ATLANTA — Plenty of discussion at this week’s Tour Championship revolves around East Lake Golf Club itself. The course recently underwent a restoration led by renowned architect Andrew Green, who also revamped Oak Hill Country Club, the site of the 2023 PGA Championship.
Viktor Hovland called East Lake a “major championship golf course,” while Scottie Scheffler kept talking about the greens. Many have used ‘challenging’ and ‘firm’ to describe these putting surfaces, which will run at about a 13 on the stimpmeter, perhaps creating U.S. Open-like conditions.
Newer golf courses—and ones with new green complexes—take a while to soften up and soak into the terrain. Hence, as we saw earlier this year at Quail Hollow and Colonial, new greens firm up, making it difficult for the pros to hold them from anywhere, let alone Bermuda rough.
“I’ve played some new courses before, and they’re a little bouncy,” said Xander Schauffele, who has a tremendous record at East Lake.
“However it was designed to be played, it’s going to be a little bit different for the first two years just because it hasn’t settled in.”
Schauffele added that he was surprised to see the Tour Championship return to this course so quickly.
“I wouldn’t have been surprised if we had to play a different venue for a year or two, like to let this course settle in. That’s how new it is,” Schauffele said.
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“It’s just too new. The course is really, really new.”
East Lake Golf Club has hosted the Tour Championship every year since 2004. It also hosted the PGA Tour’s finale in 1998, 2000, and 2002.
In addition, the tour has received a tremendous financial commitment from its three presenting sponsors for the Tour Championship: Coca-Cola, Southern Company, and Accenture, all of whom have a significant presence in Atlanta. For the tour to walk away from East Lake would have been tough, considering the 30 players in this week’s field will receive $100 million in FedEx Cup bonus money. But on the flip side, the Atlanta Athletic Club could have welcomed the Tour Championship for a year. TPC Sugarloaf in Duluth could have done so as well. Both have hosted tour events before. Atlanta Athletic Club even hosted the 2011 PGA Championship, where Keegan Bradley bested Jason Dufner in a playoff.
Yet, the tour, its sponsors, East Lake management, and its membership decided to keep the Tour Championship at the same venue for 2024, leaving Green barely any time to complete the restoration.
“We only had a certain amount of time. The East Lake team should really be put on a huge pedestal because they were here last year, and the maintenance team was preparing the golf course for this championship last year, and the day after this event was done, we were trying to kill grass and start construction,” Green said.
“But at every step, we knew we had to be ready Thursday.”
Indeed, the course will be ready, but it will play firm and fast. Its newness could even lead to some unlucky bounces and breaks, which likely would not occur one or two years from now.
It’s literally brand new.
Green and his team laid down the final pieces of sod on Jun. 15, a little more than two months ago. For reference, the third round of this year’s U.S. Open fell on Jun. 15. The next day, Bryson DeChambeau bested Rory McIlroy, which is very much still on everyone’s mind. It’s certainly still fresh on McIlroy’s.
Nevertheless, this golf course is more than fresh.
It will entertain golf fans and viewers but can potentially create some issues for those among the 30-player field. Look no further than Schauffele describing what he saw on the par-5 18th on Tuesday.
“I saw someone from the fairway hit a long iron that landed [in a small part of] the fringe, [which is pretty narrow], and it hit really soft and plugged,” Schauffele explained.
“Then a ball that landed [on the front of the green, inches beyond the fringe] just went straight over the green. It’s just because it’s new, so it’s hard to tell.”
Those bounces could lead to chaotic entertainment, which is what PGA Tour fans want, right?
And yet, Green, who received incredible acclaim for his work at Oak Hill, has made another true masterpiece, one that will receive tremendous praise as time goes on.
Jack Milko is a golf staff writer for SB Nation’s Playing Through. Be sure to check out @_PlayingThrough for more golf coverage. You can follow him on Twitter @jack_milko as well.
