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| Northern Ireland's Rory McIlroy plays out from the bunker on the 12th hole during a practice round REUTERS/Eloisa Lopez |
Considered the toughest hole in golf by none other than 18-times major winner Jack Nicklaus, the 12th hole at Augusta National Golf Club is where Masters dreams come to die.
At only 155 yards the hole is deceptive, with the smallest green on the course and a combination of swirling winds and a tiny target zone that make it a menace for the world’s best golfers. It is positioned in the heart of Amen Corner, the trio of holes 11, 12 and 13 that make up the toughest stretch of the course.
“The best players find it difficult to do well in the Masters. They’ve got to keep their tensions down on the fourth day. That hole [12th] brings it out,“ said Dr. Deborah Graham, a PGA Tour psychologist.
The 12th hole epitomizes this challenge because it has an immense psychological impact on players, with many green jackets lost here on the final day. The pressure of the tournament combined with the hole's natural challenges can lead to costly mistakes.
Despite its reputation, statistically the 12th is not the hardest hole during the four rounds of the tournament. It has been played over 0.13 strokes above par across all four rounds from 2015 to 2024, making it the ninth-hardest hole overall. The hardest is the 11th, which has been played 0.34 strokes over par in the last 10 years.
The approach to the 11th and 12th seem to be different. The par four 11th offers fewer scoring opportunities, primarily because of its length at 520 yards (475 metres). The 12th offers a greater chance for a par and a potential birdie for those who reach the green without incident, especially during earlier rounds.
But the situation changes on the final day, when the 12th becomes the fourth-hardest hole on the course. Though the 11th, fifth and fourth holes have been harder in the last 10 years, successfully clearing the 12th on the final Sunday is the last major hurdle in the quest for the green jacket.
As a result, the 12th has seen more than its fair share of collapses in the final round. There have been 12 Sundays since the inception of the tournament where chasers or leaders have faltered on the hole.
The most notable among these are Greg Norman in 1996, Jordan Spieth in 2016 and Arnold Palmer in 1959. The graphic below shows how mistakes on the 12th from players highlighted in yellow played decisive roles in the tournament’s outcome.
When 15-times major winner Tiger Woods won his fifth green jacket in 2019, three players, Francesco Molinari, Tony Finau and Brooks Koepka, all found the water on the 12th. Molinari relinquished the lead at this hole, paving the path for Woods’ comeback victory.
So what makes the 12th hole so difficult?
In the simplest terms, it is the combination of wind, a small landing zone and psychological pressure that has plagued so many of the world’s best golfers. The landing zone on the 12th is tiny. The green is the smallest on the entire course and is angled at nearly 45 degrees from the tee box.
The landing zones on the wider side of the green vary from 11 to 16 metres. Most players play it safe and go for the larger landing zone on the lefthand side, but doing so leaves them with a longer putt.
The nature of how righthanded golfers typically shape the ball also makes scoring here difficult. Most righthanded players hit a fade, which offers more control and consistency, but the slightest miscue in bringing the ball in from left to right could mean the difference between landing on the green or in the bunker.
The layout of the hole also plays into this. The green is surrounded by two bunkers at the back, one in the front and a creek right in front of the first bunker. If you aim to the left side of the green with a 144-yard shot, you may get the corner of the green but any shot right of that could land a player in the bunker – even if the power and shot shape are exactly the same.
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| Players at the 12th hole during practice for the 2018 Masters golf tournament Source: REUTERS/Mike Segar |
Over and above these considerations, it is the wind that makes the 12th hole truly treacherous. A 2016 John Hopkins study examining the effects of wind on the hole determined that “golf ball flight path over hole 12 strongly depends on the combined effect of plant canopy topology and the wind direction”.
Beyond the 12th hole’s bunkers lie enormous trees, approximately 30 meters in height. Their presence causes a phenomenon called ‘wake turbulence’ in the wind patterns within the area around the hole.
Wind speeds at Augusta Bush Field Station during the 2024 tournament
The study examined simulated ball trajectories using a nine iron on the 12th hole against winds from the north, north-west and south-west at 28 kmph. Professional male golfers average about 148 yards (137 metres) with their nine irons, according to Trackman, a radar system that tracks golf ball distances and trajectories.
The study looked at simulated shots on the 12th with and without the tree canopy at the back. It concluded that “average wind speed along the path of the ball is significantly affected by the presence of the canopy… due to the presence of low-speed wakes”.
The least amount of dispersion was for balls hit when there was a prevailing north wind, which acts as a tailwind from the tee. Headwinds, on the other hand, create significant variation in the landing spots.
Sam Snead, an 82-times PGA Tour winner, referred to the wind at the 12th as a "whirlpool", which seems an apt description. Known as Golden Bell, the 12th is one of the most famous holes in golf. Almost unchanged since the inception of the Masters, it is uniquely designed to punish inaccurate shots. The folklore around the hole also gives players pause for thought, according to Dr. Joe Parent, a PGA Tour psychologist. “The beginning of the back nine is usually the hardest holes of the course,” added Parent. But it’s also “the shift in attitude in trying to play good shot but instead trying to prevent a mistake,” that leads to players faltering at the hole, he said.
“You have to commit to what you’re doing because the wind is swirling and I am there right over the left half of the bunker on Sunday just trying to get the ball on the green,” said defending Masters champion Scottie Scheffler.
Sources
PGA Shotlink; A computational approach for predicting plant canopy induced wind effects on the trajectory of golf shots, Neda Yaghoobian and Rajat Mittal; National Weather Service; Masters.com
Edited by
Simon Scarr and Peter Rutherford
- Anand Katakam
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