XXX...wrooong. Pretty sure I didn't experience some epiphany or feeling of divine intervention when I walked off The Old Course any of the 3 times I played it or 2 times I walked it. But whatever..
Jamie:
That's too bad for you. But, it explains some of your posts on other threads.
Here's the thing, I think TOC is an outstanding golf course, certainly one of the 2 or 3 best I've ever played, if not the best. But, I don't feel like its some mystical place or anything like that. Certainly you can learn a lot about golf hole and golf course design there, but you can also learn a lot about those things from Pine Valley, or Pacific Dunes, or Pebble Beach, or a fair number of other elite golf courses. But the fact is, at TOC, you see one golf course, one style of turf/maintenance, one broad style of golf course (links). TOC gave me a benchmark from which to look at other links or links-playing golf courses. But it doesn't give the golfer much of a benchmark from which to look at a golf course like Pinehurst #2 or The Old White, for example. That was all I meant.
And I hope you don't consider my analysis of Pacific Dunes to be "bashing," it isn't. Its simply a comparison of two outstanding courses.