[Mark Saltzman]

The Routing




A couple of Maxwell routing traits to note...

1) Maxwell liked to return to the clubhouse in loops.  Unlike some of his works in Oklahoma and Kansas where he would create 4 or 5 or even 6 (at Muskogee I believe), Old Town only returns to the clubhouse 3 times, and only once other than 9 or 18.

2) Maxwell liked to position the clubhouse at the highest point on the property, and this is what was done at Old Town.  

3) Most importantly, as noted in Chris Clouser's The Midwest Associate, Maxwell's routings made great use of the "natural land features found on the site."  This is certainly the case at Old Town as Maxwell very effectively routed the course over and across some exceptionally rolling terrain, focusing on having either tees or greens elevated.  There are only 3 holes on which the tee and green are at similar elevation, and 2 of those are routed across steeply sloping terrain.

The land at Old Town is also blessed with a single stream (though it branches in one place) that runs through the property.  Maxwell must have loved this feature and figuratively bashes you over the head with it.  It must be crossed on holes 4, 7, 8, 9, 11,  and 17, and it runs parallel to holes 12, 14 and 15.  Really genius.

Further, the low point on the property, sitting next to the stream is a gorgeous and serene place.  Maxwell must have thought so too.  He built a hub of tees and greens, with 9 tee, 12 tee and 18 tee, and 8 green, 11 green and 17 green all on a piece of land just over two acres(!).

Lastly, Maxwell allowed the clever golfer the option of 'previewing the shot'.  Cresting the hill on the 4th hole, the 7th green is in clear view.. a putting surface that cannot be seen from the 7th fairway.  The golfer would do well to take note of the pin position.

Similarly, the 15th green is as wild as they come, not so far a distant cousin from Coore/Crenshaw's 8th at Sand Hills.  It is not possible to see this boomerang from the 15th tee, but it sure is possible to see it from the 14th fairway, which gets as close as 30 feet to the 15th green.


Hole 1: Par 4, 423 Yards

As is a Maxwell trademark, the first is situated just steps from the clubhouse on a high piece of property to a fairway down below.  The single fairway bunker on the right serves as an aiming marker, though it is impossible to know this on one's first play.  What appears to be the ideal line down the left will leave the golfer in the rough for his approach.

Tee View:




Approach View:




The first of many great greens at OTC.  The green flows with the land, sloping severely from right-to-left.  A false-front and deep drop-off left make this a difficult target to find from the approach, which is played from a downhill lie to an uphill green.






Greensite as seen from 3 fairway:




1 from 2nd Tee:




Hole 2: Par 3, 163 Yards

The 2nd is a short, downhill par-3, but given that the prevailing wind plays across the hole, and the green lays at a diagonal to the tee, a perfect matching of line and distance must be achieved to find this green.

My host pointed out that this hole is based on the design of one of the holes at Augusta National.  I can't recall which one it is, but based on the layout of the bunkers, I'm guessing it is the 7th.








The green is heavily contoured and is split into three sections, left, centre and right, by two ridges that run diagonally across the green.








Hole 3: Par 4, 418 Yards

A very hard par-4, playing straight uphill and into the wind.  The fairway slopes significantly to the left and shots that do not challenge the bunkers on the right, or tee shots that are not played with a fade, will likely trundle into the left rough.  From the left the approach is more uphill and must be played over a duo of bunkers on the right.






After  fade is called for from the tee, the approach asks for a draw.  An approach played from the right side of the fairway is not difficult as from this angle, the green is open in front.




Hardly the most difficult green at Old Town, though it does have some subtle slopes.  As can (sort of) be seen in the picture, a single ridge right in the centre of the green demands that shots be played to the correct portion of the green or face a difficult two-putt.

[JC Jones]

Thanks for doing this thread, Mark.

OTC is one of my top 3-5 courses I've ever played and each time I play it I come back loving it more than I did before.  The routing, the greens, the setting, the clubhouse, the members I've met, the staff ... everything is everything I would ever want out of a club.

In the Confidential Guide, Doak said this was one of the courses worth groveling to play.  He underestimates it. 

If the trees between the 9th and the 18th green were removed and the bunkering restored to the way it was (which can be seen in many pictures either in the clubhouse or on the webpage of the great Dunlop White, I'm telling you this place is easily in the top 25 in the USA and easily in my top 2-3 I've ever played.

What a treat!

[Tom Fagerli]

Just wait until the back nine! The vista makes you think you are in Africa overlooking the savannah. I have been fortunate to play OTC several times thru the years but until a couple years back I hadn't been there for many years. I was overawed by the improvement. What a fantastic golf course and club. We are in for a treat as the holes get posted.

[David_Madison]

A fabulous course that's being carefully and lovingly restored, piece by piece, under the very astute guidance of Dunlop White and other knowledgeable folks. The process continues year after year, with a well thought out and executed tree management program, addition of native grasses, and other planned improvements. As a club, one of the best golf cultures I've experienced anywhere.

A wonderful feature of the architecture is the use of diagonal slopes. Most courses and architects give you pure uphill, downhill, or sidehill lies. At OTC, you are constantly confronted with uphill or downhill sidehill lies to greens complexes that are perhaps the best and most varied in NC. The greens vary tremendously in size, complexity, and how they interface with approach shots and recoveries. Even the apparently simplest greens like #3 are complicated with internal contours such as a simple cigar-shaped bump that puts tremendous pressure on the approach shot.

[Bruce Wellmon]

At OTC, you are constantly confronted with uphill or downhill sidehill lies to greens complexes that are perhaps the best and most varied in NC. 

OTC is one special place. The use of slope in the fairways (#9 comes to mind) is just brillant.
The Maxwell Rolls make the greens. (#2 is certainly memorable).
OTC is as good as it gets.

[Mark Saltzman]

At OTC, you are constantly confronted with uphill or downhill sidehill lies to greens complexes that are perhaps the best and most varied in NC. 

OTC is one special place. The use of slope in the fairways (#9 comes to mind) is just brillant.
The Maxwell Rolls make the greens. (#2 is certainly memorable).
OTC is as good as it gets.

Bruce, I'm going to start a thread on Maxwell's templates and trademarks -- tilted fairways is certainly one of them!

[David_Elvins]

Thanks for posting, Mark, the course looks fantastic.

Apart from the bunkers, some of which look quite horrific iMO.  Have these been re-done as part of the restoration or are they scheduled to be r-done? 

who built the bunkers on the second hole, and to the right of the first green, for example?

[David_Elvins]

My host pointed out that this hole is based on the design of one of the holes at Augusta National.  I can't recall which one it is, but based on the layout of the bunkers, I'm guessing it is the 7th.

Mark,

I would hazard a guess that it might be inspired by the 4th at Augusta which has similar ridges running through the green.

[JLahrman]

Thanks for posting, Mark, the course looks fantastic.

Apart from the bunkers, some of which look quite horrific iMO.  Have these been re-done as part of the restoration or are they scheduled to be r-done? 

who built the bunkers on the second hole, and to the right of the first green, for example?

I was just going to say the same thing...#1 and #3 look great. The bunkering on #2 doesn't.

[K. Krahenbuhl]

As bad as the bunkers are at the second - the green is that good.  One of my favorites on a course with a lot of really good ones.

[Mark Saltzman]

My host pointed out that this hole is based on the design of one of the holes at Augusta National.  I can't recall which one it is, but based on the layout of the bunkers, I'm guessing it is the 7th.

Mark,

I would hazard a guess that it might be inspired by the 4th at Augusta which has similar ridges running through the green.

David, based on the bunkering style of Augusta's 7th, I think this is the hole that was trying to be copied.  I think the visual playing to an uphill green with this style of bunkering is vastly different than when it plays downhill.  That being said, I have no idea how good/bad the bunkering at Old Town's 2nd looked in days gone by.

Augusta's 7th...

[Jud_T]

Mark,

You really need to get out more my man.    Thanks in advance for yet another great tour....

[Carl Nichols]

Mark wrote:

"1) Maxwell liked to return to the clubhouse in loops.  Unlike some of his works in Oklahoma and Kansas where he would create 4 or 5 or even 6 (at Muskogee I believe), Old Town only returns to the clubhouse 3 times, and only once other than 9 or 18."

There is still one other 3-hole loop that would return you to the clubhouse -- i.e., playing 10 and 11 and then skipping over to play 9 or 18 back to the house.  Obviously that's not the same as returning to the clubhouse if you play the holes in order, but it does add another 3-hole evening loop to the mix.   

[Mark Saltzman]

Hole 4: Par 5, 520 Yards

An uneventful but demanding tee shot.  Anything on the right side of the fairway will leave a difficult second shot.  The ideal line is up the left, but some overhanging limbs protect that route.  As reaching this hole in two requires a drive to crest the hill (about 300 yards), most golfers would probably well served hitting less than driver from the tee.




No second shot view, but there is very little to see from the DZ.  Hopefully you have a good host because picking a line is no easy task.  Ideally the second will be played along the tree line to the right, though shots that bail out left will have ample width to use (but a more difficult line into the green).

Cresting the hill, much of the remainder of the course is laid-out in front of you.  Just like cresting the hill to get to the 4th tee at Ballyneal, this is a wow moment...




The large green at the 4th is protected by bunkers short-right and short-left, making shots played from the rough on either side of the fairway more difficult.  Unlike the bunkering on the 2nd, the bunker shaping here is certainly more creative, with a unique 'X' shaped bunker on the left.




Some forced perspective (?) architecture here.  Shots played from the fairway feel much shorter than they actually are as the fairway appears as though it flows right into the apron of the green...




But there is actually a creek and large false-front/collection area short of the green.  Who knew?






A look back at 4 from the 7th tee.  Look at the tilt in that fairway!




And a look across 4 and 7 from 17 tee.  Some wonderful fairway bunkering on 7...




Hole 5: Par 4, 380 Yards

A wonderful short par-4 over some more dramatic land at Old Town Club.  A sharp dogleg left with two bunkers guarding the inside of the dogleg... it's about 230 over them.  The fairway contouring is very clever, as the entire fairway is designed to accept and slow tee balls and keep them in the fairway, but once the rough line is reached, the land slopes away sending the ball a long way off-line.

Tee View:






While most of the fairway cants right-to-left, the area short of the green and the green site slopes significantly the other way... not surprisingly, the green fits perfectly with the lay of the land, sloping severely from left to right.






Shots can be played to the left side of the green to feed down to the right.  Anything near the front-left portion of the green will feed back, off of the green.  Subtle tiering makes it feel like there are three greens in one here.








Hole 6: Par 3, 185 Yards

What looks like a simple par-3 is really a masterpiece.  Yes, it's just a downhill mid-iron to a green open in front, but with the removal of trees behind the green, depth perception is nearly impossible.  The only containment is the bunkering in the left side of the green, but drop-offs long-left, long and right make shots that miss this green very difficult to recover from.

Tee View:






Though the pictures fail to capture the movement on the 6th green, it is spectacular.  Anyone that plays the 5th and 6th at Old Town must wonder if this is the best duo of back-to-back greens in the country!






6th as seen from the left from the 5th fairway:

[JLahrman]

#5 is a great-looking hole.

[David_Elvins]

Augusta's 7th...

Mark,

I think the comparison based on the bunkering is flawed in a couple of ways.

One, it is rather superficial and clumsy to describe a hole by it's bunkers.  There is nothing else similar about the 2nd at Old Town and the 7th at Augusta other than they both have a lot of bunkers.  

Two, until 1951 there were only three bunkers on the 7th at Augusta, so the comparison of bunkers was not true when Maxwell was there.

The 4th at Augusta is an 'eden' hole.  A par three over a valley with a prominant front right bunker and a left bunker with a gap to run the ball up between them to a heavily sloping back to front green.  This is also the prominent schematic of the second at Old Town.  In 1938 Maxwell redid the 4th green at Augusta (was this before or after or at the same time as Old Marsh was designed/built) and from reports incorporated a couple of spines to break the green into segments.  This is similar, but not identical to what appears to be the design at Old Town.  

Both the 4th at Augusta and the 2nd at Old Town look like loose Eden templates to me.

[Mark Saltzman]

David, I agree with much of what you saw, but disagree overall.  I still think that if this hole is actually based on one of the Augusta holes (remember, I'm just going by what my host told me), that it would likely be the 7th.

Per Sven Nilsen's Augusta changes thread, the only change Maxwell made to the 4th was to flatten the green and push the bunkers out in 1938.  At the 7th in 1937 he added the three front bunkers, which are very much in the same position as the three at the front of the 2nd at Old Town.

The actual routing of the 2nd, a par-3 over a gully with the green could be a copy of ANGC's 4th, but it is also very much a routing tendency of Maxwell's (as will be profiled in my other Maxwell thread).

Can somebody in the know answer this question for us? Is the 2nd at OTC inspired by a hole at Augusta, and if so, which one?



Note: Old Marsh was not yet built when Maxwell worked on the 4th at Augusta.  I know Pete's been at it for a long time, but in 1938 I think he was just entering high school. 

[Mark Saltzman]

David, here is a link to Dunlop White's excellent IMO piece of Old Town.  He suggests (though it does not seem he is sure) that the 2nd may have been inspired by the 7th at Augusta:

Note: A 1939 article from the Winston-Salem Journal states that Maxwell attempted to replicate a hole at Augusta National here at Old Town. The green complexes of Hole 2 at Old Town and Hole 7 at Augusta, which Maxwell designed a year earlier, are quite identical. Check out the similarities! Both green complexes are perched on a knoll. Both green complexes are completely surrounded by bunkers. Both greens are undoubtedly the most heavily bunkered greens at their respective sites. Both greens are wide with varying horizontal sections. Both greens slope from back to front.

http://www.golfclubatlas.com/in-my-opinion/old-town-club/

[Dunlop_White]

A 1939 article in the W-S Journal indicated that Old Town would have a "replica" hole of one at the Old Course. This is not surprising since Maxwell always harbored an undying affection for the Old Course. Obviously, this has been correctly identified as the double green at Hole 8 and 17.

The article continued to say that there would also be a hole "reminiscent" of one at Augusta National. This is not surprising either since he came to Old Town by way of Augusta National just months earlier (through Clifford Roberts). Augusta was fresh on his mind in December of 1938 when he arrived in W-S.

So which hole is it? Your guess is as good as mine? No one really knows for sure which hole he was referring to? Here's the news article.

http://70.61.113.114/attachments/Sports%20Calendar/20100508012630WSJ_1939.pdf

The Article goes on to say that the planners (Charlie Babcock and Roberts) felt like Old Town was "one of the best 3 courses in the south'' and "one of the Top 10 in the country" in 1939. This date marked the near end of the Golden Age of golf design, so we are basically talking about Classics here when this comment was made. Also note that Babcock and Roberts had seen many of the best and were qualified to make such a declaration.

In another W-S Journal article in 1939, Maxwell himself describes OTC "as one of the seven finest in the nation". While it is likely they were all tooting their horn a bit, (and I don't know if Maxwell had a big ego like many of his predecessors?), but I often wonder what other courses they all felt were in the mix here?

http://70.61.113.114//attachments/Sports%20Calendar/20100508012727WSJ_1939a.jpg

[Ronald Montesano]

I'm stunned that this thread fell off the first page.

I played OTC once, in September 1983. I am having the time of my life reminiscing via this photo thread.

The course sits a hybrid away from the Wake Forest campus. It is a calming, marvelous place.

[Chris Clouser]

Dunlop,

I have wondered about those comments in the past as well.  I wonder what courses in the South that Old Town would have been ranked against.  Seminole, Augusta, and Pinehurst come to mind.  What else would have been around back then? 

As for Maxwell's ego, I think he did like to use hyperbole to great affect at times, but to use the term "seven finest" seems awfully precise for him.  I know he had not been to California to see Cypress or Pebble at that point in his life.  He did see them during World War II and took some photos of Crypress that I have.  I'm guessing Pine Valley was in that group and the National as he held those in high regard.  He despised Oakmont as evidenced by some comments in an interview he did for American Golfer, so that wasn't in the group.  He was awfully proud of Dornick and still referred to it highly during his later years as one of his best. He felt Prairie Dune was his best work and had what he thought was the best par three in the country (the tenth hole today), so both of those could have been there.  A couple of courses in the South would have been in the discussion obviously from the above comment.  Merion was probably one as well as he arranged for Mackenzie to see that course.  Beyond that I'm not sure what elese he would have had in that top group ahead of Old Town in his "seven finest."

[Dunlop_White]

Hello Chris, these are some strong guesses! I'm with you on NGLA, PV, Merion, ANGC and probably PD (9holes?), but really don't have any idea how Maxwell felt about No. 2 or Seminole? You're right, seven (7) is a pretty odd/exacting number. Shows he thought about it.

The "3 finest in the South" is an odd grouping as well? You know Babcock and Roberts would include ANGC in this three-some. That would leave either Seminole or No. 2 out?

As for the hole at OTC which is most reminiscent of a hole at Augusta -- in my mind it would make sense that he would have been referring to one that he renovated prior to December of 1938. Here's the rough list -- Holes 1, 4, 5, 6, 7, 10, 14, 17, 18.

[Chris Clouser]

He also worked on 3 and 9.  I think it speaks to the greatness of the par 5s at Augusta that Maxwell wasn't asked to work on any of those holes.  They were deemed pretty top notch even then by Jones and Roberts.  You have much more experience with Augusta, so I'll defer to your knowledge of the two courses as to which one he was referring to in that comparison. 

If I had to really guess I would say he probably had seen both No. 2 and Seminole in his tour of the south early in his career.  But I don't find any direct references to either course in anything I have read. 

[Mark Saltzman]

Old Town Club, Hole 7: Par 4, 419 Yards




The tee shot has an extremely open feeling, as the 7th fairway shares a fairway with the 16th. 




But, the golfer really wants to play his tee shot up the left side of the fairway, over the series of uniquely shaped bunkers.





The approach is best played from the left.  Not an easy task as the fairway slopes significantly from left-to-right:




Not only is the green extremely small given the difficulty of this uphill, into the wind approach on a fairly long hole, but it is also guarded by a couple of very deep bunkers and a significant false-front:




The green lays at a 45-degree angle to the fairway and slopes from left-to-right.  Not an easy task to find this green.  Not an easy task to two-putt once on the green.

Green from behind:




Green from left:





Hole 8: Par 4, 380 Yards

Another Perry Maxwell hole where the green is blind from the tee.  A tee shot of 220 yards is required to reach the top of the hill and have a view of the green down to the right.




Though  some golfers will have no problem cresting the hill with their tee shot, the ideal approach is from near the 150-yard marker, which is the only flat spot on a very severely tilted fairway.




Similar to the 15th at Augusta National (so I've heard), shots that get too near the creek leave an awkward pitch over a fronting hazard from a severely sloping lie.




Look at the tilt in that  fairway!

The 8th/17th greens are a great example of the 'Maxwell Rolls'.




Looking across the 17th green to the 8th green, the rolls are easily seen from here.





Hole 9: Par 4, 430 Yards

The 9th and 18th holes run parallel and are routed around a small valley.  As a result, the fairway on each hole slopes significantly (and in opposite direction) toward the low-land. 

At the 9th, the fairway slopes severely from left-to-right.  Only a very well-placed tee shot will not run down to the low-point of the fairway -- from there overhanging branches will most certainly be an issue.




The approach is played uphill to a green that is blind from the fairway.  The golfer cannot see much more than a very intimidating false-front.






The 9th green has some of the least internal contouring on the golf course, but meshing well with the land around it, the green has some serious tilt from front-right to back-left.

[Mark Saltzman]

I know I haven't got there yet, but for those that have seen both, anyone think that the 15th green at Old Town could be the inspiration for C&C's now template boomerang green, as seen at Sand Hills' 8th?

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