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Many golfers don’t like seeing out-of-bounds stakes anywhere near a playing corridor; they object on principle. Yet some of the most famous, revered holes in golf use out-of-bounds as a strategic hazard — so there must be something to it. In this installment of our Golf Architecture 101 series, Garrett takes his Fried Egg Golf colleague PJ Clark through the ways OB has been, and should be, deployed in golf course design. Garrett also brings in Craig Winter, the USGA’s Senior Director of the Rules of Golf and Amateur Status, for a quick lesson on the history of the OB penalty. Toward the end of the episode, Garrett and PJ discuss several famous, OB-centric holes, including Nos. 16 and 17 at St. Andrews and the sixth hole at upcoming Presidents Cup venue Medinah No. 3.
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"Golf Architecture 101: The Uses of Out-of-Bounds" is an episode of Designing Golf. Runtime 1 hr 20 min. Published September 17, 2026. Hit play above to stream it here, or open the free Spot Sports app for background play and offline downloads.