Course rankings handicapped by rogue entries
John huggan
AS regular watchers of Channel 4 will surely attest, we live in a world of lists, a fact that is especially true for those of us of a mind to take more than a passing interest in golf courses. They are everywhere, course lists that is - "best this", "greatest that" and "100 most the other".
The root of this particular indulgence is the world’s best-selling golf publication, Golf Digest, for which I write. The American magazine was first to come up with the idea of ranking courses - and thereby the not inconsiderable bonus of creating advertising revenue from those venues in the upper echelons - and the concept has inevitably spread. This month, for example, you can find in its pages a list of the 75 Best Golf Resorts.
All of which is fine and mildly stimulating, especially when the magazine distinguishes so readily between the ranking of courses and resorts. Two very different things, I’m sure you’ll agree.
Which is why it is easy to feel a little disappointed by the Top-120 course rankings in the current issue of Golf Monthly. Despite billing its first attempt in the ranking business as based purely on the quality of the courses, Monthly’s list is nothing of the sort, though it is hard to argue with the Old Course at St Andrews being No.1 in the British Isles under any criteria.
"The design and the condition of the courses was only part of our process," concedes GM’s editor, Jane Carter. "Ambience, off-course facilities and value for money are considered too."
While this explanation goes some way to uncovering a few of the startling anomalies contained in the list, it is also something that needs to be addressed Golf Digest style: is a particular venue simply a golf course or is it a so-called golf experience?
If it is the latter, how for example did the likes of Muirfield and Western Gailes get into Monthly’s top-ten, given how unwelcoming both places are to women golfers?
Golf Monthly’s failure to separate the course/resort argument has meant that, if we look at the 30 Scottish courses within the 120, the Kings course at Gleneagles is supposedly the fourth-best course in Scotland. Carnoustie is seventh, Royal Troon is 11th, and perhaps most ludicrously, Royal Dornoch is 16th.
Hands up all those in agreement with just that small taste of GM’s findings. Thought so.
There’s more. After writing down the 30 Caledonian courses worthy of mention in Monthly’s pages (I know, I need to get out more) it took me less than 30 seconds to come up with ten more not on the list - Dunbar, Luffness, Leven, Downfield, Barassie, Scots- craig, Murcar, Monifieth, Southerness and Lossiemouth - that are all miles better than, say, the 12-hole course at Shiskine on Arran, that is apparently the 21st-best course in our land. Come on! While Shiskine is a delightful place to be, the course is little better than pitch and putt.
In Golf Monthly’s defence, such lack of credibility will presumably be erased over time, as the number of rankers increases and the criteria under which they operate is tightened. Golf Digest currently engages in excess of 800 "panellists" - all of whom have handicaps of five or under - while Monthly has only 300 with a maximum handicap of 18.
Those numbers are important. More players ranking courses help to eliminate the statistical anomaly, and while the views of the hacker are obviously relevant, there is no doubt that the subtleties of course design are invariably lost on someone playing for bogeys rather than pars.
Then there is the touchy area of what rankers can and cannot accept from courses/resorts eager to have their premises rated as highly as possible. Golf Digest’s 800+ are instructed to call ahead and identify themselves if they wish to ask for a complimentary green fee, but they are not allowed to accept a free shirt, lunch, accommodation or airfare. Golf Monthly has yet to adopt a firm policy in such potentially touchy areas.
"It is true that we have a lot to think about," says Carter. "I have no doubt there are a few rogue entries at the moment. But we are aware that we have a responsibility to our readers to get this right. That’s why we have a panel of 30 [unidentified] members of the golf community to back up the findings of those on our ranking list. Through time we will eliminate what skews the numbers."
Judging by this first attempt, there is a long way to go in that department. Looking only at the courses with which I am most familiar, it is hard to believe that many East Lothian golfers would agree that all those silly holes on North Berwick’s enormously overrated west course - 14th in Scotland - are superior to those found just along the coast on Gullane’s No.1 course (24th). Or those at Dunbar, which fails to make the list at all.
There’s an idea, though. The last list ever: one containing the names of the 100 best courses that have not yet been included in a list.