Bridgestone National

[Texian]

Is Firestone the most boring course you've ever seen?

[deasy55]

Nope

[Wallstreet]

im sure i will get some heat for this.....but besides the length....it looks very easy.  Each fairway I saw was HUGE!!!  In short...yes it was boring.

[Texian]

It doesn't look easy to me. But there aren't many if any "memorable" holes. The greens, the fairways, the traps, the trees, look all the same.

[FowlPlay]

Most boring course? No.

One thing that bothered me was, when they showed the blimp camera, you could see the north course, and it looked MUCH more scenic. And it's also part of Firestone, so I would expect the course to be just as tough, or even more so than the south course.

[Texian]

Originally Posted by FowlPlay

Most boring course? No.

OK. So maybe I was a bit harsh.

Maybe there wasn't much to work with terrain-wise in that part of Ohio.

But I'm still yawning pretty hard.

[Defence23]

I agree that Firestone is pretty boring but it certainly didn't look easy to me. They looked like some pretty small fairways to me, although the greens seemed pretty straightforward

[ThominOH]

Boring?  no way..  Trust me Firestone is anything but boring.. I've played both North and South and found them challenging.. Both courses require accuracy off the tees.. no doubt..  West course has HUGE fairways compared to the the other two and much shorter..  There are plenty of elevation changes to keep you busy, which you can't see from the blimp, or even from the TV cameras..  Best way to experience Firestone is to just be there :)

[iacas]

It's one of the most boring courses I've ever played, yep. Elevation changes can't make up for the fact that it's boooooring. Good luck remembering too many of the holes or being able to separate them mentally without a devoted effort.

[Chilli Dipper]

Firestone-South was originally laid out in the 1920s by an amateur architect named Bert Way; this explains why sixteen holes run parallel to each other, with no regard to the site's topography. When Robert Trent Jones was hired to turn the course into a championship test in the early 1960s, all he could really do to such a pedestrian routing was stretch the course length to its maximum and narrow the fairway corridors with bunkers and trees. With today's technology, long and straight doesn't present the same challenge to top professionals as it did for previous generations. The qualities that make the South course still difficult today (uneven fairways, overhanging limbs) are more negative than positive.

The sad thing is that the North course, which Jones built after his renovation of the South, is likely the superior course on the property, with a dramatic set of finishing holes bordering a lake. Unfortunately, the South had already gained its reputation as "the Monster" by the time it opened, so the North has hosted pro tournaments only sporadically, on occasions the South has been closed for maintenance.

[FowlPlay]

Originally Posted by Chilli Dipper

The sad thing is that the North course, which Jones built after his renovation of the South, is likely the superior course on the property, with a dramatic set of finishing holes bordering a lake. Unfortunately, the South had already gained its reputation as "the Monster" by the time it opened, so the North has hosted pro tournaments only sporadically, on occasions the South has been closed for maintenance.

^^^Another headscratcher in professional sports. I stand by my previous post and think that pro events definitely should be played on the north course.

[ladders11]

I always remember this course looking easy and agree with the suggestion that the fairways look huge on tv.  The grass is always in great shape, too.

It is totally unwarranted, but I get the feeling I could play great golf there.  Even though I have no history of this whatsoever.  Trick is that the short game would definitely be the tough part for a hack in a tour event.

ETA: Atlanta Athletic Club looks tough .  The contrast is huge from last week to this week.  Hazards everywhere, tight fairways, elevation changes.

[ThominOH]

Originally Posted by FowlPlay

^^^Another headscratcher in professional sports. I stand by my previous post and think that pro events definitely should be played on the north course.

The thing is.. the PRO's demand to not play on the North.. Straight from the directors mouth.. North is more challenging and has far more penalties for errant shots..  Personally, I would love to see the pro's play the north, but that only happens if for some reason South has condition problems..