[Chris DeNigris]

More anticipation! I just made a provisional booking at North Berwick for our last round on upcoming Scotland trip. TOC was closed to visitors(first choice) but this should be a suitable sub.

Already daydreaming of stone walls...

CD

[PCCraig]

Every time a trip or round is planned more than a couple weeks out I get pumped. More often than not I'm excited for the company I'm with and where we are going, not always the golf courses themselves first.

My next big trip I'm getting pumped for? My bachlor party in Pinehurst in late July. (9 guys, 1 house, 2 courses, and a closet full of beer and wine).

[tlavin]

1.  Seminole (actually got rained out, but waited hours before decision was made...
2.  Sand Hills (the drive from North Platte to Mullen was ALL anticipation.)
3.  Cypress (If I was thinking clearly, I would have brought a change of boxers)
4.  Los Angeles CC (I wound up playing alone with a caddie, I let him play out of my bag and he beat me for a hundo!)
5.  Cherry Hills (this was my first "big" course and still is a sentimental favorite, I left with a club towel, ashtray, shoe horn and just about anything else that wasn't nailed down.)

[Anthony Gray]

  Jordan,

  Great question....I got to St Andrews on a sunday and walked the course. Most know that TOC is closed on sunday. It was so peaceful. Noone else was on the course. There was a slight drizel and as I was walking and thankfully praying I looked up and there was an awesome rainbow. What a wonderful moment. I enjoyed golfing the next day but it did not compare to the day before.

  Anthony

[J_ Crisham]

In Eire, RCD was pretty amazing-worried that it might be too hard for a 12hcp. It was! In Scotland, The Old Course was all it was billed as. In the US I would say I was a bit unsure of what to expect at my first KP (last year, 2008) at MPCC. I had seen the course many times from driving along 17 mile drive but playing with a group of guys whom I had never met other than on the internet was both exciting but unsettling. It turned out great. That being said I have taken 6 trips since then with GCA guys and what a great group of people to play and discuss golf with.                               Jack
                                                             

[Brent Carlson]

The Old Course.  It is the home of golf.  Standing on the 1st tee has to be the most anticipated feeling in golf. 

[David Stamm]

CPC- Did not sleep at all the night before and it blew my lofty expectations away. I kept staring at the hotel celing and wondering what I would hit into 16!

Riviera -See above, minus 16 and insert 10!

Garden City- Flew all nght on a red eye, crashed in buddy's hotel I was playing with for a couple of hours and then went to the course. I knew from TN that I would like the course, but I didn't think it would have the impact on me that it did. Awesome!

Valley Club- I had wanted to play it for a long time and finally it became a reality. What a day!

LACC- I got rooked years ago to play LACC, but didn't realize what a great course I had lost out on playing until I got into arch and reading about Thomas. I was very fortunate to get such a great opportunity again and it was wonderful!

Pebble Beach- Kept thinking about how lucky I was to have such a wonderful wife who understood what spending a small fortune to do this meant to me. She had Hotelling's book waiting for me in our hotel when I finished and had the head pro sign it for me. What a woman....

[Jeff Doerr]

CPC- Did not sleep at all the night before and it blew my lofty expectations away. I kept staring at the hotel celing and wondering what I would hit into 16!

Is there any other course that combines course anticipation with hole anticipation better than CPC?

Driving up the understated entrance road and then crossing 17 mile drive through the tree tunnels. There cannot be a better course and hole anticipation pairing than that.

[Jordan Wall]

I remember anticipating playing with Tom Doak.

I was young, immature, and had a lot to learn.  But that day, Tom took me in and was everything I had imagined.  I remember giving him a hug when I met him, taking him I'm sure by shock.  The course was so much fun, and with all the media I didn't know what to think.  Then I got to play the back nine with the Pops, thanks again to Tom and the wonderful Tumble Creek staff.

The entire month leading up to that day I was so excited.  Every day, twice or more a day, I was on Tumble Creek's website.  I remembered I found out on Mother's Day I was going to be Tom's guest and was just ecstatic the whole month.  That was still one of the best days of my life.  I wish I could go back to that day more mature as I am today but the fact that such a person of fame and identity would do that for me as a little sixteen year old is something I will always cherish and never forget.  And the anticipation was all worth it.


Recently, Riviera had the same effect.  And it was amazing.

[Brad Wilbur]

About 15 years ago, a friend and I scheduled a trip to Pebble for a weekend in December.  In regards to golf, we are somewhat like the two guys in the movie "Sideways".  I spent the month before analyzing each hole, and remembering the historic golf shots played from spots on the course.  My friend just showed up and said "Wow, this is nice"!  We got in Spyglass and Spanish Bay as well, but there wasn't the same feeling heading to the first tee.  It also was fun eating breakfast in the cafe that overlooks the first tee.  A higher percentage of those players hitting off the back tees had poor drives than those from the regular tees.  You could just see in the back tee boys eyes that this was going to be their chance to prove their golfing greatness, and the pressure did them in.

[Tim Bert]

I remember anticipating playing with Tom Doak.

I was young, immature, and had a lot to learn.  But that day, Tom took me in and was everything I had imagined.  I remember giving him a hug when I met him, taking him I'm sure by shock.  The course was so much fun, and with all the media I didn't know what to think.  Then I got to play the back nine with the Pops, thanks again to Tom and the wonderful Tumble Creek staff.

The entire month leading up to that day I was so excited.  Every day, twice or more a day, I was on Tumble Creek's website.  I remembered I found out on Mother's Day I was going to be Tom's guest and was just ecstatic the whole month.  That was still one of the best days of my life.  I wish I could go back to that day more mature as I am today but the fact that such a person of fame and identity would do that for me as a little sixteen year old is something I will always cherish and never forget.  And the anticipation was all worth it.


Recently, Riviera had the same effect.  And it was amazing.

Now that's a cool story.  I'm planning to give Tom a hug each time we come around to the 1st tee of Old Mac on June 1st - all 3 times.

Don't worry, Tom.  Just kidding.

[Joe Bausch]

Perhaps the 'anticipation round' I am remembering most these days is due to the upcoming US Open at Bethpage.  About 2 years ago I went up with a former student of mine and his friend (a golfer at Fordham U) on a Friday night.  We arrived in the lot around 9 PM, I think, and got car slot #11 IIRC.  There was a real buzz around the clubhouse that evening with tons of people still milling around and hanging out at the patio.  Sleeping in an SUV is not my idea of comfort, but it was okay.  In the morning we got to the reservation window to find that a single was in car slot #2 and took the very first time tee (group #1 took a later morning slot) and needed three to fill it.  Well, we jumped at the chance to go out first.  The fellow we joined was a bit older and it was very hot already in the morning and he began to tire quickly.  On the 5th hole he said 'you guys go ahead on your own'.  So we have the course to ourselves and played in about 4h30m.  The morning sunlight lead to some real neat photos, which you can view at Frank Pont's GolfArchitecturePictures.com web site.

The experience and the course met my expectations initlally.  However, I must say that I've been back there 3 times since and the more I play the Black course, the less enthused I am about it.  There is not a whole lot of strategy, IMO, and it is pretty much "swing out of your boots" on most par 4's and 5's and hope you are hitting your shots very straight or you'll never break 80, heck, even 90 can be tough from the tips.

[Chip Gaskins]

off to bed tonight on long island...needless to say, it is with much much anticipation for tomorrow   nothing replaces the "kid in a candy store" feeling!

[James Boon]

When I was younger I would always play rubbish round any top courses I got to play, usually as I'd had no sleep the night before!

Having been lucky enough to play decent courses more often the anticipation is still their but seems to be a little less intense than when I was younger, that is until Royal County Down last year! A group of guys went over to play a competition there but we couldn't convince everyone to fork out for more than the one round at RCD so we played Ardglass the day before. I played rubbish though as all I was thinking about was RCD the next day! Late night with enough beers to make sure I got to sleep but not enough to give me a stonking hangover, but no good, up most of the night in anticipation! Up early, so walked the beach and a few holes while it was raining and had a rainbow moment like Anthony, above the Slieve Donard hotel!

  Jordan,
  Great question....I got to St Andrews on a sunday and walked the course. Most know that TOC is closed on sunday. It was so peaceful. Noone else was on the course. There was a slight drizel and as I was walking and thankfully praying I looked up and there was an awesome rainbow. What a wonderful moment. I enjoyed golfing the next day but it did not compare to the day before.
  Anthony

Started well, but played rubbish in the end, but never had such a big smile on my face while playing badly!

Cheers,

James

[Doug Wright]

What golf course did you most anticipate playing before you actually played it?

That course you thought about while you were sleeping and you counted the days for weeks before you played there.

AND..

Was it as good as you thought, expected, hoped for, etc.?

Just happened--Pine Valley

26 years ago--Pebble Beach


Was it as good as you thought, expected, hoped for, etc.?  Absolutely. Both were incredible experiences.

Interesting, if those experiences had been reversed, I might have had totally different reactions. I'm not sure I knew very much about Pine Valley in 1983, and playing Pebble for the first time in 2009 would have been very different because I've played a number of other fine courses in the interim that would take Pebble off the very top of the pedestal.

[Wayne Wiggins, Jr.]

Just focusing on this year, I'd have to say one of my most anticipated rounds this year is a dark-horse compared to the heavy-hitters listed in these previous posts (i.e. CPC, TOC, ANGC, et al.). 

Omaha CC was an absolute blast to play.  While I caught it a little early in the season, I thought Keith Foster's restoration provided great strategy off the tee, wonderful bunkering, and some demanding green complexes.  Definitely lsurpassed my anticipation.

[Ron Csigo]

I recently had the opportunity to play Fishers Island.  The 45 minute ferry ride from New London, CT to Fishers Island certainly heightens the anticipation of seeing this world beater course built on such an isolated piece of property.  Of coarse, the drive from central NJ to New London, CT that morning to catch a 9:00am ferry out of New London certainly gets the blood pumping.

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