in play but our members will skull it across the green into the pond to get it out.
Getting rid of the problem area down the left of 5 where we had to grow 6 " deep blue grass under the trees - creating a terrible look and a situation where 100 yds in on the left you had rough up to your shins and trees in your way - again terrible for members and the pros never even knew it existed. The transition area keeps the same goal of potential trouble for a golfer bailing left big time to avoid the river without a constant maintenance issues and ugly look of the old area.
I would imagine Hanse will come back and make some changes this year now that the tourney has finished - he did it at the last 4-5 renovations once the pros had some time to play it. no idea what they would be honestly - maybe the center hump at the back of 13.
And now the club can focus on the clubhouse...
FrogBall09
Active Member
I hope Mira Vistas goes well - it should really be one of the best courses in Ft Worth because it has the best track of land by a long shot. The issue has always been the dirt under the grass and the drainage - can they rebuild it so its maintainable at a reasonable cost and time given the size of the footprint.
Frozen Frog
Active Member
Heard there were no cart paths. Will those be added later. I’m trying to think if I saw any when I went over 10 years ago.
BrewingFrog
Was I supposed to type something here?
I sort of miss the old days of trucks dumping loads of ice on the greens...
FrogBall09
Active Member
Doubt we are ever hosting another US Open - mens or women’s again….
FrogBall09
Active Member
Nope.
There are some using a gravel base instead of concrete and we still have the road in for heavy equipment between 1 fairway and 6 green across 9 etc
But no more concrete from my understanding
gohornedfrogs
Tier 1
Unrelated, but an interesting piece of trivia. Oakmont's greens were over 100 years old before they finally had to rebuild them. They are bent, but by the time they mature, they are mostly poa annua, which is technically a weed.
BrewingFrog
Was I supposed to type something here?
Which is sad, given that Colonial is one of the premier courses in America. I guess it's too hard to mow with a helicopter, what with all those trees...
Big Frog II
Active Member
I think Colonial needs a year to be fine tuned to be better prepared for the tournament.
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