Golden-age golf architect George C. Thomas believed golfers should be presented with options — sometimes a confusing array of choices. His best courses offer multiple ways to play many holes, providing the best scoring chances to those players who choose the optimum angles in often wide playing corridors and who then have the ability to execute the preferred shot.
Those kinds of strategic demands will be on full exhibit in this year’s U.S. Open at The Los Angeles Country Club’s North Course, Thomas’ most highly ranked course as judged by Golfweek’s Best raters. Each of Thomas’ top three courses — including Riviera and Bel-Air — is near Los Angeles, but it’s LACC that tops the list, tying for No. 13 among all classic courses built before 1960 in the U.S.
Thomas’ North 1927 routing at LACC actually supplanted another layout by previous architects, introducing width and strategy atop glorious inland landforms, all within the urban confines of Beverly Hills with the Los Angeles skyline a frequent backdrop. Hills, valleys, barrancas and ridges provide constant intrigue as players approach a sublime set of greens guarded by bunkers that often intrude into the putting surfaces themselves.
As with many historically significant courses, Thomas’ design suffered through ensuing decades as holes were adjusted, bunkers and greens were shifted or moved outright, and trees grew where none belonged. Enter the modern architecture team of Gil Hanse and Jim Wagner — working in consultation with author Geoff Shackelford — at LACC.
The trio began a restoration of Thomas’ North layout, with a first phase focused on a bunker restoration that evolved into the second phase of pretty much everything else. Several original Thomas greens were reintroduced, the dry gullies were brought back into play and width was re-established. The team’s work concluded in 2010 to rave reviews. This year’s Open will be the third in the past four years on courses restored by Hanse and Wagner, following the championships at Winged Foot West (2020) and The Country Club (2022).
The U.S. Golf Association has narrowed the fairways – which can reach 60 yards wide in places — a bit for this Open, but the North (7,381 yards; par 70 for the Open with five par 3s and three par 5s) still will play much wider than a typical Open layout. But what does all the talk about strategy mean, exactly, and how will it come into play in June? Check out three great examples at LACC on the following pages, with yardage book information provided by StrackaLine.
No. 6: Par 4, 325 yards
Before the restoration by Hanse et al., this played as a basic shortish par 4 with a downhill tee shot followed by an uphill pitch over a barranca to a green set into a hill and blocked by a bunker. During the restoration, the build team discovered Thomas’ original green still buried lower down and closer to the barranca. They rebuilt that small green closer to the barranca, then worked backward toward the tee to reestablish one of the most interesting short par 4s imaginable.
From the tee, the player might choose to play safely down the left, beyond a hillock topped with trees. From that lower portion in the fairway, the player must pitch back up the hill to the right, carrying the ditch and a bunker to a flag set into a severely sloped putting surface. Even with the decision to go left off the tee, the player must decide how close to play toward the barranca, with a more daring shot close to the ditch possibly setting up a better angle.
Or … a player can take a swipe at the green in one, blasting over the trees on a blind line at the front right portion of the putting surface. Some 40 yards of downhill fairway await on the far side of the trees atop the hillock. Any miss on this line from the tee likely will find the usually dry ditch full of native vegetation, sand and double bogeys.
The sixth green will be in reach for most of the U.S. Open field. The question that each player must answer when choosing which club to swing off the tee: Is any possible reward worth the risk?
No. 8: Par 5, 547 yards
Hanse’s team focused much of its efforts in the area of the eighth green and its relationship to the nearby old second green, as originally laid out by Thomas. Over the decades both greens had been repositioned, with the eighth green moved farther back to the area originally occupied by No. 2 in Thomas’ routing. Hanse and his team returned both greens to their original setup, a move that shortened the par-5 eighth – an unusual choice when preparing a course for a modern championship.
That shortening of the double-dogleg eighth brings all kinds of strategy into the equation. The hole is divided by a barranca that cuts diagonally across the fairway from short right to far left, and the first portion of fairway is canted on a relatively steep angle toward the ditch. The fairway runs out some 350 yards off the back tee, forcing the longest U.S. Open contestants to consider a shorter tee shot. Trees frame the gully, and after crossing the ditch the fairway curves leftward. The green is protected short and left by a scrubby native area extending from the barranca.
In effect, any player hoping to reach the putting surface in two might need to hit a fade off the tee, then a draw into the green with a fairway wood or long iron from a difficult sidehill lie in the fairway. The best angle into the green might be from farther back in the fairway through the trees framing the fairway. The closer the tee ball finishes near the ditch, the better, but at great risk of rolling into trouble. The hole asks strategic questions of every shot from tee to green and punishes any misstep or miscalculation.
No. 12: Par 4, 380 yards
Judging by the scorecard, there isn’t a lot to this medium-short par 4. But the restoration of width reintroduced all kinds of options when playing to a perched-up green fronted by two large bunkers with high shoulders on either side of the putting surface.
Over the decades, dozens of trees had grown alongside the curving fairway, which plays steeply and blindly uphill off the tee before reaching a wide plateau. The trees choked out the strategic options when playing to either side of the green – the goal was simply to hit short grass then figure out the approach from there.
Most of the trees were removed during the restoration, and because the green is high on both sides with a valley through its middle-left in line with the center of the fairway, with two large bunkers guarding the front and left side, players will be rewarded by playing to different spots in the fairway to set up the best angle to certain hole locations. It might be a driver up the right side, or it might be a 3-wood or even an iron off the tee up the left side of the fairway to approach a back-right flag.
In an age of bomb-and-gouge Tour golfers, this green should force players to think about the angles into that day’s hole location before they ever tee off, lest they leave themselves a shorter wedge shot without much spin on a bad angle to a firm green waiting to swat away overly aggressive approaches. That kind of thinking is the definition of strategic golf.
