Hell Bunker

The second shot on No.14 at St Andrews is not for the faint-hearted. If you've hit a good one off the tee then you can have a stab at going for the green in two. However, a not-so-perfect drive leaves you the ultimate risk/reward shot in golf - the carry over Hell Bunker.

The pit itself is enormous. Almost the size of your average green. But size isn't the issue here, it's the tall vertical faces. If you're far enough in, then you may only be able to play backwards. But the curvature of it's shape often interferes with the path of your swing, and sometimes the only option is to chip it back to the middle of the bunker.

The local caddies are so worried about their player finding Hell that many of them actually recommend that they play down the adjoining 5th fairway. It lengthens the hole and leaves a shot of around 150 yards for the third, but it does provide the best angle for approach and more importantly takes the cavernous beast out of play completely.

To make matters worse, the 14th fairway sits on a plateau above the second half of the hole which makes the bunker disappear from sight. A golfer playing here for the first time could finish up in Hell without even knowing it was there.

From the back tee, this sandy grave will be on the minds of even the world's top golfers. Jack Nicklaus needed four blows to escape from here during the Open Championship in 1995, and finished up carding a ten. Ben Crenshaw commented, "When you're in perdition like he was, sometimes there's no way out. You can get in there and stay in there, that's why they call it hell".