Five things to know: Accordia Golf Narashino CC

It’s time for primetime golf. At least, in U.S. time zones. For the third time in four years, the PGA TOUR is headed to Accordia Golf Narashino Country Club in the Tokyo area. The ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP’s challenge has already been validated in just two Japanese editions by a simple peek at the champions. Tiger Woods won in 2019, Hideki Matsuyama won in 2021 and Keegan Bradley reignited his career with a win last year.

A product of Japan’s mid-20th century golf boom, Narashino took an American and European influence while also celebrating its native Japanese traditions upon entering the world in 1965.

Long, competitive history

The ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP may have introduced North American fans to Narashino in 2019, but for Japanese and other international fans, the course has long been a staple of competitive golf. In 1968, just three years after opening, Narashino hosted the 1968 Japan PGA Championship, won by Kosaku Shimada, a nine-time Japan Golf Tour winner.

This preceded some of the big names of the 20th-century golf world. In 1972, the second Japan Airlines Open made its way to Narashino and invited a 36-year-old Gary Player, still very much in his prime. Player, coming from behind in the final round, posted a 70, edging five-time Open Championship winner Peter Thomsen, who was 42 at the time, and three others by one stroke. Player’s win earned him 2 million yen (roughly $5,540).

A half-decade later, the Japan Open made Narashino its home in 1977. That year, a 20-year-old phenom named Seve Ballesteros became the first non-Asian to win the Japan Open. At even-par, the reigning DP World Tour Order of Merit winner edged Takashi Murakami by one shot. Ballesteros successfully defended his title in 1978 at Yokohama.

More consistently, Narashino was known as the home of the Suntory Open on the Japan Golf Tour from 1974-1997. Among those to win the Suntory Open were PGA TOUR winners Graham Marsh, Bill Rogers, Larry Nelson and David Ishii. Isao Aoki finished as runner-up four times at Narashino. All three Ozaki brothers — Masashi (Jumbo), Tateo (Jet) and Naomichi (Joe) — won the Suntory, with Tateo and Naomichi each winning twice.

If Suntory sounds familiar, that might be thanks to the American film industry. The Japanese brewing and distilling brand hired Bill Murray’s “Lost in Translation” character Bob Harris to shoot a commercial in Tokyo.

The ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP has expanded this rich history around Narshino by adding two mega-stars as its initial champions: Tiger Woods, who tied Sam Snead with his 82nd (and most recent) PGA TOUR win in 2019, and Hideki Matsuyama, Japan’s most successful global golfer, in 2021.

Japan’s legendary designer

Born in 1899, Kinya Fujita traveled to the U.S. for his college studies, right as the nation entered the Roaring Twenties. He studied at the University of Chicago, Miami (Ohio) and Columbia University, and along the way, he became infatuated with the varieties of American golf course architecture. He traveled further abroad to Great Britain and examined the work of C.H. Alison of Colt and Alison.

When Fujita went back to Japan, he joined Tokyo Golf Club. In 1928, the club was offered a new piece of land 30 miles away from its current course, but the club determined the land too remote. Fujita and other members, disagreeing, broke away from the club to create their own course on the new property. That course, founded in 1929, would become Kasumiagaseki Country Club’s East Course, the home of three Japan Opens, a Japan Women’s Open and perhaps most notably, the 2020 Summer Olympics.

In the 1930s, Alison made a series of trips to Japan, consistently meeting with Fujita among others. One of his first stops was Kasumiagaseki, a course Alison called “pleasantly undulating.” He offered redesign ideas for five holes, and Fujita and his contemporary, Seiichi Inoue, quickly made sure those changes were carried out. They would continue to meet and play golf with Alison over the next few years, as Alison worked on a few of his own original courses and redesigns. At the suggestion of Fujita, Alison visited Inagawa Golf Club and eventually participated in a redesign. The renovated course became known as Naruo Golf Club and would host Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer and Gary Player in a 1967 “Big 3” exhibition match, along with Kasumiagaseki and Nagoya Golf Club.

According to Golf Club Atlas, there were fewer than 100 golf courses in Japan before World War II. There are now more than 2,000. Much of that growth is courtesy of Fujita and Inoue, who took Alison’s teachings and expanded that web throughout Japan. Alison’s long, curving bunkers that dominated his Japanese creations are now known as “Alison Bunkers” and spread amongst Fujita and Inoue’s works.

Narashino would ultimately be one of Fujita’s final works. The club opened its gates in 1965 and Fujita would pass away in 1969 at age 80.

Two-green surprise

Going backwards in golf history, it was common to find courses built with two greens on each hole, especially in multi-climate locations. Golf courses could designate one surface for summer, using Bermuda or zoysia grass, while a winter green might favor bentgrass. Eventually, due to space constraints, maintenance requirements and general upgrades in turf management, this practice was weeded out (pun intended).

However, many golf courses in Japan never got the memo. Narashino is among a series of courses that still maintain two greens on every hole. For regular members and guests, this can completely change the gameplay of a hole day-to-day.

The ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP has embraced this history without overwhelming the field. So far, each edition of the event has featured one second green open. In 2019, it was the par-4 fourth hole using both greens, alternating between a drier but farther green and a shorter but wetter hole location.

In 2021, the two-green treatment shifted to the fifth hole, a par 3 measuring 205 yards to the left green and 202 yards to the right. This will continue in 2022. A pond comes into play on both front sides of the green – the front right for the left green and front left for the right green – leaving a bunker to split the remaining land between the two surfaces. While the left green is slightly longer, it requires more of a straight tee shot, while the right green is more of an angular shot across the pond with large bunkers off to the right. This makes the right green more horizontal-looking and harder to hold without a high tee shot.

Short and long

The Narashino course for the ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP is a par 70. That is not strange on the PGA TOUR. However, the layout is obscure. Mixing nine holes each from the club’s King Course and Queen Course (both designed by Fujita), the result includes five par 3s and three par 5s.

The par 3s are noticeably short. Only the fifth hole, playing with its two greens, will play over 200 yards and that is by less than a first down. The 13th hole will play only 141 yards, and while that number may have you thinking about No. 7 at Pebble Beach, the two holes look vastly different. No. 7 at the ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP will play uphill, with the green sharply sloping from back to front. Aiming to keep the ball below the hole presents more danger, as deep Alison bunkers gulp up anything short of the green.

Meanwhile, the par 5s each display their own flavor. No. 6 is a 587-yard dogleg right with a tee shot going directly over water into a thin fairway. Holding the horizontal fairway then turns the player toward a vertical green running back-to-front.

No. 14 is a perfectly straight, uphill 608-yard beast with a skinny fairway, showing off a series of waves. Players who catch the right piece off the tee then face an uphill, lengthy second shot.

The 562-yard 18th hole features a more traditional, straightforward par-5 layout, with a slight dogleg to the left. A series of bunkers guard the tee shot at the bend of the fairway, but a successful tee shot should lead to a manageable second shot. Hideki Matsuyama memorably set up an eagle with his approach shot on No. 18 in 2021, walking up to a hero’s welcome as he became the event’s first Japanese champion.

No. 14 played as the 10th-hardest hole overall at the ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP in 2021, with scores averaging 0.003 over par. That made it the third-hardest par 5 on the 2021-22 PGA TOUR season behind only No. 18 at TPC Twin Cities (3M Open) and No. 15 at the Nicklaus Tournament Course (The American Express).

Meanwhile, No. 18 and No. 6 served as the two easiest holes on the course, respectively. Together, they combined for 21 eagles and 302 birdies.

Beware of long par 4s

The 2021 edition of the ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP made it pretty easy to identify the most difficult holes. The three hardest holes were the only three par 4s measuring 490 yards or longer. Five of the seven most difficult holes were par 4s measuring 486 yards or longer.

Last year, No. 4 played as the most difficult hole on the course with an average score of 4.28. Playing at 505 yards, an aggressive drive from the left flirts with water running down the left side of the fairway. A successful tee shot then requires a long approach shot into an uphill green, which runs back at the ball-striker. Only 15 birdies were recorded all week in 2021. As previously mentioned, this hole had even more of a wrinkle in 2019 when both greens were used.

No. 12 served as the second-most difficult hole for the week and most treacherous hole in Round 4 in 2021. It averaged 0.31 strokes over par for the four days and gave up just 12 birdies on the weekend. A par 5 for the members, this 490-yard hole starts with a downhill tee shot that sounds more generous than it is. Bunkers on the left side, jutting out and narrowing the fairway around the 230- to 260-yard mark can steer a shaky tee shot into trouble. The approach shot then goes back up into a three-tiered elevated green with bunkers short of the surface.

No. 17 completes the Big Three, as this 491-yard hole includes a slight dogleg left with a fairway inclined to the right. A tee shot on the left side – easier said than done – makes the approach shot more manageable. But an undulating green rolling balls off the front brings two deep bunkers into play.

Players in contention on Sunday will just look to skate by this hole with a par and give themselves a chance on the scorable 18th hole.