The smallest bunker on Tour?

As play gets under way at the Challenge de Madrid today it is not only the stunning scenery of Real Club de Golf La Herrería that will catch the players’ attention.

At first glance the seventh hole is your average par three. It’s around 159 yards to the pin, and five bunkers surround the green. But one is not your average bunker; in fact it is very, very small.

At just over one metre wide the tiny trap is proving a popular topic among players and spectators in the Spanish capital this week. But why is it there?

“Jose Gancedo made the small bunker as his signature,” said Fernando Blanco, the Sports Director at Real Club de Golf La Herrería.

“In 2000 the course was rebuilt by him and it was then that he put it in place. We are not sure exactly how big it is, but I would guess somewhere between one metre and one and a half metres wide.”

Before the third event of the European Challenge Tour season got into full swing, two players gave their thoughts on it.

“It is most definitely the smallest bunker I have ever seen,” said Jordan Smith, who won his maiden Challenge Tour title at the Red Sea Egyptian Challenge Presented by Hassan Allam Properties last week.

“It is  uniquely placed as well, as it is just on top of another bunker. I think it would be really hard to find. If you did land in there I think you would have to stand outside it to play your shot. It is quite a funky one, isn’t it?”

“I have never played in anything as small as this,” said Dominic Foos, who became the youngest player to win on the Challenge Tour last year.

“I  heard there used to be a tree and they took the tree out so where the trunk and everything was I think they just put a bunker there.

“It looks really great but I hope I never have to play from it. It would depend how the lie is, but if the lie is not that good I would have to stand outside the bunker,because the ball would not be perfectly in the middle. But overall it is such a fun bunker.”