Designing Golf Golf Architecture 101: The Three (or Two?) Schools of Design
Jan 28, 2025
PJ Clark, producer at Fried Egg Golf and Champions Tour correspondent, joins Garrett Morrison to unpack golf course design philosophies. They explore the three design schools—penal, strategic, and heroic—highlighting how each impacts player experience. PJ shares his drive to understand architecture for better storytelling. The duo discusses the balance of challenge and enjoyment, with insights on how holes can reward or punish players. They also examine the shifting tides from penal to strategic designs, emphasizing the intricacies of decision-making during play.
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Schools Are Design Philosophies
- The three so-called schools (penal, strategic, heroic) are philosophies for hole design, not literal schools.
- Understanding them gives a framework to analyze nearly any golf hole or course.
Penal Focuses On Rewards And Punishments
- Penal design rewards good strikes and punishes poor strikes by placing hazards to catch wayward shots.
- Difficulty can vary; penal focuses on fairness rather than sheer brutality.
Design Hazards To Reward Good Shots
- Place hazards to penalize poor strikes and keep fair landing areas level to reward good shots.
- Make greens and fairways relatively flat if you want to clearly reward good approach and tee shots.