In the 18 days leading up to the June 18 start of the U.S. Open Golf Championship, FOXSports.com and Golfweek will preview the Chambers Bay course -- one hole at a time.
The hole starts on a broad, open point, then narrows down at 170 yards from the green and ends up forming a defile through massive, towering dunes formations. Those dunes are the remnants of old spoils piles from decades of mining, and here they structure a theatrical sensibility that will be enhanced by spectators lining the dunes up top and by a small window toward Puget Sound from behind the green. The effect is that it’s hard to concentrate on the task at hand, which is mainly to adjust to uneven lies (even on the tees).
The key to playing the hole is simply finding fairway off the tee and keeping it short of those fairway bunkers at the pinch point, 270/305 yards from the tee. From there, anywhere from 165 to 210 yards out, the green sets up diagonally to be approached from the left, with the incoming shot having to skirt a very deep, front-right bunker. Tee shots from the right side will face a semi-blind green behind the toe of a hill that juts out across the fairway. This hole will make many players overcompensate to the left, thus producing a wide range of scores.
Earlier holes
No. 1 -- Par 5/4, 598/496 yards
Golfweek's complete preview
