Pebble Beach, California – Meena Harigai has never seen a pebble beach like this.
Last year’s U.S. Women’s Open runner-up was born in Monterey, California, and attended the nearby Stephenson School and played the course more than 50 times. Of the 156 field players this year, Harigae probably has the most knowledge of the course. However, what you’ve seen so far this week and will continue to see throughout the week will be something different, in more ways than one.
“It was really funny, in the last few days it was easier to set targets in the training round than in the last two days, because there are more TV towers and grandstands,” Harigai said on Tuesday. “But the rough is tough… It’s no longer a resort golf course. This is championship golf.”
This note is music to Shannon Rouillard’s ears. The USGA’s chief tournament director has been the leading figure in turning Pebble Beach from a path Harigae seems to have known her entire life into something new and, more importantly, something that will test the world’s best players as of Thursday.
“It’s really important that we play in the cathedrals of the game,” said Rouillard. “We are trying to match the architecture with the skill level and offer a USGA golf test that will test all aspects of their game along with truly showcasing the golf course as well.”
Rouyard’s job was not straightforward. The challenge in action can be traced as far back as the history of golf (“courses generally are not designed for elite players”) and as recent as the game’s present, the truth being that it has come a long way too long for women to play. In the same places that men have been occupying for some time.
On a practical level, this means not using data as a starting point. As Rouillard points out, there are no statistics that tell her how the best women in the world play Pebble’s famous par-5 6th hole, or any hole on the course for that matter. Rouyard had no choice but to use other methods (like talking to the 40-year-old Pebble bandwagon) as well as look at the data the men had produced, mainly at the most recent Open Championship in 2019, to try to extract what she could. To prepare women.
“We wanted to give the women a similar presentation as they did the men,” said Rouillard, noting that the itineraries and roughnesses surrounding the bunkers were prioritized to be as similar as possible to what the men dealt with in 2019.
World No. 1 Jin Yong-koo and No. 3 Lydia Ko both said they watched highlights of the US Open to try to find out, while a few other players said they also took to YouTube to watch Tiger Woods’ historic win in 2000. Everyone said they expected Tough challenge.
“Around the greens there are some really bad lies, especially around the edges of the dugouts,” Annika Sorenstam said. “You might not even have an attitude. I would say it puts a premium on your iron shots, and of course if it gets windy here you need to be able to keep the ball down, have more control of the ball.”
Part of the intrigue this week lies in the different ways women will play a tournament that men play each year. All around the bag, the women are generally shorter than the men, but they’re usually more refined, and as many will tell you, Pebble’s little green will require every bit of that precision.
“It was probably the smallest vegetable I have ever seen,” said Nelly Korda, adding that the weather cut 7 to 10 yards at close range. “I think it’s a great golf course. I think every part of your game has to click.”
“I love that the greens are small,” said defending US Open champion Mingye Lee. “I think hitting the ball is going to be really important, especially the tee to the green.”
Once on those little greens, the journey is far from over. As many players have pointed out, the poa annua grass on the green makes for hard hitting, more breakage and bumpy surfaces as the day goes on. Short shots are harder than usual and late shots are crucial.
“You have to really focus here, especially with the bouncer,” Korda said. “You never know what kind of first bounce you’ll get, so just make sure you take your time on every shot, and be very diligent with your routine.”
“There’s more downside to these greens than people realize,” said Rouillard. “Players who can be students of the Greens and really teach them are going to play well.”
For Rouillard, it started fitting the Pebble puzzle pieces on those tricky greens, working back from there and asking what kind of shots each green was supposed to receive and how that would fit into the women’s game, then through the fairway and back to the tee box.
Rouyard calls the 509-yard par 5-second hole as an example of this drill. The green on what’s usually the men’s Par-4 during Pebble’s recent US Open is a skinny, narrow green flanked by the bunkers. Without any data to digest how the women would play the hole as a par-4, Rouillard made a bold decision.
“My feeling was that this would be more appropriate as a 5-man,” said Rouillard. “We could play them all the way back where the guys played it as par 4, and he could be a good 5. The guys will have to decide if they can do that.”
“I think they’re all here, depending on the wind, but they’re real five-stars,” said Michelle Wei West. “I think the 8 and 9 are two of the toughest holes around here, but they are really good holes.”
Rouillard said she thinks the third and fifth holes will likely play harder this week than the men’s in the 2019 tournament. But when it comes to the shots she thinks she’ll see the most, it’s hard not to pick the close shot on the eighth hole over the steep cliff. Steep and bay below.
“I expect this hole to be very difficult,” said Rouillard. “Eight, nine, ten will be quite a challenge.”
The close-up shot that Jack Nicklaus once called one of the best in the world usually hovers around the 170-yard range, which for men probably means a short slop of iron. For women, that means a longer club. During the training round on Tuesday, Rose Zhang hit a five-iron while Wei West hit a fairway wood. They both hit the green.
The ninth runs all the way to a 430-yard par-4 for women and is likely to be heavily affected by winds from the Pacific Ocean. Most players will probably hit two metal woods – the latter from an uneven lie from a left-to-right fairway to a left-to-right slanted green.
“You have a longer iron, and I think the greens are going to be sturdier and faster,” Chang said, comparing the current version of the course to the one where she hit a course record 63 during the 2022 Carmel Cup. “By the time Thursday comes around, we’ll have some fast greens. So that’s definitely going to change a lot of how we play this week and how we’re going to use the numbers and catch the bounce.”
The eighth is one of several holes where the fairway lines have been narrowed considerably, which somewhat contradicts what the course structure intended, but places an extra premium on accuracy off the tee. Rouillard also said that offering fair lines similar to what the men had in 2019 was also factored into the decision.
“Each hole was touched in some way with respect to the waterway line,” Rouillard said.
Despite all the preparation work and adjustments, Rouillard is also not naive to the fact that, for all the preparation work that has been done and will continue to be done throughout the tournament, some things are not in her control. On Thursday, during a USGA press conference, Rouillard acknowledged that she and her team may use different types of tees on some holes depending on how winds, which could be in excess of 20 mph sometime this weekend, affect conditions.
“The patience we always talk about in the majors will play an extra big role here,” Sorenstam said. “Conditions can change, so you have to know your distances well, you have to have confidence in them, and you have to be precise. I think it tests everything you might ask for in a major.”
On Thursday, Rouyard will sit down and watch all the work you’ve done over the past year come to fruition. Given the newness of the place, it wasn’t easy work, but as Rouillard said, building the puzzle was fun. Now, it’s up to a field of 156 players to go out and try to piece it together.