David:
Well, that's the first time I've heard Cape Kidnappers called "bland". I guess there's a first time for everything! You are probably right that most people would prefer Barnbougle, because it's got the classic linksy contours which most people here enjoy. The ground at Cape Kidnappers is just a tilted plain (with the deep eroded valleys coming back into the plain, creating the "fingers" everyone talks about). There is not a lot of undulation in most fairways on the back nine, whereas on the front nine most of them dip into the heads of the valleys. But that's one thing I like about Cape Kidnappers -- it's not just another links course, it's really not like anyplace else, and I think that's why it winds up so high in the rankings. (That, and it's an absolutely first-class operation in every respect.)
Adam:
You are criticizing Matt's judgment of the course but YOU haven't been there either. And your speculation is incorrect ... the fairway area of the 15th is about as flat as it could be, as is the rough to the left. (The rough to the right works off the top of the bank and starts down toward the trees.) We DID consider less fairway and more rough to keep the ball on top, as someone suggested, but even that doesn't help much when you are landing a 320-yard tee shot on a hard surface!
Brett:
Cape Kidnappers is NOT rocky ... I never saw a rock there. There's about eight inches of topsoil over a very weird subsoil that we think is some sort of volcanic material. It is HIGHLY erodable and that's why those valleys between the holes are so deep ... the valleys actually come to a V point at the bottom. Most of the land is tilted toward the ocean at 2 to 4 percent, and sometimes tilted to one side or the other just a bit. The only drainage pipe on the course is under the greens and bunkers ... for everything else we relied on surface drainage to one of the valleys, sometimes requiring some subtle reshaping to get it to drain. On #15 where we did do some subtle work we tried to get the water off to the right, so we wouldn't take a chance of the cliff face eroding further. A little bit of the cliff face along that edge collapsed a year or two after we built the course, which is why it's fenced off!