| Championship |
452 |
| Maroon |
407 |
| Teal |
382 |
| Orange |
351 |
| Green |
351 |
| Ocean |
303 |
| Khaki |
303 |
| D. Muirhead |
240 |
Par
(Mens/Ladies) |
4/4 |
Handicap
(Mens/Ladies) |
8/8
|
|
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This hole provides a strong tee shot though some interesting mounds higher than a man. You can get lost in this maze of mounds but you can find yourself again.
The mounds guarding the tee from the lake on the hole represent the Plough or the Big Dipper, the constellation, which normally points to the North Star. The Scottish word iron also means sword and is a component of the plough. Michael Murphy in his fine book Golf in the Kingdom suggests, "...turning swords into ploughshares is... one of the chief promises the game holds out for us." Here the plough does not point to the North Start but to the bunker called Hell, which is protected by Florida's most ferocious plants, yuccas, or Spanish bayonets.
Our Hell bunker is deep and hot but not nearly as deep as Hell on the 14th at St. Andrews where my friend and former partner Gene Sarazen took three strokes to get out and lost the 1933 British Open by two strokes. Gene, by the way, is the most lucid critic on golf architecture I have met.
Hell is followed by Purgatory, a dip near the green which is a letter day Valley of Sin, names aftet that unpleasant hollow of St. Andrews' 18th, which finished off Doug Sanders in the 1970 British Open. He needed par to win. To avoid the hollow, he used a sand wedge instead of trying a pitch and run. He bogied and forced a playoff, which he lost to Jack Nicklaus. Such deceptively simple golf hazards are the stuff of drama in both club and tournament play.
The green on this hole is attainable Paradise, a platform of security and grace if you can get there. The flag on this vanished Eden can be set close to the water, or quite mercifully a good way inland. The water is fortunately on the hook side, but in this hole it is very definitely in play.
Finally, the Garden of Eden, is the trinity with water (Yang) the missing link in "The Creation" on number 6. On number 14 we have a classic case of binary opposites and the mediating third- grass, sand and water/turf, traps and lake. In Paradise the wind is always gentle behind you. It is no exception on this hole.
Desmond Muirhead |