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Sean_A

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Re: St George's: built to rival St Andrews
« Reply #50 on: November 10, 2009, 10:28:04 AM »
Looking at the aerial, note the 13th green at RstG in the bottom right corner. First, it's huge. Second, it's a perfect rectangle. Wow.

What is the date of the picture?

Bob

 

Bob

I too noticed the size of the #14's green and the rectangular nature of it as well.  I also noticed some of the very square bunkering on Princes.  I don't think Princes was built until 1905/10ish so this photo must be later.  

I think I remember that the Suez being re-directed.  It is after all just a drainage ditch!

Ciao
« Last Edit: November 10, 2009, 10:30:40 AM by Sean Arble »
New plays planned for 2024: Nothing

Jamie Barber

Re: St George's: built to rival St Andrews
« Reply #51 on: November 10, 2009, 10:30:31 AM »
Gene Sarazen's autobiography has a long hole by hole description of Prince's, where he won the 1932 Open Championship with an ancient caddy.  It's a great story.  There was one par 5 with a blind second shot where Sarazen made at least one eagle and a couple of birdies, whacking his brassie over the dune.
Yeah that was the old 11th I think. It now plays different and the blind carry is gone. I found this old drawing of the teeshot. The outline of those bunkers still exist, but now they lie between two holes so not in play. A sad loss IMHO

Bill_McBride

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: St George's: built to rival St Andrews
« Reply #52 on: November 10, 2009, 10:51:11 AM »
Gene Sarazen's autobiography has a long hole by hole description of Prince's, where he won the 1932 Open Championship with an ancient caddy.  It's a great story.  There was one par 5 with a blind second shot where Sarazen made at least one eagle and a couple of birdies, whacking his brassie over the dune.
Yeah that was the old 11th I think. It now plays different and the blind carry is gone. I found this old drawing of the teeshot. The outline of those bunkers still exist, but now they lie between two holes so not in play. A sad loss IMHO


Thanks, Jamie.  That drawing is by Rowntree from Bernard Darwin's "Golf Courses of the British Isles."

From Darwin's description, it sounds as though it might have been the 8th hole:  "At the eighth we need not place the shot with quite such dreadful accuracy, but instead we must hit prodigiously hard and far, for after we have hit the tee shot a steep hill rears its sandy face between us and the hole, and a really fine carrying brassey shot is needed if we are to be on the green.  It is more like a Sandwich hole than a Princes hole....this eighth brings back memories of the mighty Alps at Prestwick...."

He goes on to describe the 11th as "another good hole, where, if we push our drive far enough out to the right over the big hills, we may hope to pout our second on the green, where it nestles amid a guard of hummocks."

I guess it could be either hole, both sound like great blind second shots, but I don't recall the drive as being blind on Sarazen's hole.  I'll have to get his book out and take a look!

Jamie Barber

Re: St George's: built to rival St Andrews
« Reply #53 on: November 10, 2009, 11:10:01 AM »
Yes that's right.

OK so he does mean the 8th. I had heard he eagled this but wasn't sure. This was the hole with the Himalaya bunkers (there were some pictures of those posted on here somewhere). What threw me was the designation as a par5; I don't have the yardage but thought it would be a rather short 5 (maybe 450 yds?) - still no mean feat with a Haskell!!

The tee is now the 2nd of Himalayas which is a sharp dogleg left. The original routing was straight, over what is now the 9th tee, to the double-green of the current 4th and 8th. Attached is a Google maps view, the red lines are the current routings (2nd, 4th, 8th and 9th), the blue are the old 8th and 11th. The blue splodge is where the Himalaya bunkers would have been, but that dune had the top flattened post war for the new tee. The blue circles are indentations where I believe bunkers once were (the three at the bottom are the ones in the drawing)

Scott Warren

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: St George's: built to rival St Andrews
« Reply #54 on: November 10, 2009, 11:15:27 AM »
Jami, I've said it before and I'll say it again: I'd LOVE to see 8Hims become a short DLR par four, with the 9th tee moved onto the site of the present 8th green and those three bunkers re-instated.!

Bill_McBride

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: St George's: built to rival St Andrews
« Reply #55 on: November 10, 2009, 11:15:49 AM »
Yes that's right.

OK so he does mean the 8th. I had heard he eagled this but wasn't sure. This was the hole with the Himalaya bunkers (there were some pictures of those posted on here somewhere). What threw me was the designation as a par5; I don't have the yardage but thought it would be a rather short 5 (maybe 450 yds?) - still no mean feat with a Haskell!!

The tee is now the 2nd of Himalayas which is a sharp dogleg left. The original routing was straight, over what is now the 9th tee, to the double-green of the current 4th and 8th. Attached is a Google maps view, the red lines are the current routings (2nd, 4th, 8th and 9th), the blue are the old 8th and 11th. The blue splodge is where the Himalaya bunkers would have been, but that dune had the top flattened post war for the new tee. The blue circles are indentations where I believe bunkers once were (the three at the bottom are the ones in the drawing)

Very very cool, thanks for the aerial and annotations.  I'm sorry we didn't have a chance to play Princes during the Buda, it would have been fun to stand on the current 9th tee and imagine those brassie shots flying over the dune! 

That little part of Kent is a treasure trove, I envy you fellows playing there all the time.

Jamie Barber

Re: St George's: built to rival St Andrews
« Reply #56 on: November 10, 2009, 11:19:14 AM »
Jami, I've said it before and I'll say it again: I'd LOVE to see 8Hims become a short DLR par four, with the 9th tee moved onto the site of the present 8th green and those three bunkers re-instated.!

Yep I agree, although actually the ones I pointed out to you are not the Himalaya bunkers as I first thought, those were in fact on the old 8th as per the blue splodge.

I wonder why Bridgland was so anti-blind golf when commisioning the rebuild? You would have thought he'd have keep those two at least.

Scott Warren

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: St George's: built to rival St Andrews
« Reply #57 on: November 10, 2009, 11:23:54 AM »
Yeah, I recall you correcting me on that a while back. I remember walking off the 8th and looking at that drive, up and over, thinking how cool it could be.

With the course so quiet usually, you could have some fun playing old holes and making up new ones!

Jamie Barber

Re: St George's: built to rival St Andrews
« Reply #58 on: November 10, 2009, 11:56:29 AM »
The plan for captain's day this year is to try to play the original routing where possible (one green and many tees are lost). The quietness may soon be a thing of the past, since Troongolf took over it's noticeably busier (which is good for the club)

Bill_McBride

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: St George's: built to rival St Andrews
« Reply #59 on: November 10, 2009, 12:20:22 PM »
The plan for captain's day this year is to try to play the original routing where possible (one green and many tees are lost). The quietness may soon be a thing of the past, since Troongolf took over it's noticeably busier (which is good for the club)

Is that the American management company?  ??? :o

Jamie Barber

Re: St George's: built to rival St Andrews
« Reply #60 on: November 10, 2009, 02:06:02 PM »
Yes, the course remains privately owned, but they now run it. It's not a members' club like Deal. Actually, I think it will be good, they have an experienced team and already they've done quite a lot of course maintenance on the fairways which should be good for next year. They run Turnberry so have some links pedigree

Mark Chaplin

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: St George's: built to rival St Andrews
« Reply #61 on: November 10, 2009, 04:16:55 PM »
Jamie - I think it is common to have far less bunkers, looking at plans of Deal from the 1910s and 1920s there were literally hundreds of bunkers, the 14th had around 15 bunkers alone. We must remember though these were often no more than roungh sandy areas as opposed to the neaty revetted style we see today.
Cave Nil Vino

Andrew Mitchell

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re: St George's: built to rival St Andrews
« Reply #62 on: November 11, 2009, 03:22:17 AM »
I've played both The Old Course and Royal St George's this year but don't feel I know either of them well enough to say I have a preference for one over the other.  RSG has more spectacular dunes, particularly on the front 9, and certainly I think it's the best course I've played in England.  However there is something magical but intangible about TOC.

One thing both have in common is that you walk off the 18th green with a desire to walk over to the first tee and start again.
2014 to date: not actually played anywhere yet!
Still to come: Hollins Hall; Ripon City; Shipley; Perranporth; St Enodoc

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