[Mark Pritchett]

Nice posts Ian and Ben.  I agree, as I often feel closest to the game at a simple public course not too far from my house. 

[Jeff_Brauer]

Mike,

In general, yes, because if you look at the courses that close, it is the lesser designed, mom and pop types.  The old adage of "building a better mousetrap" applies, and why build a course at all if it isn't going to be superior to its competition?

Now, that said, we can debate what a good hole is, or whether 100 bunkers is a better design than 50, and I agree that there are many well routed holes that are simple and elegant, and perfect without a lot of ornamentation, which might mess up a perfect design, so that is not my point.

[Duncan Cheslett]

Ian,

 I drove up to northern Michigan one day this summer (8hr round trip) to play a golf course designed by a retired music teacher.  Champion Hills was so good and so much fun.  One of my reasons was to play a course that wasn't over watered during a drought like in SE Michigan.  The course truly renewed my soul for the game of golf.  Now the course was a 5, but the simplistic beauty of it is it let the land do the work.

I looked up Champion Hill Ben, and was fascinated.


http://www.championhill.com/course.shtml


We are always hearing of the vast membership fees paid in the US to belong to a country club, and how reasonably priced our golf is here in the UK.  Yet here is a club with a great looking course charging $725 per year for unlimited golf!  That's cheap even by UK standards.  What's more, you can play a neighbouring course too!

[Peter Pallotta]

Some of you talk as if talent grows on trees. 

Talent is not "competence". The latter is much more common. I've never played a professionally-designed golf course and come away thinking that the architect was incompetent.

I'm convinced that all working professionals know more about the game and its strategies and design possibilities/options and routing than I ever will. But that's not talent.

It's talent - not the site, the client, the budget, the environmental restrictions, the intended market, or even the intentions -- that separates the competently-designed 3s and 4s (that I've played dozens of) from the very good 6s and 7s (of which I've only played a very few). 

The talent to shape intriguing, exhilarating, varied, challenging, playable and strategically-meaningful greens hole after hole after hole.

The talent to juggle in the mind's eye several potential routings, each with its own pros and cons, and emerge with a flowing routing that highlights the site's strengths, hides its weaknesses, and provides a consistently good field of play.

And the talent to imbue that whole field of play with a pleasing aesthetic that is not obvious/eye candy but instead a subtler melding of many qualities: e.g. the blending away of fairway lines, the connecting of greens to their surrounds. 

Talking about whether there "should" be more/less "3s" as if we "could have" more 6s and 7s just by wishing them into existence seems to ignore the nature/reality of talent.

Some have more talent, and some have less -- and most of us have less of it than we'd like to believe. If someone ever manages to bottle a talent-pill that I can take twice a day, please let me know. 

Peter

[Sean_A]

In nearly all cases, yes, I do think its wrong to build Doak 3s because I believe nearly all archies are capable of building a 4-5 on the same land with the same budget.


Ciao

[Jason Thurman]

After playing a hundred rounds or so out there as a child and a few more in recent years, and after nearly a decade of reading and/or participating on this site and mulling over what a renovation could possibly mean for the course, I've finally come to the conclusion that they shouldn't change a thing. Sure, it's noble to talk about how even people paying $25 a round on a daily fee course in God's Country deserve architectural interest. But despite the best intentions of architecture-loving dorks, the reality is that the locals who play the joint don't want a renovation that raises their greens fees and closes the place down for a few months. They love the course the way it is, and just want to play golf. And I agree with them on both counts.

There's nothing wrong with Doak 1's, 2's, or 3's. There might, however, be something wrong with the people who see them only as a missed opportunity architecturally. They miss out on the opportunity for a lot of fun.

Jason:


I appreciate your post.  But I agree with Mr. Solow that we appear to be talking past each other.


I've got nothing against people going out and having fun on any course whether it's a 10 or a 3 or even a zero on the Doak scale.  And I agree with your observation that your family and neighbors are getting what they want out of that course, and it would be stupid to spend money to try and "add architectural interest" they don't care to pay for.


But the question was phrased, is it wrong to BUILD a "Doak 3," and I still say it is.  Nobody is going to spend the cash to BUILD the course you describe and charge $25 for it, in today's golf market, because they'd go broke doing so.  What Dave McCollum describes above was terrific, and sounds reminiscent of Scotland, but there aren't many current examples of anything similar.


Which raises the question, what IS the lowest-priced new course in the last 10-15 years?  Common Ground is $40 or $50, and we did rebuild the whole course, but they had the land in place for free and the maintenance equipment already in the barn.  I'm sure there are lower-cost examples ... but let's stick to one that still belongs to the original owner.

I agree with you, Tom. And as to your question, the State Park Signature Series courses in Kentucky that Doug Ralston always sang the praises of all mostly opened in the last 10-15 years, and they're all in the $25-$35 range including the cart that you'll almost certainly need. While I don't think it's so much "wrong" as "incompetent" to build a 3 with private capital, it is a bit depressing to see the land of my ancestors spend a few million taxpayer dollars to build a Doak 3 in the middle of nowhere that pulls 6000 rounds a year at $30 a pop. So yeah, I love a few Doak 3s, but it's still pretty lame when someone actually builds one.

[Mike_Young]

Jason,

The Kentucky examples are subsidized. Right?  I still say no one can build a "Doak 3" today unless it is subsidized.  It will not last two years.  NOW, if it is sold for pennies on the dollar it may be that a private owner can pick it up and make it work but he cannot be making improvements could be cost prohibitive.  JMO

[BCowan]

Some of you talk as if talent grows on trees. 

Talent is not "competence". The latter is much more common. I've never played a professionally-designed golf course and come away thinking that the architect was incompetent.

I'm convinced that all working professionals know more about the game and its strategies and design possibilities/options and routing than I ever will. But that's not talent.

It's talent - not the site, the client, the budget, the environmental restrictions, the intended market, or even the intentions -- that separates the competently-designed 3s and 4s (that I've played dozens of) from the very good 6s and 7s (of which I've only played a very few). 

The talent to shape intriguing, exhilarating, varied, challenging, playable and strategically-meaningful greens hole after hole after hole.

The talent to juggle in the mind's eye several potential routings, each with its own pros and cons, and emerge with a flowing routing that highlights the site's strengths, hides its weaknesses, and provides a consistently good field of play.

And the talent to imbue that whole field of play with a pleasing aesthetic that is not obvious/eye candy but instead a subtler melding of many qualities: e.g. the blending away of fairway lines, the connecting of greens to their surrounds. 

Talking about whether there "should" be more/less "3s" as if we "could have" more 6s and 7s just by wishing them into existence seems to ignore the nature/reality of talent.

Some have more talent, and some have less -- and most of us have less of it than we'd like to believe. If someone ever manages to bottle a talent-pill that I can take twice a day, please let me know. 

Peter

Peter,

   I fully understand that it takes talent for course in the 6-10 range.  There are however a good deal of less competent archies that produced shit on great land, in the doak 3 range. I think some have absolutely no excuse imo, I could be wrong.  There is a line when someone is either an Archie or a prostitute.  I'm more interested in 5's, it keeps elitist and notchers off the gems.  Also there is greater chance the track will be maintained firm(er).  Doak 5's, high 5's, No 5 somes!!!

[Jeff Bergeron]

I'm going to try to post something interesting

You achieved your objective! Very interesting. i spent a 40 year career pushing my people to do great work. Now I'm stuck with this group of knuckleheads. I'll keep pushing!

[Peter Pallotta]

Ben - you may be right...and I may be naïve or (in this matter at least) too generous to professional architects...but I don't think I have ever encountered a "failure of competence", i.e. a site that struck me as wonderful but upon which a professional architect only managed a 3 when a 5 was available. BUT -- when I say that I don't mean that those architects who built these 3s all shared my tastes or all made the (to me) best and most interesting choices.....choices like the ones we've discussed on your thread about improving 3s with modest budgets...e.g. their greens are not as interesting as one could hope for, and their rough lines are narrower and/or more set in stone, and they left standing or even planted more trees than necessary etc.  But all that I chalk up to TASTE and to lack of TALENT...neither of which one can buy.  Now that I think of it, maybe I'm not being too generous....maybe I'm just being a pessimist!       

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