(3) A reverse experience. The only time I've ever played Carnoustie we were told that on that day we must play from the back tees - not the "way back" championship tees used for the Open - but the regular backs. Wow! It was a very long course.
The first time I played there in 1991 they allowed play from the back tees if you asked, so I did. These were the real honest to goodness Open tees as far as I know - it played a little over 7000 yards, back when 7000 yards meant something. Of course since then they've added plenty of distance to keep up with the equipment changes, so it doesn't overly surprise me they don't want anyone playing 18 at 500 yards, for example.
When I played Muirfield in 2001 they just had some set tees for everyone to use, or some green tees for those who want to play up. The tees that day were the Open tees on all holes except the par 5s, those were all played up, with the 9th playing as a 465 yard par 4 rather than a 5 (certainly a more difficult hole against par) It really screwed me up on 17 because I accidentally calculated distance over the bunkers on the corner from the back tees, thought it looked like a good play, then proceeded to fly the ball about 25 yards deep into the hay on the far side of the dogleg for my only lost ball of the day.
I'm not sure how Muirfield typically does things, I've talked to others who have played there, and they've played the par 5s back but some of the par 4s up, others have played everything up (but on an extremely windy day, so that makes sense) I like that though, sounds like they change things up so you get a different course on subsequent visits. Plus I'd hate to play some of those par 4s back with a 30 mph headwind, yikes!