Distinctive Course Features at Castle Stuart

[Mike_Cirba]

Wow...they say the devil's in the details but those architectural details look pretty heavenly to me.

[Adrian_Stiff]

The £150 market will be severley tested in this economic tsunami. If it worked at £150 when this was planned, things have taken a considerable turn for the worse. USA visitors have the benifit of a good dollar...we have a crap currency and within a few months we might see parity with the dollar and even two euros equal to three pounds....The course is absolutely outstanding. Sean is right from a UK perspective there will be fewer punters, factor also whilst this is a great course it has a dreadfull location, Inverness is a nine hour drive from the south.

[Bill_McBride]

The £150 market will be severley tested in this economic tsunami. If it worked at £150 when this was planned, things have taken a considerable turn for the worse. USA visitors have the benifit of a good dollar...we have a crap currency and within a few months we might see parity with the dollar and even three euros equal to two pounds....The course is absolutely outstanding. Sean is right from a UK perspective there will be fewer punters, factor also whilst this is a great course it has a dreadfull location, Inverness is a nine hour drive from the south.

Adrian, that's why I'm thinking you may see more American groups setting up up in Dornoch or Inverness for a week and playing that rota from Brora down to Castle Stuart and Nairn - and maybe even over to Cruden Bay for Anthony! 

[Anthony Gray]

  There is a lot of talk about the price. This course is CLASS. I believe it will crack the next top 100. It is on par with the the other courses that charge the same.

  Anthony

[David_Tepper]

Adrian Stiff -

I beg to differ re: the location of Castle Stuart. It is less than a 7-minute drive from Inverness Airport. I believe there are now low cost flights between Inverness and Gatwick, Luton, Bristol and Dublin, as well as Edinburgh and Glasgow. I expect there will be direct flights from Inverness to the Continent (possibly Amsterdam or Stockholm) within the next year or two. It is about a 90-minute drive from Aberdeen Airport to Castle Stuart.

As Tom Dunne said so eloquently, it is a shame the commercial aspect of the Castle Stuart project seems to take over these threads, especially as this discussion group is dedicated to GCA.

I toured the entire course last May. The routing and design of the course is exceptional. It would not surprise me at all if CS is considered to be one of the top dozen seaside courses in the British Isles within the next 3-5 years.   

DT

[Matt Day]

love the irony of the music selected for the course tour - fanfare for the common man playing in the background whilst you look at a the course that costs 150 quid to play


having said that is looks very, very nice....

[Mark Chaplin]

Ben - For US players £150 maybe a small percentage of the cost of a trip but with other venues you also buy pedigree. We only need some more world conflict/terrorism and the US market tends to shrink back into it's own shores.

David Tepper - Golf clubs cost around £25 per flight on "budget" airlines or the cost of a day at a very pleasant golf club for a return trip.

Dornoch is one of the world's great courses at a fraction of the price. A great course may have been produced but if the money doesn't stack up it may not last in it's designed form.

[Neil_Crafter]

An inspiring presentation.
I had never associated the word 'rumple' with undulations before, but I can see what they are on about and rumple does seem the appropriate term.
Well done to Gil, Mark and the team.

[Adrian_Stiff]

The flight times are not kind from Bristol or Lundunn, probably £150 with clubs and tax and you can't do a one dayer, so I suspect a 4 would take on the 8 hour car journey and do it as a package coupled with the other great courses up there. Are the Dornoch's, Cruden bay's very popular with English golfers?

[Rich Goodale]

I think it is a good (if maybe too extensive) listing of the characteristics of most links courses.  I doubt if more than a very few of them are "distinctive" relative to Castle Stuart.  What are the key (and possibly distinctive) features of the course can and will only be determined by the golfers who play the course, over time.  For the designers to do so before the course is even open is a bit cheeky.

As for the pricing, I see from their website that there are lower prices for locals (£50) and people living in other parts of Scotland (£90).

[Tim Nugent]

As they say, "you get what you pay for".  A segment of the golfing public seeks out Trophy Courses in which they only ever play once or twice.  It seems they will pay just about anything for the opportunity.  THe question boils down to whether or not they can consistantly draw enough of these players, year after year.  Rich points out the second tier pricing for locals - with whom they hope to fill in the tee sheet with. 

The difficult part of the equation rests in the "competition".  Afterall, they are chasing the same Pound.   This may have a greater impact on the foreign tourist golfer than the local as it has been stated earlier, pricing of goods and services in Isles is numerically equal, it's just that the Pound cost 1.5-2x's the Dollar.  And tourists tend to go for petigree - which a new offering like CS doesn't have.  Oh sure, in the first couple years they will get the golfophiles (like GCAer's) but after the must see it guys have come and gone, it still must have enough to compete against the Dornachs of the area.  Only time will tell.

It seems there are 2 schools of high-end course pricing.  One is to price yours higher than the rest.  This is to attract those who equate price with quality.  This is fine as long the quality does equal the price.
The other school of thought is to price it just below the most expensive.  This is a bit more forgiving and attract those who would otherwise not come.  Also, golfers tend to be less critical thecheaper the fee.

All that said, I know Gil has been working diligently on this project and even secured the grow-in super from KB.  His attention to the detail is high and I believe he has actually gone out on a limb with some of his techniques.  Rather risky on such a great site because if you don't pull it off, it's a crime.  However, if you do (and I believe he did) your a genous.

One thing that did scare me was the scorecard.  It seemed that the White (second tee from back) was rather long at 6800+  with the green at 6100+.  Then, upon closer examination, I noticed that the in yardage was longer than that of the back tee and adding it up manually, found it to be a tyypo and the white course is really 6500+.

[David_Tepper]

Adrian Stiff -

Bandon Dunes is arguably the most successful golf resort development in the U.S. (if not the world) over the past 10 years. By most travel standards, it is in a VERY remote location. People do often drive 8 hours from the San Francisco Bay Area for a weekend of golf at Bandon.

As I mentioned earlier, Castle Stuart is very close to Inverness Airport and is reachable from virtually airport in the British Isles in no more than a 90 minute flight. With courses such as Nairn (15 minutes away by car), Moray Old (30 minutes away), Fortrose (30 minutes away), Tain, Dornoch, Golspie & Brora (50-75 minutes away), it is not hard to imagine CS will become part of a long weekend of golf for many golfers visiting the Highlands.

Time will tell.

DT

[Tim Nugent]

David, I would tend to agree.  For a place to become a destination, there needs to be a certain critical mass of venues to justifiy the travel expense.  Hence the reason Keiser didn't stop after building one course at Bandon and is currently building #4 (wouldn't be surprised to see #5,6,7, & .  Same with Pinehurst, Monterey, Phoenix, etc.  The same reason why car dealers tend to cluster around one another.
If I'm spending the money and time to fly from Chicago to Glascoe, I'm definately going to be there for a week or 2 and pro-rate that expense and the food/lodging/car rental expense against the number of courses I'm planning on playing. So there needs to be enough options to attract me.  The closer they are to one another the more it allows me to get 36 in on the same day.  If I have to travel a bit, like to Dornach, I'd probably play the Struie too because at that point, time is more valuable than money.

[Adrian_Stiff]

Adrian Stiff -

Bandon Dunes is arguably the most successful golf resort development in the U.S. (if not the world) over the past 10 years. By most travel standards, it is in a VERY remote location. People do often drive 8 hours from the San Francisco Bay Area for a weekend of golf at Bandon.

As I mentioned earlier, Castle Stuart is very close to Inverness Airport and is reachable from virtually airport in the British Isles in no more than a 90 minute flight. With courses such as Nairn (15 minutes away by car), Moray Old (30 minutes away), Fortrose (30 minutes away), Tain, Dornoch, Golspie & Brora (50-75 minutes away), it is not hard to imagine CS will become part of a long weekend of golf for many golfers visiting the Highlands.

Time will tell.

DT

David- The UK mindset is miles different for travelling. Inverness airport is not convienent, flights are not cheap, they are infrequent, and mid-day times from Bristol and London (the south). The highlands and 8 hours drive will be a massive deterent for southerners. I had never heard of Bandon Dunes until I visited this site, for the UK we do not know it (someone from the UK please don't say 'ive heard of it'.. I don't mean it literally) it is just to remote, from the UK Myrtle Beach is the big name, 16 of us were planning a US trip, I lost 15-1 on going to Bandon and we never even got to price...the 5 hour drive from the airport killed it.  

Time will tell, we have a saying in the UK.. location, location, location.

Gorgeous course though.

[Sean_A]

Adrian Stiff -

Bandon Dunes is arguably the most successful golf resort development in the U.S. (if not the world) over the past 10 years. By most travel standards, it is in a VERY remote location. People do often drive 8 hours from the San Francisco Bay Area for a weekend of golf at Bandon.

As I mentioned earlier, Castle Stuart is very close to Inverness Airport and is reachable from virtually airport in the British Isles in no more than a 90 minute flight. With courses such as Nairn (15 minutes away by car), Moray Old (30 minutes away), Fortrose (30 minutes away), Tain, Dornoch, Golspie & Brora (50-75 minutes away), it is not hard to imagine CS will become part of a long weekend of golf for many golfers visiting the Highlands.

Time will tell.

DT

David

I could be wrong, but I get the impression that Bandon does very well in the return visit business and its the only resort in the North America where a golfer can get a bit of of links action.  Of course, the Highlands is only one of many destinations a golfer could hit in GB&I - this is why I think the return business aspect of CS is important.  Its a good idea to reduce the fee for more local golfers to reduce what I can only assume the owners of CS expect to be a bit of lull in business.  In any case, I will certainly place CS on the agenda for the next time we think of visiting the Highlands as I am one of those guys that returns to places until the price gets too high for what I want - one such course being Muirfield.  In any case #2, I am waiting for those guys who want an architectural discussion to kick things off.  I would like to know the skinny.

Ciao

[David_Tepper]

Adrian -

I am the guy who makes 2 round trips a year between San Francisco and Dornoch, so clearly we have a different perception of the time, effort and expense involved with travel!

DT

 

[Adrian_Stiff]

Adrian -

I am the guy who makes 2 round trips a year between San Francisco and Dornoch, so clearly we have a different perception of the time, effort and expense involved with travel!

DT

 

David- Your passion for golf as many others on here is never in question, it is just are there enough in these times of less money and less surplus money Castle Stuart is a lot more than a £150 experience for a southerner (if this course was in the South, ofcourse it would work) .

[David_Tepper]

Adrian -

I know there is at least one London-based GCA-er who flies up from London with a group of 8 each May for a golf weekend in the Highlands. They fly up on Friday, play 36 at Brora on Saturday, play 36 at Royal Dornoch on Sunday, play 18 at Dornoch on Monday morning and fly back to London from Inverness on Monday afternoon.

I have no idea how many more groups make a similar trip each year. I suspect there might be more than you think.

As to whether groups like this will include a round a Castle Stuart in their future trips, of course, remains to be seen.

DT   

[Niall C]

Let me make a couple of comments on the economics of golf tourism before I ask the architectural question.

Firstly, as Rich observed, Kingsbarns (the Castle Stuart prototype) gives concessions to locals etc. I've played it 4 or 5 times and have yet to pay more than £40. I believe the published green fee is well over £100. Unfortunately it seems the overseas player is subsidising the home player, so thank you all for coming 

Secondly, I heard from a member at Royal Troon that by this time of year they normally have 85% of their available visitor times for the season pre-booked. They are currently at 40% which suggests to me that Castle Stuart is going to have its work cut getting established if a course like Troon is down in numbers.

The point I would really like to ask though is on the blowout/waste bunkers round the greens. To my eye this looks like a rather romanticised idea of how links golf used to be. I can't think of any other course that has this feature. Indeed the only links course I've had any experience of "natural" bunkers is Silloth and they were no where near the greens (and yes I'm discounting those obvious natural sandy wastes called beaches).

Can anyone give an example ?

Niall

[Sean_A]

The point I would really like to ask though is on the blowout/waste bunkers round the greens. To my eye this looks like a rather romanticised idea of how links golf used to be. I can't think of any other course that has this feature. Indeed the only links course I've had any experience of "natural" bunkers is Silloth and they were no where near the greens (and yes I'm discounting those obvious natural sandy wastes called beaches).

Can anyone give an example ?

Niall

Niall

While I wouldn't call some of the so called blow out bunkers by that name (as they are contained), I too was trying to think of examples of blowout sand.  I know many links used to have this feature until golfers felt it was more important to have grass on the course.  Does Barnbougle have a few blowout areas>  How bout Pacific Dunes?

Ciao

[David_Tepper]

Niall -

You have raised a valid point re: the blowout bunkers at CS.

The course is very exposed to the wind. My guess is it does/will get VERY windy there at times. It will be interesting to see if they have a problem with too much sand being blown out of these less structured bunkers.

DT

[Tom_Doak]

Niall / Sean:

Pacific Dunes has some large blowout areas (such as in front of the second tee and to the right of the 13th hole) which are native to the site.  These are not quite stable and so generally we tried to keep them away from the greens for fear we'd get a green buried with sand in a gale.  They do change with the winds over time, which gives them a unique look compared to most golf courses ... but eventually some of the bunkers are gutted out by the wind until they're too deep, and it's very hard to keep those the way you want them.  Which, again, is why they're better as fairway hazards than next to a green.

At Barnbougle we CREATED some blowouts to the edges of the fairways, mostly to give a wider area in which to find your tee shot.  We were on a very bare-bones irrigation budget there and the marram grass off the fairways was so thick that we looked upon some open sand as an inexpensive temporary solution.  I hear they have cleaned up a couple of those areas but alas, I haven't been back in a while to see them.

[Sean_A]

Niall / Sean:

Pacific Dunes has some large blowout areas (such as in front of the second tee and to the right of the 13th hole) which are native to the site.  These are not quite stable and so generally we tried to keep them away from the greens for fear we'd get a green buried with sand in a gale.  They do change with the winds over time, which gives them a unique look compared to most golf courses ... but eventually some of the bunkers are gutted out by the wind until they're too deep, and it's very hard to keep those the way you want them.  Which, again, is why they're better as fairway hazards than next to a green.

At Barnbougle we CREATED some blowouts to the edges of the fairways, mostly to give a wider area in which to find your tee shot.  We were on a very bare-bones irrigation budget there and the marram grass off the fairways was so thick that we looked upon some open sand as an inexpensive temporary solution.  I hear they have cleaned up a couple of those areas but alas, I haven't been back in a while to see them.

Tom

I suspected there may be some blowouts on BD and PD. 

I did see a proper blowout at Pennard once.  One of the dunes left of the 3rd fairway before the dogleg gave way and sand was all over the fairway - it was wild.  The club quickly built a wooden wall to shore up the erosion because as you know the turf at Pennard cannot afford any other inhibitors to growth. 

I went to the BD website to have a look at some blowouts, but I couldn't see any.  I did notice that to play 18 and stay in a cabin costs about £85.  Is this not one of the great deals in golf???

Ciao

[Tom_Doak]

Yes, I do think Barnbougle right now is a real bargain in the world of golf.  Sadly, the Australian golfers are so spoiled that they have to keep prices down in order to keep the course reasonably busy.  (And I say that as a proud 3% owner of Barnbougle Dunes.)

St. Andrews Beach failed primarily for that reason ... it didn't cost much at all to build, but the land costs were high and that makes it impossible to compete with the reasonable membership dues or green fees at other Australian courses.

[David_Tepper]

Sean -

The rate you see quoted for stay & play at Bandon is likely their winter rate. The charge during the summer season is probably 2 or 3 times as much.

DT