Confidential Guide Tens

[Jim Franklin]

  It would be hard for me to give any course a 10 which borders a neighborhood. That would eliminate Pinehurst. I prefer golf only. No houses no swimming pool.

That would potentially eliminate Merion as it has a neighborhood next to it and Pine Valley certainly has homes there as well. All in all, I would say be flexible. Part of the charm in playing TOC is hitting back into town on #18.

[M. Shea Sweeney]

  It would be hard for me to give any course a 10 which borders a neighborhood. That would eliminate Pinehurst. I prefer golf only. No houses no swimming pool.

That would eliminate Cypress Point also - houses to the right of #2, behind #8.

Interesting standard... but does it need to be absolute?

TH

With that logic Shinnecock is out.

[Chris Kane]

As is the Old Course!

[nandoal]

Tom:

I agree with ALMOST all of your "10's".

I cannot see how Oakmont could be left out.

To me Oakmont would be in with Pinehurst #2 on the outside looking in IMHO.

10: Nearly perfect.  Every hole at the very least adds something of value to the course as a hole. MUST see these courses to appreciate how good golf architecture can get.

[Sean Leary]

Matt,

16 at RCD.

[Anthony Gray]

  It would be hard for me to give any course a 10 which borders a neighborhood. That would eliminate Pinehurst. I prefer golf only. No houses no swimming pool.

By that logic, you also eliminate TOC at St Andrews.

Believe me, it's a solid ten, houses notwithstanding.

  But you are not golfing in somebody's backyard. At Pinehurst people are grilling out in their boxers. For me it is about the whole golf experience. The experiences at places like Bandon, the Honors Course, etc. which are isolated and are solely for golf are superior to those at "golf communities".

[jim_lewis]

Anthony:

Are you sure you are talking about #2 and not the other courses at the Pinehurst Resort? There are not very many houses adjacent to #2, and I have rarely (if ever) seen a live human being it the back yards of any of those houses while playing the course. I know most of the people who own those houses on #2. I doubt if many of them have a grill in the back yard, and none of the ones I know would be caught dead in their yards in boxers. In fact, most of them probably don't know how to fire up a grill. I think you are putting out bad info, but that's not uncommon on this site. Many seem to confuse Pinehurst with Southern Pines and Aberdeen. Someone recently posted that Pinehurst was plastic with lots of chain restaurants and retail stores. There are NO chain restaurants in Pinehurst. There is one Exxon station, a Jos A. Banks store, and a Lowe's grocery store on the edge of town, but I believe those are actually in Taylor Town. Almost all of the commercial crap and most of the golf courses (other than the 8 Resort courses) are outside of Pinehurst. There may be many fair criticisms of Pinehurst, but "plastic" is not one of them. BTW, I'm happy to report that Tobacco Road is 25 miles from Pinehurst in a neighboring county!

Jim Lewis

[Matt_Ward]

Sean:

Thanks for the clarification.

Intersting that you raise that point because a few of the people I was with when I last played RCD said much the same thing.

I liked the short distance element and the fact that you have a range of different decisions to make with the tee shot.

I just see the next two holes that follow as substandard when held against the bulk of what is there. No doubt RCD excels in so many ways but I see the 16th as adding something to the overall picture.

If you see it differently please tell me why.

[Bill_McBride]

Matt Ward,

Do you think 16 fits? I really liked the hole but I thought it felt like a modern hole and did not fit with the rest.

Sean, when did you play at Royal County Down?  There is a new 16th hole that people familiar with the course say is much better than the old one.  It was in play for the Walker Cup (September 2007) and I'm not sure how long it had been in use.

The old hole went at right angles to #15, the new one continues on the line of #15.  There was a nifty fall away green with a deep, deep front left bunker and a big fall off to the right of the fairway that made most players play down the left side and bring the bunker and over the green into play.  It is a little longer than the old #16 which I never saw.

Here's the new hole:

[Anthony Gray]

Anthony:

Are you sure you are talking about #2 and not the other courses at the Pinehurst Resort? There are not very many houses adjacent to #2, and I have rarely (if ever) seen a live human being it the back yards of any of those houses while playing the course. I know most of the people who own those houses on #2. I doubt if many of them have a grill in the back yard, and none of the ones I know would be caught dead in their yards in boxers. In fact, most of them probably don't know how to fire up a grill. I think you are putting out bad info, but that's not uncommon on this site. Many seem to confuse Pinehurst with Southern Pines and Aberdeen. Someone recently posted that Pinehurst was plastic with lots of chain restaurants and retail stores. There are NO chain restaurants in Pinehurst. There is one Exxon station, a Jos A. Banks store, and a Lowe's grocery store on the edge of town, but I believe those are actually in Taylor Town. Almost all of the commercial crap and most of the golf courses (other than the 8 Resort courses) are outside of Pinehurst. There may be many fair criticisms of Pinehurst, but "plastic" is not one of them. BTW, I'm happy to report that Tobacco Road is 25 miles from Pinehurst in a neighboring county!

Jim Lewis

    JIm,

  Sorry. I'm not criticizing Pinehurst. My observations were that I was golfing in a golf community. My caddy even had short conversations with a couple of residents. One guy was on his porch and appeared to be wearing bedtime cloths. It was simply an observation. My point is that courses in residential areas detract from the golfing expierence. Nobody would consider the occasional Butler Cabin or Granny Clark's Wynde parts of a golf/residential community. Pinehurst is CLASS but it lacks the ambience of isolated courses.

[Sean Leary]

Matt Ward,

Do you think 16 fits? I really liked the hole but I thought it felt like a modern hole and did not fit with the rest.

Sean, when did you play at Royal County Down?  There is a new 16th hole that people familiar with the course say is much better than the old one.  It was in play for the Walker Cup (September 2007) and I'm not sure how long it had been in use.

The old hole went at right angles to #15, the new one continues on the line of #15.  There was a nifty fall away green with a deep, deep front left bunker and a big fall off to the right of the fairway that made most players play down the left side and bring the bunker and over the green into play.  It is a little longer than the old #16 which I never saw.

Here's the new hole:

Bill,

I played the new one last year.

I like the hole a lot actually, I just felt like it should be on a modern Doak or C and C course, thats all.

I like 18, and thought 17 was fine.

A Doak 10 in my book.

[JWinick]

Anthony,

I find your position to be absurd.   To automatically rule out a golf course because it has a home or two around is ridiculous.   It's like someone decided who to vote for President solely on their position on guns, or abortion.   

In the real world, land is expensive and golf courses sit on attractive land in good locales.  You are expressing a bias to "middle-of-nowhere" golf courses.    No one wants to play a course that has homes lining both sides of fairways, but economic reality suggests people like to live near or bordering golf courses.

If anything, I'm more impressed with a designer who takes a tough site in a suburban/urban neighborhood and builds a great golf course.   We all want to escape when we're on the golf course, but I can't understand how a few homes along a few holes requires a severe downgrade.   

  It would be hard for me to give any course a 10 which borders a neighborhood. That would eliminate Pinehurst. I prefer golf only. No houses no swimming pool.

[Bill Gayne]

The first six holes at Ballybunion are views of a graveyard, holiday homes, chain link fence with barbed wire pointing inward so you can't escape, and a large mobile home park. It's a ten in my book.

[Tom_Doak]

If Royal County Down should have been a 10 ... why have they been making changes to it? 

[Paul_Turner]

There's no such thing as a "bullet proof" golf course; no course has everything.

RCD certainly has as much good, and unique, golf to offer as many of the other "10s" in Tom's book.

I used to like assigning numbers to courses but have come to dislike it more and more.  B Darwin didn't need to, so why do we?

[Tom_Doak]

Paul:

I agree; no course has everything.  Or, in other words, golf is too big to put it all into 18 holes.

The problem is that a lot of clubs seem to want to try that ... to identify whatever is the course's "weakest link," and keep working on it until there is a different weakest link to work on.  It's a never-ending game.  That's part of what I was trying to say about Royal County Down.

Plus, nobody on this board writes anywhere near as well as Bernard Darwin.  He was a 10.  By comparison, nobody here is more than a 7.

[Ronald Montesano]

That would be why we're still working on our writing skills, Thomas; trying to eliminate the weaker links.

[Anthony Gray]

 You are expressing a bias to "middle-of-nowhere" golf courses.    No one wants to play a course that has homes lining both sides of fairways,   

  It would be hard for me to give any course a 10 which borders a neighborhood. That would eliminate Pinehurst. I prefer golf only. No houses no swimming pool.

  I totally agree with you. It is not a severe downgrade but simple not "dream golf".

[Ronald Montesano]

Although it in no way ranks as a Diez, Wachesaw East Plantation in south Myrtle Beach is an absolutely enjoyable and challenging round of golf, in spite of the fact that condos line the course.

[Paul_Turner]

Paul:

I agree; no course has everything.  Or, in other words, golf is too big to put it all into 18 holes.

The problem is that a lot of clubs seem to want to try that ... to identify whatever is the course's "weakest link," and keep working on it until there is a different weakest link to work on.  It's a never-ending game.  That's part of what I was trying to say about Royal County Down.

Plus, nobody on this board writes anywhere near as well as Bernard Darwin.  He was a 10.  By comparison, nobody here is more than a 7.

Tom

Do you think The Confidential Guide would have been a success (or as successful) without the Doak Scale?  Did it need the numbers to be controversial or would the prose have been enough?

[Anthony Gray]

  It would be hard for me to give any course a 10 which borders a neighborhood. That would eliminate Pinehurst. I prefer golf only. No houses no swimming pool.

Interesting standard... but does it need to be absolute?

TH

   Not absolute. But where would you rather kiss your dream girl on a desert island or in someones backyard?

[Tom_Doak]

Paul T:

The whole purpose of the Doak Scale was as a kind of shorthand, so I could use the rest of the page to write about whatever I wanted to without having to say "I love Pebble Beach but ..."  Giving the course a 9 accomplished that in one character, and allowed me to write about aspects of the course that I found interesting.

Ultimately, though, the numbers made the book a lot more controversial, and that probably made it more successful (or at least sought-after) as well.

Anthony:

Obviously, I disagree that you can't have a 10 in a residential development, since I put Pinehurst in that category.  I don't really have a problem with you saying that for you it is a disqualifier for "10" status ... but I do think it's a problem when I run into panelists (there are many) for whom it disqualifies courses as a top 100 contender or best-new-course contender.  It's akin to the baseball writers who won't consider a pitcher for MVP, even though the rules don't make any distinction -- it skews the voting.

[Ronald Montesano]

To bring us closer to Doak's Darwinian model, it's not a desert island (an island covered with sand) but a deserted island (one that is devoid of people.) 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desert_island

A dessert island, however, would easily be the most enticing.

[Bob_Huntley]

  It would be hard for me to give any course a 10 which borders a neighborhood. That would eliminate Pinehurst. I prefer golf only. No houses no swimming pool.

That would eliminate Cypress Point also - houses to the right of #2, behind #8.

Interesting standard... but does it need to be absolute?

TH

Tom,

Also behind No.2 and to the right of No.4 and behind the 5th Tee.


Bob

[Matt_Ward]

Tom D:

Curious since you have played RCD fairly recently -- do you see the course still as 9 according to your standards?

Second question - can changes / improvements be carried out and further enhance a course? I'm speaking about a good bit more than simply widening fairways and removing trees, and issue of that type. More about specific hole improvements.

FYI -- I think having the numbers no doubt added a bit of controversy but it also provided some greater level of understanding on how different courses size up against one another. Plenty of 19th hole discussions begin and end with such comments from golfers when assessing different courses.