Hardelot (Les Pins) - Tom Simpson on France's Channel coast (PICS)

[Frank Pont]

Michael,

very nice before-after animation, clearly shows the "unwrapping" effect of taking out the trees and shrubs on the hole and restoring the original scale of the bunkering.

Hope to show you many before and after pics of Hardelot with a similar effect in the next few years.

Andrew,

My colleague architect Patrice Boissonnas, with whom I did the work at Hardelot, will be joining GolfCliubAtlas shortly, and  as a true Frenchman maybe can give recommendations on where to stay, eat and drink at Le Touquet.

[Frank Pont]

Some more old pics courtesy of Christoph Meister, again please do not use without his permission.


Hardelot routing in 1931, notice holes 1 and 10 were switched, which makes logistics on holes 2 and 11 easier....


Hardelot hole 7 as it was......


... and as it is.

You can imagine this is one par 3 hole our hands are itching to get started restoring..... if we do our job right should be one of Simpsons most spectacular par 3's.

Also notice that the old picture says hole 16! Suggests that originally the two nines were switched.
Would not work today since in that case the last hole would not end in front of the clubhouse.

[Jim Tang]

Those are some sweet pics.  Thanks for sharing.  Love all the movement in the land.  The greens look relatively tame, with some tilt but not a lot of severe internal contouring.  True?

[Scott Warren]

Jim,

That is true, with a couple of exceptions.

The kind of greens where there aren't really any snakes, but you need to be careful for a little movement even on the short ones.

[Patrick Kiser]

Frank,

Wow that is some bold bunkering from back in '31.

It never ceases to amaze me on these classic courses how often we see the same story being played out with the loss of playing surfaces and the shrinking of bunkers.  It just goes to show how import and how big a difference the maintenance makes long term.

Fortunately, it looks like most if not all of the shaping is right there in the ground.  Would that be a fair statement from your perspective?

[Sean_Tully]

Frank-

Some nice pictures here to, amazing how different the bunkering has gotten from the original style on the 7th. Trees and housing in the second pic reminds me of the look around Spyglass!!

Here is some info that I have on the course at Hardelot when the first hole teed off from one of the towers of the castle! Looks like some of the old holes are on the current property, from a 1908 Golfer Magazine article on the course. Cool stuff.

Tully

[Frank Pont]

Sean,

interesting find. I knew there was a golf course at part of the Hardelot site before the current Simpson one, but I had not seen the details of it yet.

See the overlap of the castle and the roads between this Google Earth picture and your old layout. Basically holes 12-16 of the current course overlap with holes 2-7 of the old course.

[Frank Pont]

Fortunately, it looks like most if not all of the shaping is right there in the ground.  Would that be a fair statement from your perspective?

Patrick,

yes a lot of it is still there, but there have been capes removed, parts of the original green discarded, bunkers closed, new bunkers made, tree growth has been unchecked etc. So it will still need some major surgery to get it back into shape, and we will need to see if we can restore everything; access to and from the green is a bit of a bottleneck, and the old green was clearly designed for golfers/caddies carrying their bags....

[Ulrich Mayring]

The European Tour plays their Qualifying School at Les Pins currently and, suprising to me, the scores aren't all that low, considering the course plays at 6450 Yards:

http://www.europeantour.com/europeantour/qualifying/season=2012/tournamentid=2012985/leaderboard/index.html

Ulrich

[Sean_A]

Frank

How is the work coming along?

Ciao

[Frank Pont]

Frank

How is the work coming along?

Ciao

Sean, starting work on Hardelot middle of November, goal is to do the whole front nine this winter (tees, bunkers and green surrounds). Will be massive project, exciting and Patrice and I are really looking forward to it!

Last year we only did hole 5 of the front nine, it has grown in nicely this year. We also have started extending the greens into the more extreme areas bordering the green bunkers, thereby creating some exciting pin positions. I include some pics of hole 5 taken during the Q school in a separate post.

[Frank Pont]

Hole 5 as seen from the tees. You can see how the green has been extended out into the edges bordering the bunkers right and left



Detail of the large bunker right of the green



Hole 5 seen from the walk off to tee of hole 6 behind the green

[Sean_A]

Frank

How is the work coming along?

Ciao

Sean, starting work on Hardelot middle of November, goal is to do the whole front nine this winter (tees, bunkers and green surrounds). Will be massive project, exciting and Patrice and I are really looking forward to it!

Last year we only did hole 5 of the front nine, it has grown in nicely this year. We also have started extending the greens into the more extreme areas bordering the green bunkers, thereby creating some exciting pin positions. I include some pics of hole 5 taken during the Q school in a separate post.

Frank

Cheers.  I hope you will keep us apprised of the improvements.

Ciao

[Mike Viscusi]

Hi Frank,

Any further pictures from the Hardelot renovation?

[Frank Pont]

Going there again tomorrow, will try to make a lot of pics, hope to post something later this week.

[Scott Warren]

If you want to see just how Frank and Patrice are rediscovering the greatness of Hardelot - have a look at their Twitter feed. Some remarkable work so far.

https://twitter.com/IVGD1

Those visiting Hardelot around next month's Buda Cup are in for a real treat.

[Patrice Boissonnas]

I believe it's time to bring up Hardelot again as a lot of things have happened there since this thread was started.

Here is a quick recap if you don't feel like reading the whole thread all over again :
Last year, Frank Pont and I have been appointed to restore Simpson’s aesthetics and strategy.

Hardelot did not suffer dramatic changes over the years save for what time usually does to a golf course: encroaching trees, vanished bunkers, shrunk greens, narrowed fairways etc. A post war renovation also added some RTJ runway tees which will be replaced by more natural looking platforms.
Thank God the greens were very well preserved. They only would make a trip to Hardelot fully rewarding. In our opinion, Hardelot greens are among the best Simpson ever designed. Our job here is to leave them untouched and extend them back to their original sizes

With only 5900 meters from the tips and almost no room to stretch, Hardelot will never become long by modern standards. That said, we will bring the par down from 73 to 71 by converting 2 par 5s in par 4s (up to now, the course featured no less than 6 par 5s!) On top of that, we would like to implement a grass conversion program enabling the course to play faster and firmer.

Bunker renovation will be the most visually striking part of our work, all of them being rebuilt with typical Simpson lace edge style. Following the documentation we found (significant but sometimes incomplete), we try to replicate Simpson’s original bunker scheme but we do allow certain changes when necessary.

Here are some pictures and comments about the work we did last winter. Back nine restoration is programmed for this coming winter.


Hole 1:
Our main goal here was to bring back a strategy which had been lost due to excessive trees and an ill placed fairway bunker. Effectively, this reachable par 5 offered no real options from the tee. Players had to lay up short of the 1st bunker with a 3 wood before knocking another unlikely 3 wood into the green. If they don’t carry it all the way, a massive hump short of the green deflects most balls either left or right.

First, we moved the central fairway bunker 15 meters shorter so it’s now a risky yet possible carry from the tee for the long hitters.
Second, we cut trees all along the left side and widened the fairway by 10/15 meters opening a new route to the green. Long hitters will get a great shot at the green from anywhere left of the central fairway bunker and short of the 2nd fairway bunker on the left.
Alternatively, the right side of the fairway provides a safer drive but the 3rd fairway bunker on the left will put additional pressure on the 2nd shot.
The extended left green bunker is now as threatening as ever while the right green bunker has been moved forward to collect more inaccurate approach shots.


Hole 1 before restoration.


View from the 1st tee with new fairway extension on the left.


If you lay up short of the 1st fairway bunker, here is the shot !


An ideal drive will take you short of this 2nd fairway bunker. Your best chance to go for the green in two.


A threatening bunker just left of the green.

Hole 2:
Originally a par 5, this hole is now officially a par 4.
Although the 450 meters back tee remains opened for championships, we’ve built new forward tees for the regular players, including 2 new ladies tees.
Our main work on this hole was to scale down a large dune in the middle of the fairway which blinded the 2nd shot. The drive is now large and opened with no bunker while the long 2nd shot can be played in two ways : either safely to the left leaving natural tilt feeding back to the green, or straight at the pin with the risk of falling short right into a new grassy hollow.
Any player in the left green bunker will face a devilish downhill out.


When hole 2 was still a par 5.


Hole 2 now seen from men's tee. The dune on the fairway and its bunker are gone...


2nd shot into the green with renovated bunker on the left


hole 2 seen from behind the green with new grassy hollow in front of the green

Hole 3:
Few changes were made on this hole. We extended and redesigned the green bunkers, and cut a cluster of poplar trees on the left side trying to re-open a view from tee to green. Doing so, we got rid of the wet area where the poplars grew from and have replaced it with a more sandy soil.


The green is now "visible" from the tees.


2nd shot before restoration. Note the runway 4th tee in the background.


Same place after bunker restoration.

To be continued...

[Ulrich Mayring]

I agree with most of the changes or rather, I endorse them enthusiastically (played Hardelot Les Pins a few weeks ago). The front 9 are now remarkably fresher and wider than the back 9.

However, I happened to really like the big dunes on hole #2. Why soften these unique landforms? The main problem on #2 were the encroaching trees, the dunes created a bit of a bathtub-like effect that would contain balls.

Ulrich

[Frank Pont]

Ulrich, there was a maintenance issue with that the gap left of the dune was too small to allow for significant traffic. That coupled with the fact that the hole was changed from a short par 5 to a long par 4 made it more logical to lose the fairway bunker, which btw was not an original bunker, and create more fairway space

[Diederik Visser]

The course looks much better than the time I played (april 2012).
The playing corridors seem to be wider and the bunkers look much better and seem to be more in play. Looking forward to plan a return visit when the course plays firmer and faster.
Looking forward to see more pictures of your great work.

[Ulrich Mayring]

Good thing you guys didn't have me on the green committee, because I would have fought this out to the end ;-)

Here's how #2 looked in 2007 from the tee. If that is not an original Simpson bunker, then someone got it damned close:



And here the partially blind approach, to another level of fairway(!):



This was a completely different hole. The course may have deteriorated somewhat since 2007. But it was a very unique hole, one of the most memorable on the course. Yes, it was too tight to play to its potential, it's a lot more forgiving today. But I firmly believe that these landforms should have been preserved for the visuals alone. I do agree that the hole should play as a two-shotter, maybe it could be 10 or 20 yards shorter still.

Ulrich

[Thomas Dai]

Hardelot hole 7 as it was......

... and as it is.

 
You can imagine this is one par 3 hole our hands are itching to get started restoring..... if we do our job right should be one of Simpsons most spectacular par 3's.

Just bumping this amazing original green site with the old pics courtesy of Christoph Meister as included in Franks post of last year.

Only a wee 120 yd hole and what a travesty of change it has become in the period between 1931 and when the second photo was taken (2012 presumably).

And to think in its original form, players of all ability were expected to recover from the numerous deep bunkers using a bunker club that was the equivalent of a modern narrow sole blade style 9-iron (okay some back then may have used a club like the later banned Hagen concave faced sand wedge but I guess only a few had such a club in their bag back then).

I'm really looking forward to seeing some photos of this green site after it's been restored.

All the best.

PS - ref the tee on top of the castle wall. Can anyone think of any other tees that are in such an unusual positions on another courses?

[ward peyronnin]

Ulrich

Before you roll up your sleeves to duke it out you should play the new no 2.

It is the place where Whittaker and I first began to sense the magical. It is simply too good a green platform and surround to remain hidden behind a clunky mound with a bunker cut into the face like a large pimple. The hole front nine is magical and the back is too.

Nine is a very very memorable and unusual combination of features (and very hard I might add).

I would go back and play any day

[Ulrich Mayring]

Ward,

I did play Les Pins post Buda this year. The hole plays well the way it is now, but to me it lost some of its character. What is a pimple to some, is a unique feature to others

Ulrich

[ward peyronnin]

I admit it is a dramatic feature but it did seem to crowd the hole from the picture and if it was original made more sense when those majestic pines weren't the 60 foot columns like the Temple of Karnak.

Anyway what did you think of the rest of the nine this time around?