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At Sahalee Nation Membership, the timber can loom.
Ezra Shaw / Getty Photos
SAMMAMISH, Wash. — There’s one thing meditative concerning the grounds at Sahalee Nation Membership, host of this week’s KPMG Ladies’s PGA Championship. There’s one thing non secular concerning the setting. It’s the timber, it’s the shadows, it’s the calm.
“It’s simply fairly totally different from something we play,” World No. 1 Nelly Korda stated. “It’s only a lovely stroll.”
“It’s virtually like an oasis of its personal right here,” added Lydia Ko. “I’ve loved it. It’s been actually peaceable.”
“It’s lovely. The timber are simply so spectacular. It’s kinda of magical,” stated membership professional Stephanie Connelly-Eiswerth, equally wowed.
In her follow rounds, Brooke Henderson she didn’t even really feel like she was on a golf course.
“You simply really feel such as you’re in amongst nature. It’s only a nice feeling,” she stated. “I like simply form of trying round and respiration deep and feeling that recent air. It’s an unbelievable feeling.”
Research have demonstrated the advantages of being in nature. Decreased stress. Lowered blood stress. Improved bodily and psychological well-being. Primarily based on their descriptions, that checks out.
That’s, till the golf begins.
“I heard it’s known as ‘Sa-Hallway’ down right here,” Ko stated.
“It’s form of like hitting on a bowling alley,” Connelly-Eiswerth added.
Like bowling, baseball or organized labor, golf is a recreation of strikes. However when golf followers consider Seattle-area golf they often consider Chambers Bay, the mega-links some hour south of downtown that hosted the 2015 U.S. Open and the 2022 U.S. Novice, amongst others. You possibly can see your complete wide-open expanse of a course from the clubhouse. You possibly can see most holes from most different holes. There’s very actually one tree on the property — and it’s not even in play.
This week’s take a look at is a bit totally different.
Sahalee isn’t any stranger to big-time match golf; the course hosted the 1998 PGA Championship and the 2010 U.S. Senior Open and the 2016 KPMG Ladies’s PGA Championship plus high newbie occasions in between. However to get there you permit Seattle and drive 15 miles east into the center of the forest. Sasquatch is literally sewn onto Korda’s golf bag this week. They’ve undergone some tree-trimming in recent times, decreasing the estimated tree depend on property to … 7500. They loom over each fairway and each inexperienced. That’s the place the descriptors come from. Sa-Hallway. Sa-Alley. There’s a number of speak of chutes and corridors and grocery-store aisles.
“I feel I used to be a bit nervous coming into this week as a result of I knew it was slender,” stated Madelene Sagstrom.
A number of of the sport’s high stars performed their strategy to the highest of the first-round leaderboard on Thursday. Celine Boutier, Charley Hull and Leona Maguire shot 2-under 70. Nelly Korda and Patty Tavatanakit shot 3-under 69. And Lexi Thompson shot 4-under 68. Different stars confirmed out, too: Cedar, fir, hemlock, maple. It’s not simply the variety of timber however their dimension; they’re 150 ft tall or extra and loom over fairways. You possibly can catch lie within the tough however get stymied. Hell, you possibly can hit the fairway and get stymied.
Therefore the bowling metaphors.
“This course has its tooth for certain,” Tavatanakit stated. “A few drives I hit actually good right this moment and I ended up getting blocked by the timber.”
In a contemporary golf world the place tree-chopping is in vogue and wide-open vistas all the fashion, there’s one thing great a few main championship heading to a setting that’s so clearly the alternative. Sahalee is the Pacific Northwest. It’s set in the identical sort of forest that’s house to Bigfoot, to the werewolves from Twilight, to the escape of D.B. Cooper. Thriller hangs within the air, damaged solely by the thwack of ball on tree.
What’s the hardest tee shot at Sahalee?
“I feel they’re all tremendous, tremendous powerful,” Korda stated. “Y’know, No. 1, the tee shot, that’s going to be your first tee shot of the day and that’s a extremely laborious gap.”
She began ticking via the remainder of the difficult tee photographs and finally stopped; there have been too many.
“Majority of the spherical I can be hitting driver simply since you don’t desire a longer membership into these greens,” she stated. “That is the kind of golf course the place you simply obtained to sack up and hit your driver.”
That’s the powerful factor about this main championship setup; you possibly can’t precisely simply lay again and play it secure. Yuka Saso, who gained the U.S. Ladies’s Open a couple of weeks in the past, outlined the problem.
“I’ll in all probability hit drivers many of the holes, except they transfer the tee up or the wind adjustments or something like that,” she stated. “Hitting driver clearly the goal will get narrower. However I feel I’ve to hit driver; KPMG is one the championships that could be very lengthy. I don’t wish to have like 5-iron or hybrid [for my] second shot.”
She summed it up like this:
“This golf course it’s very slender, so you need to be aggressive but in addition conservative. You need to hit it straight but in addition lengthy.”
Ah, that’s all.
There are some intriguing wrinkles the timber present. Within the morning the course stays shaded, the bottom stays dewy, the temperatures keep cooler, the greens keep extra receptive.
“I really feel like within the morning you possibly can positively be a bit bit extra aggressive with a majority of the pins being within the shade and a bit softer,” Korda stated. “However as soon as the greens begin to see a bit bit extra daylight they begin agency up a bit extra and you need to play a bit bit extra defensive.”
On this planet the place Sahalee’s a bowling alley, the timber typically function bumpers. Thompson was amongst these to ricochet a tee shot off a fairway-adjacent tree trunk solely to see it bounce again into play.
“Ended up getting some fairly respectable photographs out of the tough and gave myself some birdie alternatives,” she stated.
Different instances the timber can function gutters, swallowing up wayward photographs. Thompson known as it a “first-shot” golf course. Stats guru Justin Ray reported that the early wave shot 74.65 photographs whereas the later wave shot 75.71. Each par-3 and par-4 averaged over par.
“General I feel the entire golf course is demanding,” Korda stated. “By the top of the week we’re going to be actually drained. You’re going to must put plenty of the thought into all of your photographs.”
From speaking to gamers and caddies it’s clear the timber can loom so giant they’ll intrude into your ideas…
…except you’re Charley Hull. The British star quickly misplaced her golf golf equipment en path to Sahalee, delaying her pre-tournament prep — however she scouted the course Wednesday and cruised to 70 on Thursday, shrugging on the problem.
“No, I’m fairly tight on my targets anyway, normally each week. This golf course seems like house to me,” she stated. “The Duchess at Woburn [her home course in England] is strictly like this. Even tighter. So it doesn’t actually faze me an excessive amount of.
“I really feel fairly snug. I like tree-lined golf course. The tighter it’s, normally the higher I play.”
That’s the spirit. Fortune favors the daring, in golf and bowling. Goal for the headpin. Then see what’s left in your second ball.
Dylan Dethier welcomes your feedback at [email protected].
