[TEPaul]

The pits and hollows that show in the photos of Huntercombe above are natural???

Dream on! Those hollows are about as naturally occuring as those mounds on the 7th. Maybe Brutus Aureleus made them a couple of thousand years ago when he was doing his military stint in Anglia but if WPjr didn't make them somebody did. What Mother Nature makes is a little more, how would you say---natural looking than that.  

Keith and SPDB:

I agree with you that the way the land flows in those photos combined with those rudimentary looking mounds and hollows (by some of today's standards) gives Huntercombe a truly fascinating look of a most interesting "break-through" era in the evolution of golf course architecture. And I certainly do agree that greens that seem to just flow off fairway approaches are a wonderful look particularly if the contours of the greens look to almost meld off those approaches somehow. Those Park greens at Sunningdale and Huntercombe apparently are some of the first well made (and apparently "made" they were) and "made" to look quite natural greens and architectural features in so-called "inland" golf (when golf finally migrated out of the original Scottish linksland).

[T_MacWood]

TE
Not every hazard on the course is natural. The grass bunkers seen in the photo at the 7th are WPII-made, as is the cross hazard at 17th (which was originally a sand hazard or gravel & sand hazard...Huntercombe was blessed with a base of gravel and sand).

The irregular grassy hollows seen in the other photos were ancient cattle and sheep shelters....technically part man-made, part animal-made, part Mother Nature-made (time and weather).

The cresent shaped ridge/earthworks at the 2nd, the dominant feature of the hole, was an ancient tribal boundary.

Of the two course--Huntercombe and Sunningdale--Huntercombe was by far the more famous. It received a tremendnous amount of publicity when it opened. Hutchison, Alison, Paton, Hilton and Abercromby were early members of the course. Travis thought it was the best design he saw in Britain. Huntercombe's influence on the early architects of the day is underestimated IMO. Another prominent member was George Riddell publisher of Country Life, at one point he tried to bail Willie out.

[Keith Durrant]

Philip/Sean,

Scanning your pictures, I could not make out a single fairway sand bunker. Is this the case for all 18 holes? Just a few bunkers around the greens?

How does that affect the playing strategy of the course? Does it hold its own? Given the generally flat terrain, how good is it compared to England's other inland courses?

If ridges and hollows are cheaper to maintain than sand bunkers, does Huntercombe have relevance to low-cost design, even today?

[Mark_Rowlinson]

I love your discussion about the features of Huntercombe.  It got there first - perhaps - fine.  If you scratch around in many a British course laid out any time between 1500 and 1970 you will find similar features, but that is not the issue.  Huntercombe is relatively unadulterated to this day.  Is it a better (or worse) course for its adherence to tradition?  

As an Oxford undergraduate (one who had not the slightest chance of making any representative team, 4th team or worse) we had the opportunity of playing at Huntercombe and we were told that this was completely unchanged since laid out by Park.  Was that true in the late 60s/early 70s?

[Ian Andrew]

Philip,

Thank-you. This is facinating and eye opening. I need to see more of his UK work, I think much of the later Canadian work does not do his career justice when I look at these photos. I look forward to Jim sending me the photos of some of his better US work.

Ian

[Philip Gawith]

Keith - aside from the cross-bunkers on the short 11th, the only fairway bunker is on the outside (right) elbow of the 18th - it catches a long drive. There are bunkers on the 5th and 14th that are not quite greenside - about 40 and 25 yards short of green, but that is all. No bunkers at all on 1,2,3,4,6,8,9,13,15 - and only twelve in all, I think.

I think the course stands up very well to the pointers you read on the front page of GCA:
- enjoyable on a day-to-day basis;
- much to be learned;
- not overly self-promotional.

I am not sure that I would say it is "inspiring" to play - leave that for a few gems - but it passes most other tests.

In terms of how it compares to other top inland courses, Sean is probably right that it is not in the top draw, in part because its lack of length means better players will probably never hit a driver. It is interesting, though, to be reminded by the quotes Tom Macwood  has repeated here about how highly regarded it was at inception, with many feeling it a better course than Sunningdale.

Sunningdale has evolved into a very competitive club, generally not welcoming of weaker golfers, and also host to major tournaments. It aspires to play in the premier league and conducts itself accordingly. Next to Ganton and Woodhall, it is consistently the highest ranked inland course.

Huntercombe could not be more different; it has an older membership and is not nearly as competitive. It never appears in the rankings and is a welcoming home to many indifferent golfers! I think the lowest handicap at the club is three, and there are probably only 20 players with single figure handicaps out of a couple of hundred members.

In short - a great members course, that forces you to think. I never tire of playing it. When I became a member I was not that enamoured with the course, but the more I play it, the more I like it.

As for how the lack of bunkers affects strategy, I would put it differently: the course has quite thick rough, and a lot of trees and punitive undergrowth. You cannot play wild golf and survive - you have to steward your ball round the course. That is what dictates strategy at Huntercombe.

[Keith Durrant]

Thanks Philip and Sean, a great thread.

Surely Huntercombe deserves to be immortalised with a Ran Morrissett course profile?! Speaking of which it's been in the "Next Fifty" for ages, currently number 10. Have you noticed how the order of the "Next Fifty" keeps shifting...?! e.g. Barnbougle and Old Sandwich are no 1 on the domestic and foreign lists.

Here's a vote for Huntercombe!

[Philip Gawith]

Maybe if Ran makes it over to Hoylake next October he will find time to divert via Huntercombe.

I plan to do a "my home course" submission sometime soon - a poor second prize, I realise.

[Jerry Kluger]

Phillip: Thank you for posting the pictures.  I must admit that I was not familiar with the course and it seems that I was missing something very special.  It would appear that the greens alone would make it a joy as one's home course.  Could you give us an idea of the lines of play of some of the holes, are there any angles which from which you approach the greens which are of interest?    

[Philip Gawith]

Jerry - there are certainly favoured angles of attack into some holes:

- the 2nd is a great example. If your drive hugs the left, you get a much better view of the green and can fly the ball all the way there. But out of bounds is nearby on the left, so that presents a challenge. If you chicken out up the right, you cannot fly the ball to the green and have to make a difficult calculation of how far short to pitch the ball and run it up.

- the 3rd invites you to put your drive up to the right side of the fairway, but then your second shot has you aiming towards the green with OB again very close. But difficult to get your drive to settle on left side of the fairway - which gives you a better line - because the strong right to left slope of the fairway means that this angle will often end up pushing you into the left rough which leaves you with no shot.

- another good example would be the par 5 16th, a good risk-reward par 5. The green is very much in range for longer hitters with their second shot, but the best angle in to the green is definitely from the left side of the fairway.

Those are the best examples I can think of.

A related, but slightly different point, is that because quite a few of the greens are not at all elevated, depth perception is difficult, and hence judging distance. Compounding this, a number of greens slope front to back (6, 9 and 10 are good examples) and it can be difficult to get your approach shots close on these holes, not to mention your putts. On the short 10th, for example, the local lore  is that you never give anyone a putt longer than 6 inches on this hole, so difficult are the putts owing to the slope.

In general you are right, I think the course has some excellent greens - a lot of variety and a lot of challenge, and mostly taking advantage of the natural features of the course. I think they are the best features of the course. My own favourites are 1,2,13 and 15.

[Brent Hutto]

Having now played Huntercombe, this thread looks like a good place to insert my own thoughts...

I'll accept on faith the testimony that longer hitters never need driver at Huntercombe. Speaking as a shorter hitter, I'll say that after seeing the course there is plenty of room for me to hit driver. However, I played it teeing off with my three-wood since I'd never seen the course before and feared its reputed narrowness and twistiness. In retrospect, the 3-wood was the right play on many holes because the penalty for being in the thick, brutish rough just off the fairway was so great. I only hit that club 180-190 yards in the air so even with plenty of roll on the firm fairways there were holes where driver would have been more prudent.

I could tell from the tee that the second hole needed to be approached from the left. On my first playing of the hole, I judged it perfectly and had the perfect angle into a front hole location from just inches inside the left rough line about 185 yards out. A few hours later (I replayed the first five holes before departing) my ball bounced into the left rough and I was unable to reach the green with any club that would extract the ball from the rough. Given the slope of the fairway and the thickness of the rough the hole is very "strategic" simply because there's a fine and hard to execute line between a ball that finishes far enough left for a good angle and one that makes it a yard or two into the rough.

Regarding the third hole, there's good news and bad news about an approach shot played from the right side of the fairway. Yes, there is OB for a shot played directly at the left (lower) tier of the green. But in reality you have to aim at the right side of the green or even just off the green to the right and let the slope feed it down which seems unlikely get away OB for any decently struck shot. I don't know what the heck you'd do if the hole were cut up on the high part of the green along the right side (it was all the way left the day I played).

I love the fourth hole. My first time around I couldn't see that lower tier on the right. So I played my short iron toward the flag in the middle of the green and pushed it 20 feet left. Fortunately, I was on the very right edge of the fairway so that is a perfect safe approach (made the putt, too). The next time around my drive found the right rough and a flyer 9-iron directly at the flag (unintentionally) landed short of the green and kicked hard right all the way down to the back right fringe. Three attempts to scale the hill with a putter from there were unsuccessful and I picked up after knocking the fourth one all the way back off the front of the green. Yikes!

My favorite of the short holes is the seventh, at over 200 yards from the gold tees with bunker/mound complexes left and right is a tee-shot challenge. However, it seems to play just a bit downhill so it's not quite a challenging to the shorter hitter as many long Par 3's tend to be. Getting a ball onto the back of the green or back fringe isn't too tough if you can hit a fairway wood straight so a three is always within reach with a well-executed tee shot. I believe a member playing right behind me aced that hole on the Sunday afternoon I played there. He was a lefty, too!

I believe it is the eighth hole with the wonderful shallow back ledge on which the flag is always placed. I can't reach that green in two (at least not teeing off with a 3-wood) so I can play a bump-and-run that's pretty straightforward and still keep it on the green either pin high or behind the hole. I can see why it would be very difficult for anyone trying to keep the ball on that tier with a long-iron approach.

As Philip mentions, a lot of the greens are at grade making them semi-invisible or at least hard to judge visually. There are also as many reverse-pitched greens at Huntercombe as any course I can recall. Once again, the thick rough (at least when I played) plays into the design of the course effectively. It's one thing to hit a "good" approach that runs off the back of the green. It's quite another when it runs off into a couple inches of thick, juicy grass that requires a semi-explosion shot to chip the ball 20-30 feet to the hole.

I had particularly memorable encounters with balls running off the back of greens at that Par 3 with the bunker in front of the green (can't recall the hole number) as well as the hole Philip posted a picture of with that damnable ridge built into the front of the green. That may have been the single most frustrating hole of my day. I drove it in the right rough, did not make good contact with a hybrid club from the long grass and therefore had a full wedge third shot (from a decent lie in the rough). The ball landed as intended on the very front of the green and, having no spin I guess, ended up just trickling into a thick lie off the back right edge of the green. I had to make a two or three foot putt for my double bogey and never felt that I hit a single "bad shot" on the hole.

Philip says he particularly likes the first green. I like the hole because it has some little bushes on a rise just to spoil your visibility (disconcertening on your opening tee shot of the day to a Par 3 green). The green is kind of funny somehow I think. The first time I hit a beautiful shot dead on line with the back-left hole location. It ended up just short of the hole among some tricky internal ridges and humps (had to play it several feet left of the hole on a 12-foot putt). The second time I played the hole I pulled my 7-iron and landed short of the green and well to the right (maybe even right of center of the green). I'll be darned if I didn't end up putting on exactly the same line as the first time, maybe two feet farther out. I never did figure how a short-iron shot works ten yards left once it gets on the green, maybe I sliced it or something.

To sum up, I think Huntercombe is a treasure. It was my first Willie Park course and it definitely had the feel of something that had been around for nearly a century. The club has made no apparent concessions to modern prejudices and expectations and the result is a course that is not particularly "quirky" but still seems fresh and different than other courses I've played. I can't wait until my next chance to play there, especially if I get a chance to play it under match-play conditions rather than just navigating my way around to shoot a score (which BTW was 96 off a USGA 20 handicap and par of 70).

I would use the word "great" to describe it because:

a) It offers a well-rounded but reasonable challenge to a bogey golfer while also making the better player execute and think well to score well,

b) It is truly an early-20th-century course as opposed to a modern-ish course on which you can see the century-old bones by squinting your eyes just right,

c) I played it without losing a single golf ball while at the same time it was not straightforward to recover from a poor shot,

d) The setting (cf. the view from the second fairway) and the club are very relaxing and lovely and

e) The greens, both their design and their condition (which was absolutely perfect), are challenging and varied which is one of my primary criteria for greatness.

[Brent Hutto]

The 15th is a lovely hole.  It is really cool that the card has essentially two par 3s marked at essentially the same length yet they play completely differently.  I think the 15th really shines when the pin loks as if it is benignly placed on the right middle of the green.  Up close you can see the putting/chippng woes if you are right, left or long.  This is my favourite par 3 on the course.  That ridge creating the back shelf makes the hole.

When I played it the hole was frontish and well to the left. The hole looked a lot shorter and easier than the tenth but somehow my ball managed to climb just barely to the top of that ridge (directly behind the hole) and stick there. Basically I touched it lightly with the putter, watched it roll all the way to the front of the green and then two-putted. Actually, I think it that first putt may have swooped pretty hard toward the left side of the green as well. Easy hole, brutal green but as you say a case study in making two "same distance" holes very different in actuality.

The 16th is one of the more strategic holes on the course.  This is especially true if the pin is on the back shelf.  To get anywhere near that pin you must approach from the left.  What is fantastic about the set up is that most of the immediate trouble is right for the drive (ob) and the second (Huntercombe Hollow).  Why anybody is over there is beyond me.  Somehow, I think there should be a reward for taking all that on.  Instead all one gets is a shiza minnelli angle for the approach.  Good stuff.

This is embarrassing to admit but I have absolutely no memory of the sixteenth hole. While I was eating lunch after my round I grabbed a scorecard and wrote down my scores so I know I made a bogey six but your description (and Philip's) isn't ringing a bell. Probably an indication that I got caught up in "why can't I hit a fairway" swing thoughts for a while instead of playing golf.

[Brent Hutto]

OK, I went back and looked at Philip's picture of the sixteenth green. The bunker rang a bell and I've got it now.

The hole was all the way on the back of the green. I hit a good tee shot, pulled (lefty) lay-up shot into the rough either in or somewhere around that second grass hollow. Third shot was a short iron headed for the flag that just caught the (greenside) edge of the bunker and kicked in. I hit a good bunker shot that managed to get up on the back shelf with the hole but I hit a chicken-out putt that I was scared spitless would go past the hole and roll back down onto the front of the green. Tap-in six.

So my experience jibes with your conclusion. Don't get over on the right side or trouble can happen. Another great green, though.

[Bill_McBride]

The excavations at Painswick were apparently either the result of quarrying or fortifications of the Iron Age fort.

Do you think the broken ground at Huntercombe is natural, or pre-existing due to some form of quarrying or agricultural effort, or manmade by Park?  The mounding and hollows are very interesting.

[Philip Gawith]

Brent - I am delighted you enjoyed the course and so sorry I was not able to join you. In many ways it does not suit my game - long and wild! - but i always find it a challenge.

You are right that the rough - especially the undergrowth - is on the punitive side, especially in summer. Personally I don't think this is much of a recommendation since it is hardly the work of the architect and also slows down the game which is ironical since the club prides itself on having a fast golf ethos.

Overall, I think the course is more difficult to score on that  meets the eye. Although it is short, it is not easy to overpower because the punitive rough encourages caution. And there are many holes where it is difficult to get the ball close to the hole - so while pars are not that difficult, birdies are.

I think you have captured well the best features of the course - it has an excellent set of greens with a lot of variety and originality; it is largely unchanged; the setting is great - and the club has a very appealing low-key ethos. Overall, a nice play to play your golf.

One thing you forgot to mention in your post but you commented on by phone was the large number of dogs being taken around the course. That is another fine feature - and the surest sign, bar none, that you are playing on a very traditional course in England.

[Brent Hutto]

Philip,

Generally speaking, I am not a fan of severe rough that's anywhere near the line of play. For me, a little over an inch of Bermuda rough or 1-1/2 to 2 inches of rye, bluegrass, etc. is ideal for extracting a partial shot penalty while not wasting too much time searching for golf balls. Now some long fescue or whatever native grasses looks marvelous and I don't object if it's well outside the playing corridors (where it can sort of serve the same purpose on linksy courses and trees do on parkland).

That said, for some reason I thought the brutal and somewhat too long rough at Huntercombe seemed to have a certain synchronicity with the rest of the course. Given the none too large greens that often fall off in an inconvenient direction, trying to play shots to those greens from the penal rough really accentuates the green designs and makes you long for a typical front-to-back sloping receptive green. I think my objection would be more to the severe rough just a couple yards off the greens than to the severity of the rough between the edge of the fairway and the tree line. While some of the Huntercombe greens are pretty in-your-face, there are good subtle features to many of the others that would seem to invite areas of short, playable grass around them (maybe not fairway-cut "chipping areas" but shorter rough allowing a bit of creativity instead of just Tour-style chips from thick lies).

Notwithstanding the rough, the members I saw playing that Sunday (was it just a week ago?) definitely had that good vibe of near-continuous motion through the round. Huntercombe, like Deal for instance, is not a place where you can just hit the ball here and there without a care in the world and yet at neither course do you see groups of people standing around like you do at even much easier US courses. And the fact that every third game is accompanied by (remarkably well behaved) dogs is the crowning touch.

Maybe it's because Huntercombe was the most parkland like of the courses I played (Walton Heath, Littlestone, Walmer and Kingsdown, Royal Cinque Ports and Huntercombe) or maybe it was the homey feel of husband-and-wife twosomes, dogs and the Sunday-after-church couples in the clubhouse but I certainly felt more at home there than anywhere else I went during my trip. Walking from the first green to the second tee through a few trees I had a little shiver of recognition after having spent a week enjoying the very foreign (to me) feel of the links courses on the Kent coast.

A fine club. And one final note...the Red Kite logo on the shirt I brought home is one of the classiest I've seen. I heard some sort of bird screeching at various points during my round and it sounded hawk-like. Perhaps the namesake bird of prey was in the area that afternoon.

[Philip Gawith]

That would definitely have been the red kite you were hearing Brent - there are lots of them about these days. I don't think you are in much danger back home of bumping into anyone else sporting the logo.

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