Quail Hollow Longer, Tougher And In Much Better Shape

You may recall that a year ago Quail Hollow's greens were so bad that Sergio Garcia resorted to chipping a four-footer and players were pretty much counting the days until the surfaces were torn up and rebuilt.

Jeff Shain talks to superintendent Chris Dearsio who says despite a cool summer and cooler winter, the new MiniVerde Ultradwarf greens have come through nicely for this week's Wells Fargo Championship and beyond.

Not that Deariso hasn’t had his challenges. The arctic blasts that put the Eastern seaboard into a recurring deep freeze forced the greens to spend perhaps 50 nights under cover. Then after a warming trend in March and early April, temperatures dipped below freezing again two weeks ago.

As a result, the new surfaces are somewhat firmer than first-year greens tend to be.

“They will accept a well-struck shot from the fairway,” Deariso said. “But if you’re hitting a shot from the rough with no spin, it’ll be tough to hold the greens.”

This will be interesting to watch post-Doral where players refused to adapt to the new green firmness and continued to carry shots too far. I spoke to Dillard Pruitt of the rules staff and who oversees the Wells Fargo Championship advance preparation, who reported that depending on early week rains, the greens would have that new firmness.

Also impacted will be the new-look finish. Steve DiMeglio reports on early reviews from players who say the conclusion to rounds at Quail Hollow will be brutally difficult.

While club member David Eger tells me the new 16th has a really nice strategic element (lay back, obstructed view second shot, but drive long over a fairway bunker and get an easier second shot), it's the new tee angle and length of the 17th that sounds dicey.

From DiMeglio's story:

At the 17th, with the new tee, the angle of the tee shot has been changed. In the past, the angles came from the right and the left; now it's a straightforward shot to the green that slopes toward the water.

"No. 17 is extremely long," Simpson said. "I've been hitting 4‑iron or hybrid it seems like every day. … If we play it back, the tournament's going to need to hire someone permanently to stand on the tee and every time somebody hits just yell, 'Fore,' because people will go right of the green. I just think that (back) tee is so long for such a hard hole that you just have to have the right conditions to put the tees all the way back there. So it definitely favors the guys who hit it longer and higher."