Hole description: For the second straight week, we have a short, risk-reward par-4. Formerly East Hartford Golf Course, Long Hill Country Club has several of these types of holes here.

“if you take driver out, you won’t have awhole lot of coming club in,” Long Hill co-pro Al Pascale said. “But if you get caught in the trees or hit it in the wrong place, you bring bogey and double-bogey into play.”

The seventh hole is a dogleg left, which makes the hole even shorter if you choose to take a driver and blast it over the trees, a realistic possibility. But failing to clear it will lead to a potential pitch out, then a scramble just to make par. There are a clump of trees off the right side of the fairway that will lead to a similar siutation with an errant tee shot.

“If you want to take the big shot and try the draw around the trees, or keep it on the left side and hit it over the trees, it leave you with a birdie opportunity,” Pascale said.

You can choose the safe route also: hitting a mid-iron into the fairway, clearing the small hazard that cuts across the fairway some 130 yards from the tee. That leaving a similar distance to the green guarded by two deep bunkers on each side. This is the smart play, especially when the hole is playing into the wind.

It’s not a difficult hole - unless you turn it into one.

Played like a pro: Pascale used the downwind conditions to his advantage. He blasted his tee shot over the left tree line. The shot caught the cart path and the ball came to rest pin high to the left side just in front of the bunker. He used his 58-degree wedge to flip the ball to 7 feet. He had a slightly downhill putt, but Pascale made it anyways for birdie-3.

Played like your average Joe: I also pulled driver and hit a screaming low duck hook into the hazard. It was dry enough in the hazard to allow me to barely get it out of there. It left me with a good lie in the rough, but even with tree trouble in my path toward the green, I still decided to take a chance and use my 5-iron. The shot was well-struck, but it did hit the top of the trees and caromed off to the left. That left me with a 9-iron fourth shot, which finished just off the green to the left. My poor chip left me 12 feet short, but I did make it for a double-bogey 6, a familiar score if you have been reading this column throughout the season.

Register golf writer Joe Morelli will be playing the signature hole from several public courses from around the state this season. If you have a hole to suggest, or would like to participate, contact him at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it .