From Aug. 13-16, 2009, Hazeltine National Golf Club located in Chaska, Minnesota will host the 91st PGA Championship. A Robert Trent Jones design, Hazeltine first opened its beautiful fairways and greens in 1962. Today, Rees Jones succeeds his father, serving as consulting architect for the course’s renovations and remodeling efforts. Rees first came to Hazeltine in preparation for the 1991 U.S. Open Championship. Since that time, the course has hosted numerous tournaments and Majors. In addition to this year’s PGA Championship, Hazeltine has also been selected as the host for the 2016 Ryder Cup Matches. ASGCA staff recently sat down with golf course architect Rees Jones to discuss Hazeltine National Golf Club.

Hole 10 at Hazeltine (Larry Lambrecht)

ASGCA Staff: Thank you for joining us again Rees. I’m sure you are busy with the tournament right around the corner, so let’s jump right in shall we?

Rees Jones: Of course, I’m very excited to talk a bit about such a beautiful course.

ASGCA Staff: Rees, you first began work on Hazeltine National Golf Club in preparation for the 1991 U.S. Open. What was your initial reaction to your father’s design, and how did you envision enhancing the course for tournament play?

Rees Jones: I can tell you that Hazeltine has a great routing plan. My father did a fantastic job with a natural piece of land up in Chaska. But I was around for the 1970 Open, so I had heard about some of the desires even back then to modernize the course. So when I took charge of preparing the course for the 1991 Open, I made it my primary goal to bring the course into the 21st century. We improved the fairway grading, added length to some holes and did some strategic re-bunkering. At the time, we wanted to keep the course flexible so it could host future Majors like the upcoming PGA. Not long ago it was also selected as the eventual host of the 2016 Ryder Cup. That’s one of the reasons we’ve got a green rebuilding project on tap for 2010.

ASGCA Staff: You mention bringing the course into the 21st century. Obviously much has changed in the near 20 years since you first began work on Hazeltine … design trends, golf technologies, and water usage tendencies, etc. … how has this impacted not only your preparation for present-day Hazeltine, but your vision for the future of the golf course over the next few years?

Rees Jones: Quite frankly, equipment advancements are the main reason for many of the changes we’ve made to Hazeltine over the years. For a while there was quite the run on better balls, improvements to club grooves, and the like. It required us as architects to think differently about a course; we almost had to predict where the technology was going to go so that our courses could keep pace. But now it seems like the USGA is drawing a line in the sand as far as equipment advancements.

ASGCA Staff: One of the recognized traits of the course is the way it keeps players busy … specifically in the way it requires a smart strategy to avoid some of the potential hazards that come from errant shots. Can you talk a bit about some of the nuances to Hazeltine in this regard?

Rees Jones: Sure. It’s important that players be thinking about avoiding the high prairie grasses that dot some of the surrounding areas of the fairways. Often times the tree lines can come into play if a player is not careful. Plus we get some nice water traffic on seven, eight and ten from those that have the occasional bad swings or misread their shot. Other than that, we’ve set the bunkers on the Par 5 holes to really impact the strategy of a player’s second shot.

Hole 15 at Hazeltine (Larry Lambrecht)

ASGCA Staff: That’s a great segue into the next question on bunkering. Over the past few years, you’ve done a masterful job at re-bunkering several of the holes. Can you walk us through your thought process on why you chose to re-bunker some of the more recent holes as you did?

Rees Jones: Yes, over the past 25 plus years, we’ve done quite a bit of re-bunkering at Hazeltine. As I mentioned before, technology being what it was, the balls were just traveling too far. So we had to slide some the bunkers around a bit from their previous locations to make them factors again. We also set some cross bunkers up on two and fourteen. We also moved quite a few closer to the green surfaces as well. Where the bunkers really come into play is on some of the course’s diagonal greens. But to keep the club members from throwing in the towel, we made sure to eliminate some of the truly massive sand areas.

ASGCA Staff: One final question for you then, Rees. If a couple of players are running tight on that final Sunday for the upcoming PGA Championship, which hole on the back side of the course do you feel could most influence the outcome of the tournament and why?

Rees Jones: Hmm…that’s an interesting question. I consider thirteen to be the most difficult hole on the course. It’s a 246 yard Par 3 that could see a couple of bogeys. On the opposite end of the spectrum though, fourteen is a player-friendly Par 4 that should provide a lot of scoring opportunities and even let some big hitters have a chance for a makeable eagle. But not too long after, sixteen presents a different type of challenge with a difficult, narrow green with water on both sides. How’s that for an answer? You asked for one and I gave you three!

ASGCA Staff: Thank you very much, Rees. We appreciate your taking the time with us, and we all look forward to the PGA Championship.

Rees Jones: My pleasure.