These Five Holes at Valhalla Golf Club Could Decide the PGA Championship

Valhalla has a flair for dramatic PGA Championships, and Pat Forde says this year is set up for another one.

Anything is possible at Valhalla's par-5 finishing hole. / Aaron Doster-USA TODAY Sports

A lot has changed in the decade since the world last gazed upon Valhalla Golf Club. There is new ownership, a new architecture theme connoting a thoroughbred horse farm amid the rolling bluegrass and new Kentucky-based names for every hole.

Oh, and the course is longer in a few key spots. We’ll see if it’s also tougher.

At the three PGAs past here, the course has been conducive to going low. Winning scores have ranged from 11 under par to 18 under, and the cut has never been higher than 3 over. All three tournaments have been dramatic: Tiger Woods won in 2000 and Mark Brooks in 1996 in extra holes; Rory McIlroy won in ’14 by a shot over Phil Mickelson while finishing the round in darkness.

The entire Valhalla experience should be better with the PGA now being played in May rather than August. It’s 10-15 degrees cooler and the course is more lushly green. (With considerable rain Tuesday and more expected, the course likely will play longer than its listed 7,607 yards.) This is peak season for growing gnarly rough in Kentucky, but it has been cut to three inches. Without mowing, that could end up an inch or two longer by Sunday—but the fairways are plenty wide.

If we are going to be blessed with a fourth Valhalla PGA of low scores and a dramatic ending, these five holes might provide the defining moments: 

Hole No. 6. Name: Long Shot

Course co-owner Jimmy Kirchdorfer has predicted that this 495-yard par-4 might be the most difficult hole on the course. It’s a whopping 80 yards longer than it was in 1996, requiring length off the tee but also enough control to avoid Floyds Fork, the creek that flows around much of the front nine. The second shot will be a long one as well, with a price likely to be paid for missing the green.

History: Bogeys are inevitable but survivable. Woods and challenger Bob May both bogeyed this hole while shooting 67 and 66, respectively, on Sunday in 2000. McIlroy bogeyed it in 2014 while shooting a 68. For the entirety of the tournament in ’14, there was an even split between birdies and double bogeys or worse with 20 of each.

Hole No. 7. Name: Genuine Risk

The hole is named after both the 1980 Kentucky Derby winner and the inherent risk-reward of choosing which side of a split fairway to attack on this 597-yard par-5. Driving to the left fairway offers the shorter way home and a better chance to get there in two, but the landing area is not huge (26 yards wide). Driving to the right is safer but could require a howitzer second shot for anyone hunting eagles. (The expectation is that most players will go left.)

History: Trailing May by two shots on Sunday in 2000, Woods began a sizzling finish with a birdie on the 7th. (He played the final 12 holes of regulation in 7 under par to force a playoff.) Woods missed the fairway into long grass off the tee, but ripped his second shot into a collection area in front of the green and then rolled a 100-foot chip shot to within a foot for the tap-in birdie.

Hole No. 13. Name: The Limestone Hole

This is Valhalla’s most picturesque hole, a short (351 yards) par-4 that is downhill but not drivable due to a small island green. The surrounding limestone walls and background waterfall are the stuff of Instagram pictures and TV overhead shots—and maybe birdies. But a poorly struck wedge can also produce a watery disaster.

The par-4 13th hole demands an accurate wedge to its island green. / Aaron Doster-USA TODAY Sports

History: Phil Mickelson, then 26 years old, led the 1996 PGA by three shots entering the third round. The quest for his first career major met a watery grave on 13. After slicing his tee shot into the rough, Mickelson’s second shot splashed down short of the island green. He carded a 74 and fell out of contention.

Hole No. 16. Name: Homestretch

This par-4 is playing 58 yards longer than it did at the first Valhalla PGA, now stretching across 508 yards in the tree-lined eastern corner of the course. Brush Run Creek presents problems along the right side of the hole and any drive that finds the rough on either side will make for a brutal second shot into a well-protected green. Expect a lot of pressurized chips and sand blasts from golfers who couldn’t reach the green in regulation.

History: The hillside to the left of the green created a perfect viewing area for thousands of fans to watch Woods finger-point a 25-foot birdie putt into the cup in the first playoff hole against May in 2000. That proved to be the winning margin in one of the most memorable of the 105 PGAs to date.

Hole No. 18. Name: Photo Finish

All things are possible on this beauty of a par-5. The drive is from an elevated tee into a valley with water long up the right, then it’s an uphill climb to a sprawling green with a protecting bunker in front. Birdies are imminently possible, and eagles aren’t out of the question. But trouble off the tee is also possible and could lead to disaster with the championship within reach.

History: All three prior PGAs have had memorable moments on the 18th. Kentuckian Kenny Perry had the title in his grasp in ’96, but bogeyed the 18th twice—the 72nd and 73rd holes of the tournament—to give it away to Mark Brooks. 

Woods and May both birdied the 18th at the end of regulation in 2000 with clutch putts, and Woods survived an errant tee shot on the hole in the playoff. (That one gave rise to a conspiracy theory that someone kicked Woods’s ball out of trouble and sent it rolling down a hill to a safer spot. That was almost certainly not what happened.) 

And in 2014, McIlroy rushed up into the group that was playing ahead of him, playing with Mickelson and Rickie Fowler, to get the final hole in before nightfall and avoid having to come back Monday morning. That was quite a photo finish in its own right.