"You'd be crucified...

[Tom_Doak]

Sean:

As long as I'm alive, there will be one architect who would build a course like St. Andrews.  And I hope to have the chance someday ... I just haven't seen the right venue for it yet.

[Steve_ Shaffer]

Wasn't Kelly Blake Moran's Lederach "inspired by St. Andrews?" When it opened, it didn't receive a rave review by Joe Logan when he was writing for the Inquirer. It did get a lot of "one and done" plays because of the severity of the greens and the center line bunkers.  I don't think the general golfing public was ready for it.It's a course that takes a few plays to learn and many did not want to return like my barber. He 4 putted the first green and said he had enough. The GCA outing there produced a different view of the course. We like quirk.


http://www.philly.com/philly/sports/golf/course_guide/6235852.html

[Matt MacIver]

Sean:

As long as I'm alive, there will be one architect who would build a course like St. Andrews.  And I hope to have the chance someday ... I just haven't seen the right venue for it yet.

Agreed and FTR I'm game for trying it too...of course I've likely broke MCirba's 4th commandment about posting while drinking...

[Matthew Runde]

Bryan:

Yes, you are right about that.  There are several things on The Old Course which would get a modern designer or course owner sued.  I'm not even sure we could get away with the first and eighteenth fairways together, as wide as they are.

[One interesting point about that is that the fact the holes are short really helps the safety situation.  The players on 1 & 18 aren't driving to the same part of the fairway ... players on 18 just have to worry about players walking down off the first tee, and vice versa.]

But, I don't think that's what the guys on TV have been saying.  They're not saying you'd be SUED for building holes that close together.  They're saying you'd be crucified for building features like those on a new course.  Which I believe is really sad.

Wouldn't it be possible to have all players sign waivers before playing?  It seems as though that could solve many problems.

[Sean_A]

Sean:

As long as I'm alive, there will be one architect who would build a course like St. Andrews.  And I hope to have the chance someday ... I just haven't seen the right venue for it yet.

Tom

Not to be a major venue you wouldn't.  I even doubt you would take on the risk of the saftey issues - which I hear more and more archies getting nervous about. Alright, you may build something like TOC without the saftey issues, but to me this is an integral part of TOC's charm and significance.  We have to consider TOC in all its contexts, not as only another one off like Painswick.

Ciao

[Steve Kline]

Every time I heard a comment like I started this thread with I felt it was in reference to the mounding, rolls, centerline bunkering, etc.  and not anything to do with double fairways, double greens or other liability issues. All the Bandon courses, Ballyneal, even Sandhills have many of the features that make TOC great (and TOC isn't great simply because of double fairways or double greens - would doubling the width and eliminating those features reduce its greatness?).

I think Doak is right. The guys making these comments don't bother seeing a course that isn't on Tour or suits their game. Because there seems to be a significant trend to build courses that have the ethos of TOC. I guess the comments really stood out to me because I had just played Ballyneal and it has many of the same features as TOC - always a safe roue, wild green contours in places, humps and bumps throughout the fairway, wind, centerline bunkers that are real hazards that you must avoid, etc.

[Bill_McBride]

 I sure don’t see many golf courses being built. Is it such a bad idea to study a course that cost less than 3M to build, can be cared for with 4 guys, (you’d need about double that if it were a busy public) is a blast to play…and didn’t require expensive “special” land?
You think if we can find a way to build good golf courses that are fun to play, on average land,  maintainable for ˝ of what is usually spent, we might get a few more dreamers to turn their dreams into sustainable reality. 

Don my man!  During my first round out at Wolf Point (while you were off barbequing lamb or hiding under trees or something), Mike and I were walking past Infierno when I asked him, "So how much of the this is really publicly viable?"  In what must be a typical Mike Nuzzo reaction, he said in a confident yet monotone voice, "Oh, about 98%", and then chcuckled to himself. 

He then spent a few minutes explaining what few things would need changing for WP to be a "public" idea.  I was flabbergasted at just how much of that course's ideas could be put into a public model. 

1% is probably the relatively small double green at 8/18.  Where else?  I can't think of anything.

[Adam Lawrence]

 I sure don’t see many golf courses being built. Is it such a bad idea to study a course that cost less than 3M to build, can be cared for with 4 guys, (you’d need about double that if it were a busy public) is a blast to play…and didn’t require expensive “special” land?
You think if we can find a way to build good golf courses that are fun to play, on average land,  maintainable for ˝ of what is usually spent, we might get a few more dreamers to turn their dreams into sustainable reality. 

Don my man!  During my first round out at Wolf Point (while you were off barbequing lamb or hiding under trees or something), Mike and I were walking past Infierno when I asked him, "So how much of the this is really publicly viable?"  In what must be a typical Mike Nuzzo reaction, he said in a confident yet monotone voice, "Oh, about 98%", and then chcuckled to himself. 

He then spent a few minutes explaining what few things would need changing for WP to be a "public" idea.  I was flabbergasted at just how much of that course's ideas could be put into a public model. 

1% is probably the relatively small double green at 8/18.  Where else?  I can't think of anything.

I think you'd have to formalise the teeing grounds a bit more, and you'd not be able to have tees on the apron on the previous green. Otherwise, I think the course could be opened for public play without any significant changes.

[Ben Sims]

1% is probably the relatively small double green at 8/18.  Where else?  I can't think of anything.

Bill,

I was thinking of how the rather large area of 1 fairway/green, 2 tee, 4 fairway/green and 5 tee/fairway would need to interact to make it a bit more defined.  I think the double green at 8/18 would be fine. 

[kconway]

could something like TOC be built on the flatter land running near the driving range at ballyneal?

[Tom_Doak]

kconway:

We've actually talked about that.  The contours are not the same as what's on The Old Course, but the scale is close to the same.

[kconway]

tom,

what would you consider the essential elements that would make a course like TOC?

kelly

[Tom_Doak]

what would you consider the essential elements that would make a course like TOC?

kelly

a)  The uneven stances in the fairways and the contouring around the greens would be the most difficult part.
b)  The severity of the bunkers.
c)  The "odd" placement of many bunkers being right in the fairway.
d)  Enough shrubbery to keep you focused on the hole you're playing [even if you can't always see over it].  If the course was just a giant open field of green, it would not have the same feel.

[kconway]

what about the double greens?

a)  The uneven stances in the fairways and the contouring around the greens would be the most difficult part. 
You get this at BN

b)  The severity of the bunkers.
Could riveted bunkers be maintained at BN

c)  The "odd" placement of many bunkers being right in the fairway.
This would seem easy enough

d)  Enough shrubbery to keep you focused on the hole you're playing [even if you can't always see over it].  If the course was just a giant open field of green, it would not have the same feel.
Not sure about that one

[Tom_Doak]

Kelly:

I am very proud of Ballyneal but it does not have nearly the same scale of contours as The Old Course.  Very few courses do, even for just a few holes out of the 18.  That's what makes St. Andrews so special.

Personally, I am not a big fan of double greens anywhere except St. Andrews.  On The Old Course they evolved naturally, and that makes them unique.  If you were trying to get the shared fairways of St. Andrews, then you'd have to have the double greens as well.  But you could just as easily spread the holes out more and build them wide with individual greens and still get the feel of the course.  I don't think the 150-foot putts from left to right are an essential feature of the course ... mostly wide and shallow greens, yes, but not THAT wide. 

It's very rare for anyone to really find the putting surface on the wrong half; it happens maybe once per tournament for the professionals, and less than once a round for amateurs, in my experience there.  On TV they just make a big deal out of it anytime it happens ... like hurricane warnings.

[Peter Pallotta]

Tom - thanks, it's fun to read your thinking on this,  but I am still surprised you'd consider giving such a course a go.  It seems like an enormous challenge, capturing the essential spirit while avoiding the label/criticism of a 'replica'.  But mostly, wouldn't the seeming lack of architectural artifice there at TOC be tough to embody? What I mean is, I'd imagine that you'd almost have to 'forget everything you knew' in order to make some of the choices the contributors to today's TOC have made over a couple of hundred years.  How does one get into the proper 'mindset'?

Peter 

[Tom_Doak]

Peter:

It would be so great to have a course in America that was really anything like St. Andrews.  I need somewhere to play when I retire.

You are right, that it would be hard to do such a thing.  Actually, the downside of trying to build it is that it would not be as fun as the real thing because as the architect I would be supposed to UNDERSTAND it all.  On The Old Course, no matter how well you know it, you're always learning a new facet.  Being the architect of a course that was comparable would not be as fun as it was for everyone else.

[Peter Pallotta]

Really interesting, Tom, thanks. One last question: could you imagine ever feeling comfortable NOT understanding it all, as the architect during the actual design and construction phase?  Is such a thing even possible, let alone desirable?

Peter   

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