Well, the mighty Buda caravan swung into RSG yesterday. Today the good gents have been at Deal and are partaking as I write of a fine clubhouse dinner while some of us had to retire to earn a crust. The ROW team were leading after yesterday but lets hope the GB&I boys have fought back!
Anyway - we were blessed with a spectacular day at RSG. I have posted pictures on this course before but in the afternoon with wonderful light i could not stop myself snapping away again.
The strongest impression I took away from this visit was that the actual playable surface of a number of the greens was actually very small. A few examples would include 9, 11 and 15 ( a remarkably small green for a 490 yard hole). The overall size of some of these greens is reasonable (though not large considering the scale of the course) but they are dramatically reduced by severe slopes, run-offs etc.
Yesterday afternoon at RSG was one of those really special occasion that warms the golfing soul!
Here are a few snaps to savour. If you want commentary I refer you to Ran's excellent Oct 2007 Course review.
Approach to 2
A view of the short 3rd
The wonderful rolling 4th fairway
The tee shot on 5, with the green hidden in the distance behind the dunes
The 7th fairway with trademark coolling stations in the distance
Watching the world go by...
Mark Chaplin tees off 7 and Tiger Bernhardt admires..
The 8th green
The extraordinary 9th green from the side
Approach to 9 (i think!)
Another view of 10 - this time taken right from the bottom of the course.
more to follow....