[Kalen Braley]

Obvious drama is my short answer, Kalen.

There are no do or die decsions, no forced carries, no real hazards other than the maddeningly placed bunkers and the backdrop to most holes is...well..a field. 

It also does not have the undulations and huge Dunes and heaving twists evident at places like County Down or Bally bunion or Cruden Bay.

It's simply an unforgiving exercise in judgement and precision hole after hole.  There is nothing even remotely like a bad hole and several great ones.  It's the Shinnecock Hills of Scotland.

Your last paragraph is interesting.  Would you call the course more strategic in nature, or more penal?

When I hear that precision is required hole after hole, I think penal/ball-buster kind of course....which admittedly, the course looks like you can spray it a bit and still be relatively OK.

Kalen

[Mark Pearce]

I think Mike has it spot on.  It's actually rather easy to get a ball round but really hard to score well.  It has a lot of bunkering but is very strategic.  The green sites aren't spectacular but require both imagination and precision.  It requires good driving AND good thinking off the tee.  Precise approach shots are rewarded, poor ones punished.  Every hole is at least very good.  More than a few are great.  As a course to play it is far, far superior to somewhere like Birkdale, which is far, far more dramatic to look at.

[Kalen Braley]

I think Mike has it spot on.  It's actually rather easy to get a ball round but really hard to score well.  It has a lot of bunkering but is very strategic.  The green sites aren't spectacular but require both imagination and precision.  It requires good driving AND good thinking off the tee.  Precise approach shots are rewarded, poor ones punished.  Every hole is at least very good.  More than a few are great.  As a course to play it is far, far superior to somewhere like Birkdale, which is far, far more dramatic to look at.

Sounds like its one of those hard par, easy bogey kind of deals if you play it conservative.

As opposed to the truly penal courses I've played where its hard par, slightly less harder bogey, easy double bogey! 

[MCirba]

Kalen,

It's not penal in the sense that we often think about it in the states. It's more like death by a thousand cuts. Shinnecock is much the same way.

[Kalen Braley]

Kalen,

It's not penal in the sense that we often think about it in the states. It's more like death by a thousand cuts. Shinnecock is much the same way.

Yea I can kind of visualize that where you may be hole high in 2 shots and just barely off the green.  But so woefully out of position that a par is difficult, yet a conservative play wields a relatively easy bogey.  But given human nature, you go for the difficult up and down and end up making double bogey....been there, done that a few times.

Contrast this to say the Idaho Club where most tee shots are narrow, and forced carries exist on most hole,  and if you miss you either reloading on the tee or in the hazard and a big score is inevitable.

[MCirba]

Yep.  Precision is the word that kept coming to mind again and again while I was out there.  and for such a relatively flat piece of ground the holes had a terrific amount of variety.

it's as if the course has already figured out what it is you're going to want to do on any given shot and that's where the protections are built.

[Niall C]

Mike


A few weeks down the line and after some time for reflection, how would you now rate Gullane 1 against Muirfield ?


Niall

[MCirba]

Niall,

You're a bad man to ask that question. 

I admire and respect Muirfield but love Gullane. 

Gullane is the wild tart who would provide rollicking fun night after night.

Muirfield won't call and is gone in the morning.

[Michael Graham]

Niall,

You're a bad man to ask that question. 

I admire and respect Muirfield but love Gullane. 

Gullane is the wild tart who would provide rollicking fun night after night.

Muirfield won't call and is gone in the morning.

I'm pretty sure Gullane have that exact same quote on their website. 

[MCirba]

 

[Adam Lawrence]

Niall,

You're a bad man to ask that question. 

I admire and respect Muirfield but love Gullane. 

Gullane is the wild tart who would provide rollicking fun night after night.

Muirfield won't call and is gone in the morning.

I'm pretty sure Gullane have that exact same quote on their website. 

If they haven't they will soon


[he says, sending link to this thread to David Morgan at Gullane...]

[Niall C]

I'm just thinking that this could add a whole new slant to visitor packages that clubs normally offer ie. game of golf, coffee and a morning roll !


Niall

[MCirba]

Adam,

Muirfield punishes very bad boys.

Gullane only encourages them.

[Kalen Braley]

Mike keep the innuendos rolling in, this is hilarious.

P.S. If Murfield merely punishes bad boys, I'd say she's closer to a dominatrix than anything else...

[MCirba]

Kalen,

Sorry but I had a brief, perhaps premature flash of climactic, comedic inspiration the other day but obviously my powers of recovery are rather woeful.

[Tags:]

Tags:

[Tags:]

Tags:

Call to undefined function theme_linktree()