PINEHURST, NORTH CAROLINA | As Pinehurst No. 2 has evolved through the years, its essence has remained even if the way it was presented has differed.
When the first two U.S. Opens were played at No. 2, in 1999 and 2005, Bermudagrass rough defined the edges of every fairway. Although the renowned putting surfaces and green surrounds were as diabolical as ever, the course that designer Donald Ross lived on and fussed over for years was never intended to be set up with hack-it-out rough.
By 2014, when the women’s and men’s U.S. Opens were held at No. 2 in consecutive weeks, the brilliant restoration by Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw had recovered what was lost. The acres of rough were gone and replaced by scruffy sandscapes natural to the area when Ross built the course a century ago. When the June sun baked out No. 2, it played firm and fast while looking like it had decades earlier.
This year, the sandscapes have weathered in, and more than 10,000 wiregrass plants have been scattered across those natural areas. Along with the natural vegetation that grows there, an element of uncertainty will greet any shot that goes offline.
Some misses will be rewarded with clean lies on firm sand, but others will be subject to the randomness of what grows off the fairways, and it is significantly more dense than it was a decade ago.
“When the sandy natural areas were put back in and the magnificence of it, you can see the strategy of firm and fast with the ball running to those areas. You get the look, the anxiety right off the tee,” said John Bodenhamer, the USGA’s chief championships officer.
This will also be the first U.S. Open at Pinehurst played on Bermuda greens after the transition from bentgrass was made following the 2014 Opens.
The more heat-tolerant grass makes it easier to maintain and allows the putting surfaces to be firmer. Should there be rain, some of the fire could be taken out of the greens, but the sandy soil underneath should allow them to recover quicker.
While the USGA insists it does not set up U.S. Open courses with an eye toward having the winning score be somewhere close to par after 72 holes, it does take pride in presenting what it considers to be the toughest test in golf.
In that regard, Pinehurst No. 2 will present a dramatically different setup than Valhalla did for the PGA Championship last month.
The three previous U.S. Opens at Pinehurst produced a total of three players under par at the end. Payne Stewart won in 1999 at 1-under 279; Martin Kaymer won by eight strokes in 2014 when he finished 9-under, with Erik Compton and Rickie Fowler as the only other players under par; and Michael Campbell won the 2005 U.S. Open at even par.
Pinehurst’s defining characteristic is the severity of the greens and the areas surrounding them. While they are considered classic Ross greens, they are in fact noticeably different from what he originally constructed at No. 2.
The challenge to playing into the greens is two-fold: Hitting approach shots to the proper spots on the greens and, when players inevitably miss some greens, determining the proper shot to get the ball back onto the green.
Their slopes and contours, even their slight elevation from the fairways, were enhanced by years of top-dressing, making them more demanding than Ross created. While many Ross courses feature similar characteristics, the greens at No. 2 are more challenging.
According to Bob Farren, the director of golf course maintenance at Pinehurst, less than 50 percent of the putting surfaces at No. 2 are flat enough to accommodate hole locations.
It will be a familiar site at this U.S. Open, seeing what appeared to be a good shot catch a slope and slowly roll off the putting surface, sometimes several yards away. The decision is whether to bump a shot into a hillside and run the ball back up, to try a soft pitch off a tight lie or simply to putt it back onto the green.
That’s what Kaymer did so effectively in his runaway victory 10 years ago.
“By Wednesday, I told my caddie that I feel very comfortable within 10 feet, so if I miss a green, I can always putt it within that area,” Kaymer said. “It’s such grainy, sandy lies and always going a little uphill, it’s never easy to chip anywhere, so I said, Why not make it easy on myself?”
No. 2 will play approximately 7,540 yards at par-70 but there is wiggle room on at least a couple of par-4s. No. 3 can measure 387 yards but twice during the 2014 U.S. Open the tees were moved up to tempt players to try to drive the green. It’s a dangerous play given the severe slope behind the green and a deep bunker in the front.
The par-4 13th hole, at 381 yards to a green perched atop a sandy ridge, was played as a drivable par-4 on Sunday in 2014 and could be set up similarly one day this year, though Bodenhamer said a final decision isn’t likely to be made until tournament week.
“It’s always an arrow in our quiver,” Bodenhamer said.
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Top: An aerial view of the par-5 16th hole (left) with the par-3 17th hole (right) at Pinehurst No. 2
David Cannon, Getty Images