The Same Course in Name Only
Familiar Torrey Pines Is Now Fiendish by U.S. Open Standards

By Leonard Shapiro
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, June 11, 2008

SAN DIEGO, June 10 -- There was a time when Pat Perez, a San Diego native and now a regular on the PGA Tour, knew every bounce in the fairway, every break in the greens, every which way the wind would blow in from the sea down below the majestic cliffs at Torrey Pines South Course. The storied municipal course is the site for the 108th U.S. Open that begins here Thursday, the first time in 60 years America's national championship of golf will be contested in Southern California.

Perez's father, Tony, has served as the starter for the annual PGA Tour stop here for the last 15 years. Young Pat began working summers and after school at the 36-hole facility when he was only 13 years old, picking up striped balls and empty buckets on the driving range, hosing down golf carts and cleaning clubs. Best of all, he got to play here every day, at no charge, and frequently honed his skills playing for money he usually didn't have.

On Thursday, Perez will tee off in his fourth U.S. Open on a course he has played "a thousand times," but he also knows this is not the Torrey Pines South of his youth. Instead, after a major makeover by architect Rees Jones, the course has morphed into a visually stunning, classic test of golf.

"The way it was before Jones got hold of it, I think it wasn't that tough," Perez said. "Now, it's very difficult. It is a great course out there. It's awesome. I've never seen it in this kind of shape. It's fun to play because it's so much different. But it's still got the same feel. It's got the same wind. Every hole is in the same shape. It's right up there with anything."

Actually, at 7,643 yards playing to a par of 71, Torrey Pines South is longer than anything the finest golfers in the world have ever played in a U.S. Open.

There are diabolical features, as well. They would include the usual strangling Open-style rough, multi-tiered greens that will roll at warp speeds, shaved banks around several putting surfaces dropping off into kiss-your-ball-goodbye canyons and pin positions that could make some of these grown men weep by Sunday night.

Phil Mickelson, who grew up not far from the course and played high school matches here, said after a practice round in April that Torrey Pines South is now "the hardest course in the world, 7,600 yards at sea level. Even if it's soft, I don't see anything close to even par."

Rees Jones said he never intended such punishment for the greatest players in the game when he was asked in 1999 to bring the course up to U.S. Golf Association specifications.

"We did it much like we did at Congressional," Jones said, referring to his work at Congressional Country Club in Bethesda before the 1997 U.S. Open. "Basically, we had to completely rebuild it -- new tees, all new greens, new bunkers, lengthening the fairways. But we also brought in all the natural features of the place. It's a beautiful golf course, a dream come true, really. And just like Congressional, we did the work and then we were awarded the Open. That's what makes it so special."

One of the main changes involved using native kikuya grass in the fairways, resulting in somewhat spongy hitting surfaces where the ball usually sits up so very nicely. But the kikuya also is at the base of the heavily matted rough, making it virtually impossible to judge the lie or to even think about aiming for greens out of the thick grass.

Players have seen that in practice rounds this week, though they also say that the course setup so far has been fair, particularly with wider fairways than they have seen in recent U.S. Opens. For each of the last two years, the winning Open score has been 5 over par at Winged Foot in the New York suburbs in 2006 and Oakmont in the suburbs of Pittsburgh last season.

Tiger Woods said Tuesday he couldn't even begin to predict a possible winning score because of the "uncertainty" of whether the USGA will set up the course short, play it long, or mix and match on any given day.

One of the more trying holes this week is expected to be the newly lengthened 13th, which could play as long as 614 yards. A new tee box added 74 yards and is located on the far side of a canyon overlooking the Pacific. A drive of 255 yards will be necessary to carry over the gorge to a bailout fairway on the right. Hardly anyone in the field is expected to reach the green in two shots, unless there is a brisk wind at their backs.

"I couldn't believe there was a tee box back there," Perez said of the drive at 13. "There's no getting there [in two]. There's not even a chance. It looks like it's 10,000 yards away."

After his nine-hole practice round Tuesday, Woods said: "It's unbelievable how far back it is. It's usually where they start their hang-gliding over there."

Mickelson hates it.

"That new tee box is terrible, the biggest waste of money I've ever seen," he said Tuesday. "Before, there was great risk-reward. There was great reward if you hit the fairway from the tee where you could go for it. But from the back, no one can reach it. Everybody is going to be laying up from the same spot and everybody is going to have the same pitch. It's like a par 3 from the bottom of the hill. Just a terrible tee box."

On the shorter side of Jones's makeover, the 14th hole, normally a 435-yard par 4, now offers the option of a shorter tee, 277 yards from the putting surface, which the USGA likely will utilize for at least one round. Most players will be able to reach the green with a long iron. If they go deep with their tee shots, disaster awaits with a steep fall off into a hazard back left of the green. There is no recovery from there, with double bogey or worse definitely a possibility.

"Your approach is pretty much the same as any other Open," Perez said. "It's going to be hard. You're going to have to be happy with [being] 30, 40 feet if you're on a certain spot [on the green] trying to make a bogey as opposed to trying to make birdie. I approach it where I can make the least amount of mistakes."

And how will he approach teeing off Thursday at his beloved home course, now the epicenter of the golf universe.

"I don't know," he said. "I've been pretty calm so far. I haven't really seen it as a U.S. Open. I see it as a course I've played a thousand times. I'm just kind of seeing it as Torrey Pines, a place I love to play."