I've got a little further into the clubs centenary history book...
Though it appears there are questions over the degree of involvement that Colt had with the club, according to “The First Hundred Years” Braid’s involvement is a little more straightforward…
At the April 1924 Directors meeting, the management were instructed to “Engage the services of an expert to give a report on the course generally as to improvements in the lay-out and to carry out such alterations that may be recommended”. The expert chosen was James Braid.
Braid’s redesigned course came into play during 1927, though some new and reshaped bunkers were not completed until 1930.
Braid made only modest changes to the first few holes, reasoning that the comfortable start gave golfers something to play for, but new tees were added to lengthen the 4th and 6th considerably.
Braid gave the 7th a new narrow, elongated green, strongly bunkered on either side. But the old green to the left has survived and is still occasionally used on none competition days or the winter.
The 8th was given a new tee and the line of the fairway changed to the left to play to the new green, adding 45 yards. The green and fairway at the 9th also moved left producing 40 more yards.
The new 9th blocked out the old 10th which had its green in what is now a spinney alongside the 11th fairway. The new 10th green allowed Braid to add almost 200 yards to the 11th.
The old 12th tee was behind the present one, playing to a green at the right hand corner of the dogleg. The new green was sited short of the old 13th green, which was close to the out of bounds on the right of the current hole. New tees to the left of the new 12th green, the extra distance gained being added to the old 14th to make a new 13th of 440 odd yds. The old 15 had been a monster hole for the time, at 575yds, played to the current green of the par 3 15th. A new 14th of 430 odd yards finished off the run of four tough par 4s in a row. The length left over from the monster bogey 6 hole thus became a par 3.
The old 16th played straight towards what is now the turf nursery to the left of the current hole. This meant that the old 17th was much shorter at 235 yards. By doglegging the new 16th further down the hill to the right, Braid created extra yardage to stretch the 17th. The 18th was also extended, so that in total Braid had added over 600 yards.
Original Braid
1 315yds bogey 4 327yds bogey 4
2 375yds bogey 5 396yds bogey 4
3 340yds bogey 5 362yds bogey 4
4 125yds bogey 3 167yds bogey 3
5 485yds bogey 5 493yds bogey 5
6 375yds bogey 5 434yds bogey 5
7 115yds bogey 3 126yds bogey 3
8 460yds bogey 5 505yds bogey 5
9 432yds bogey 5 472yds bogey 5
10 165yds bogey 3 195yds bogey 3
11 277yds bogey 4 457yds bogey 5
12 290yds bogey 4 433yds bogey 4
13 293yds bogey 4 448yds bogey 5
14 328yds bogey 4 434yds bogey 5
15 575yds bogey 6 188yds bogey 3
16 435yds bogey 5 490yds bogey 5
17 235yds bogey 4 362yds bogey 4
18 335yds bogey 4 371yds bogey 4
5955yds 6660yds
With the original 11 through 14 all playing as short par 4s, to then be followed by a long par 5 or bogey 6, makes for an interesting difference to what Braid turned into four really tough par 4s and a challenging par 3! That run of holes that Braid created needs to be played, into the prevailing wind, to be believed. One of the toughest stretches in England for certain!
Since then there have been some minor changes, with new bunkers added, old ones removed and then restored, and some new tees, and the 6th and 9th green extended slightly. The biggest changes appear to have been on the par 3 4th, with its green in front of the clubhouse, which used to have a somewhat punchbowl green that suffered from being to wet, and was therefore rebuilt, and then the tees moved as they used to be right of the 3rd green, which put them somewhat in danger from the 5th tee.
Cheers,
James