The second half of the data is in for our fairway height debate.  As reported in the last post, the fairways are currently maintained at 5/8".  Number 16 has been mowed down to 1/2" to test the difference in roll compared to the slightly longer cut.

Kelley Spooner and Rod Souza once again lined up on the 16th tee, this time to test the 1/2" playing surface.  Rod gave me two balls to count towards the experiment, the first with a roll of 101 feet and the second with 79 for an average of 90 feet of roll.  At the 5/8" height of cut, Mr. Souza averaged 57 feet of roll.  With this small difference in height he picked up an average of 33 feet or 11 yards.

Kelley's results were very similar.  In the first go around, Kelley averaged 81 feet of roll.  Today we recorded distances of 119, 127, 130, and 97 for an average of 118.25 feet of roll or a whopping 39.4 yards.  This betters her previous performance on the 5/8" cut by an average of 12.4 yards. 

To keep the experiment fair, we did our best to maintain an even amount of moisture in the fairway.  The turf was also cut in the same time span; both were cut the day before the test in the afternoon and the drives were recorded mid-day. 

So now it's up to the membership to decide on what height of cut we move towards.  Is all this extra roll worth dealing with the tighter cut?  The two Pros in the experiment like the shorter height for obvious reasons, every yard of roll is 3 feet closer to the hole, assuming your ball is heading in the right direction. 

We will continue to maintain the 16th hole at 1/2 inch for another week using our tee and approach mower.  At that point we will make a decision on the future height and adjust our fairway mowers if a change is desired.