14 Apr Half Set At Hilton Head
Hilton Head Island
After missing the cut at The Masters several years ago, I drove over to Hilton Head Island from Augusta that weekend. I wanted to get some extra practice in on the Harbor Town Golf Links at the Sea Pines Resort, home of the PGA Tour’s RBC Heritage tournament.
Carrying the pencil golf bag that I’d used for the Masters Par 3 competition, I headed out early one morning by myself with seven clubs inside along with three balls, a glove, some tees and no yardage book.
Playing entirely by feel I shot 69 and wondered why this game is so complicated sometimes.
That’s the beauty of the Harbor Town Golf Links.
Hole 14 Harbour Town
Creativity, Strategy & Guile
It’s a great reminder of how golf should be played. Length is not a factor. Creativity, strategy, and guile are your biggest assets.
Overhanging trees line all the fairways bar the 18th, there’s hardly any rough and the greens are quite small compared to most Tour courses. Hence, GIR’s are usually some of the lowest percentage-wise on Tour all year.
A sharp short game and an arsenal of various shots is what’s needed to hold you in good stead for the week.
I rarely hit stock-standard golf shots at Harbor Town so my half-set practice round was ideal preparation.
Draws, fades, low and high shots, and combinations of all these are required to maneuver your way around the course.
I’m also probably the only player to hit driver off every tee there (other than the par 3’s) because I loved to shape my driver in a plethora of ways depending on what each hole called for. I actually became one of the longer hitters for the week (a rarity let me tell you). While guys were hitting irons and fairway woods off most tees, I snuck my driver past them to leave shorter approach shots into the greens.
Harbour Town has an Old-School Feel To It
On the scorecard, it says 7100 yards or so from the back tees but really it only plays about 6800 yards because the fairways are always firm and provide optimum roll.
The winning score is usually anywhere from 8 under to 14 under par depending on weather conditions, which simply means – length isn’t everything. Show me a short, tight and firm golf course and I’ll show you a course that won’t be eaten up by the pros.
Harbor Town has an old-school feel to it and typically the top 10 on the leaderboard at weeks end is filled with guys who have old-school-type games.
Which is why it’s always been one of my favorite tournaments to play.
Cheers
Nick
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