Evian’s quirky, spectacular hole: A road, 32 yards of elevation and Lake Geneva on the horizon

EVIAN GOLF RESORT, France — “It’s quite a fun walk down, but you’ve got to be careful you don’t slip,” Swedish golfer Kajsa Arwefjäll said after finishing her 2 under par round at the Amundi Evian Championship Thursday.

What the 26-year-old is referring to is the steep slope on hole No. 2 of the course, where one of the five majors in the women’s game is held.

Golfers must shoot their shot, clamber down the hillside and walk across a main road aptly named “Route du Golf.” There are passing cars, buggies, and cyclists who stop to allow golfers, like world No. 1 Nelly Korda, who has already won two majors this year, to use the crossing to reach the par-3 putting green, which sits on a separate site from the rest of the course.

“It’s so weird you walk across the road,” Arwefjäll added.

What makes this quirky hole popular for golfers and spectators is a view locals might call “spectaculaire.” This is one of the most eye-catching holes on a course which is full of breathtaking vistas given it is at the foot of the surrounding Alps.

“The first time I played it was a year ago, you just walk up there and go, ‘Wow!’ with the lake (Geneva) and you can see over to Lausanne (a city in Switzerland) on the other side,” Arwefjäll said. “It’s nice — and then you look straight down. It’s a one-of-a-kind hole.”

World No. 4 Lottie Woad read it as 32 yards of elevation as she lined up her tee shot.

“It’s not the most fun walk. It’s kind of too steep to be enjoyable. You’re just leaning back and trying not to fall over,” said Woad after shooting a 4-under 67, including an eagle on the ninth. “I had seen it on TV and it’s way more downhill than you think. You get up there, and you just hit it, and it’s in the air, and you’re just kind of hoping it’s the right club, because you can’t really tell.

“I don’t think I’ve ever played one that’s 32 yards downhill for the elevation. I don’t think I’ve played one as severe as that.”

The hole is 163 yards, making it a short dart across a road that’s not actually visible from the tee. Play your looping shot badly and you could easily shatter a car window. But while this hole does present some danger, it also brings opportunity, as Republic of Ireland golfer Leona Maguire found when she hit her first LPGA hole-in-one there a year ago.

“You’re never quite sure on that hole until the ball actually lands,” Maguire told reporters after her brilliant feat.

The pin was towards the back of the green during the first round on Thursday. Catching the wrong side of the left or right would see the ball tank its way down a punishing slope, and undo any chance of a birdie.

That was the experience of Frenchwoman Pauline Roussin-Bouchard, who did not stop to watch her shot roll away into the rough. Instead, she banged her club into the metal hoarding as she paced down the slope almost before the ball had hit the ground.

The winding path to the green, which players walk down at pace either in excitement or frustration, has a rubber trail for golf shoes to grip onto, such is the elevation drop. At the bottom, there is no view of any of the five-tiered tee boxes through the shrubs. But those waiting on the championship tee have a bird’s-eye view of the group in front, almost as good as the noisy hawks flying overhead. Haeran Ryu, coming off her first major win at last month’s KPMG PGA Championship, fired her shot through a kettle of hawks as if to prove just how high the starting point is.

Most players get down in three. On Thursday, 22 players managed birdies, including Woad, and 16 had to mark themselves down for a bogey. Japan’s Aki Iwai, who topped the leaderboard on 8 under after the opening round, was par.

What makes Evian so striking is the narrow, slopey greens built into the mountainside landscape at varying elevations.

“It’s a beautiful hole (No. 2),” Charley Hull said after finishing her round with an eagle at the last to tie for third going into the second round. “You need to concentrate because otherwise you just take in the view too much and get distracted.”

Hull said she enjoyed the undulating nature of the course, even if it was not suited to everyone. She grew up hitting off slopes and “wonky lies” at Kettering Golf Club near Northampton, a town about 80 miles north of London.

“You have to be able to hit and create shots off the slopes,” Hull said on the broadcast. “Where you could have a 127-yardage and on a normal golf course, it is a flat lie, it’s an easy shot. But here it is crazy below your feet, crazy above your feet, so you have to understand the slopes.”

As many found out during the first round, understanding the slopes is one thing, commanding them is another.

Whatever happens, the views are always phenomenal.