Tour pros aren’t agronomists but they give a lot of thought to grass and greens. Consider this turf-related take from Harry Higgs.
It was Friday afternoon, and Higgs was fresh off a second-round 66 that put him in a tie for the lead at the Oneflight Myrtle Beach Classic at the Dunes and Beach Club, where the putting surfaces had given players fits.
Higgs was pretty certain he knew why.
“It was real hard at the end because there’s not a ton of grass,” he said. “That’s not to say — they’re in perfect condition. But they’re almost, you know, Bermuda gets a little frictionless, and they’re fast. With the wind blowing, it moves even more.”
That makes sense. Fast greens. Breezy day. A recipe for three-putts. And not unusual.
But Higgs said that there was yet another challenge, a complication that he described as “wild.”
On many putts, he said, the grain and the slope were working in opposite directions, “so it’s a going to break little bit and then it’s going to straighten up.”
Those opposing forces — grain going one way, slope the other — were, Higgs said, “very rare.”
That’s an interesting, um, granular, take.
But is the science behind it sound? Is it true that grain and slope usually work in the same direction?
Darren Davis, superintendent at Olde Florida Golf Club, in Naples, Fla., would beg to differ.
“Grain and grade are prevalent on most putting surfaces,” Davis says. “But they are independent of each other.”
That is, just because a green is sloping one way doesn’t mean the grain will be inclined to lean in the same direction. There is no correlation between the two.
Higgs was right in one respect, though. Grain and grade can both influence putts. But, Davis says, golfers tend to overestimate the impact of the former.
“Often when putting uphill, golfers think grain is causing a putt to be slower,” Davis says. “Or when putting downhill golfers might assume grain is causing a ball-roll to be quicker. Most often the reality is it’s just the slope increasing or decreasing the speed.”
That’s a good tip for the everyday golfer, who may be wasting time trying to read grain.
But Higgs probably doesn’t need to bother with it. However he’s reading the greens this week, the method seems to be working fine.
