Do you guys think a little OB would make the course much harder? Hole 1 and 17 would be great holes for some yellow rope as well as a few others where you can get hung up early or appear to have a large landing area.
I think there are a few tweaks for a tourney which could be done to Bryant and really make it much more difficult and same goes for elm with a few mando's added in.
As much as I hate to admit it because it is my home course, but Elm Creek sucks as a competition course. There is no scoring separation unless you lose a disc on Holes 5, 11, or 12. There are too many wide open long holes. For most players it is going to be drive, approach, and putt. More often than not it is going to come down to a putting competition, especially if there is wind. And if you get behind, there is no real chance to dig deep for that something special to make a comeback. You are too dependent on other people screwing up to make up strokes. Yes, that's golf, but that is very boring and frustrating golf.
During the Majestic HSSA played very similarly. The only real hole that created any real separation is the one deep in the woods on the back side, which actually felt very unlike HSSA despite it being a permanent hole. I thought I played extremely well (considering past performances) and could make up for the debacle that was Kaposia on the previous day, but almost everyone played well at HSSA with almost identical scores. I only moved from 49th to 35th in the standings, and that was only because 20th to 60th were already packed tightly. HSSA became a putting competition.
As for Bryant, back in the day when they actually used this course for competition, your idea of ropes is exactly what they did. I am only guessing, but I think that Three Rivers shies away from allowing tournaments because of the amount of traffic it would shoo away. I know you need special permission to run leagues, and even then you cannot close it to the public despite having 60+ of your own players swarm the course.
As I see it, you could rope off the downslope (left side) of the fairway and have the dirt road on the right as an OB Boundary. Hole 2, considering the big guns of this tournament, needs a rope protecting Hole 3's fairway. Hole 8 needs a mando on the right side to protect people on Hole 10's tee box. In the past Hole 11 was roped into an island with the short tee as a drop zone. Hole 15 has the sand which can incorporate bunker rules; a nice twist to the ordinary OB rules. As much as it pains me because I have this shot perfectly dialed in and have almost aced it 8 times now, but Hole 16 needs a double mando that prevents people from throwing thumbers. I have nailed that large rock so many times on the basket side that I am surprised that it has not bounced in, but I always fear that there is someone else down there when I am teeing off. A thumber would absolutely kill them because of how blind it is. Hole 17 has the parking lot as OB, but you could add that the bike path on the right side, on and over is OB as well. That will make a few bombers think twice. Hole 18 is tough enough.
This makes Bryant challenging enough and a far better alternative than CP Adams.
