A couple of idioms caught my ear recently because they suggest an unnatural amount of dynamism on the part of a geographic locale:

• "The course walks better than it rides." — in equestrianism, of a route that seems easier during the pre-competition walk-through than it actually turns out to be (from comrade horse expert MLI)
• "The hole plays longer than it looks." — in golf, of an exceptionally challenging par 4 (from a newspaper article about the US Women's Open tournament this year)

Other examples? Is there a linguistic term for this sort of metaphor?

TopicLanguage - 2004-07-05

(correlates: PresentTension, 2004-11-06 - Fallen Leaf Forest Floor, SturmUndLeuf, ...)