Nicklaus and Palmer blast Augusta course changes
Five new tees - at the first, fourth, seventh, 11th and 15th - mean the course has been stretched to 7,445 yards since last year.
“I think they’ve ruined it from a tournament standpoint,” said Nicklaus. “Augusta is a big, big part of my life and I love it. That’s why I hate to see them change it.”
Palmer said: “I’ve been playing there since 1955 and just love everything that happens there, but now I’m not so sure. It’s changed dramatically.”
Nicklaus and Palmer, winners of the title six and four times, respectively have decided to air their concerns about the adding of 155 yards - and 520 yards since Tiger Woods won the first of his four green jackets in 1997.
The seventh, up from 365 yards five years ago to 450 yards now, and the 11th are the holes Palmer worries about. “It isn’t going to be the seventh hole that I knew all my life and won the Masters playing,” said Palmer.
“If you hit a driver say 300 yards you’ll have to hit it really very, very straight to stay in the fairway.
“So they’re not going to do that. The pros will start hitting irons off the tee to something out where the fairway is fairly wide open, then they’ll hit five, six, seven-irons into the green.
“That is a major change in the golf course and how that’s going to be accepted I don’t know.”
On the 11th, now a par four of over 500 yards, Palmer worries about the effect the planting of trees down the right will have on spectator viewing.
He played the course with club chairman Hootie Johnson recently and asked the question.
“He said: ‘We can’t make everybody happy.’ That affects me,” said Palmer.
Nicklaus believes some of the changes take away from what Bobby Jones was trying to achieve when he planned the tournament.
“Does it now do what Jones intended? I don’t think so,” commented Nicklaus, who cites the example of the first hole, where the tee has been pushed back.
“I promise you there’ll be 20 guys in the field who hit a fairway wood into that or one of those rescue clubs.
“And Tiger will still play a pitching wedge into that green and probably a half-dozen other guys. I don’t think that’s what Bobby Jones wanted.”
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