Has the World's Greatest Course Been Built Yet?

[Matt Schoolfield]

Accessibility and golf is a curious subject.
On the one hand we have muni's and pay-n-play. On the other hand we have private member clubs often actually owned by the members themselves.
If you have an immaculately tended garden or backyard, your private area, an area that you own, would you let it be accessible to essentially anyone uninvited to wack a small ball around with some sticks and disturb your peace and quiet even on payment of a fee?
atb

I certainly have no qualm with folks who want their garden walls closed. It's obviously not my style and I think it hurts the culture, but to each their own. My point is about what "greatest course" means and how we could possibly decide that collectively.

[Tim Martin]

Accessibility and golf is a curious subject.
On the one hand we have muni's and pay-n-play. On the other hand we have private member clubs often actually owned by the members themselves.
If you have an immaculately tended garden or backyard, your private area, an area that you own, would you let it be accessible to essentially anyone uninvited to wack a small ball around with some sticks and disturb your peace and quiet even on payment of a fee?
atb

 My point is about what "greatest course" means and how we could possibly decide that collectively.

Matt-That has been bandied about on this discussion group since its inception which now is north of twenty years. Good luck!!

[Joe_Tucholski]

All our "greatest" courses can be made better simply by being accessible.

I disagree for a number of reasons.

A unique and special treat often becomes less special when it's common place.

I understand what you’re saying Joe, but do you really think Pine Valley (or a similarly revered course) would go down in your estimation if you were a member and had played it many dozens of times?

I can't speak to pine valley specifically.  I also was more talking about the experience at a private club vs public course.  There are definitely courses I've played that I would go back to if invited again that I wouldn't go back to if they were public.


Conversely, as touched on, I think there are public courses I've played where the experience would be improved if they were private.


Regarding membership I definitely feel an emotional connection to each course I've called home and enjoy them more than most who play them.  I think that's likely a common feeling.


The way I feel about playing a course includes way more than where the tees, hazards and greens are placed.  Or even how the ball rolls across the ground.  When talking about good/great courses I do think the experience is often the difference maker.


I've never really enjoy playing a course on a simulator, which does a damn good job of replicating the courses, because the experience during a round of golf is about more than the the course itself.

[George Pazin]

With apologies to Robin Williams, RIP:


Let me spoil it for you, sport. There are no perfect courses. You just need to find one that's perfect for you.


 

[JMEvensky]

With apologies to Robin Williams, RIP:


Let me spoil it for you, sport. There are no perfect courses. You just need to find one that's perfect for you.


 

Not even Oakmont? 


Drop in more often.

[Peter Flory]

I think that we all get that there is subjectivity involved and that there isn't ever anything that is intrinsically the best.  So a way to boil the discussion down and cut out that element is to ask whether it is likely that a course that hasn't been built yet will ever be ranked #1 on any of the established ranking lists in the future.

It's really a question that doesn't depend on your own personal tastes.   It involves concepts like changing trends (how fashion changes), site availability, the golf business itself, the dethroneability of courses with history/ majors, whether raters are afraid to be outliers when they turn in their scores, etc. 

I guess a further way to boil it down would be to turn it into a bet.  Say, if the odds were even money, would you bet that a course built after 2023 will attain the #1 world ranking in Golf Magazine, Golf Digest, or Golfweek by the year 2060 or would you bet that it won't happen? 

[Charlie Goerges]

I think that we all get that there is subjectivity involved and that there isn't ever anything that is intrinsically the best.  So a way to boil the discussion down and cut out that element is to ask whether it is likely that a course that hasn't been built yet will ever be ranked #1 on any of the established ranking lists in the future.

It's really a question that doesn't depend on your own personal tastes.   It involves concepts like changing trends (how fashion changes), site availability, the golf business itself, the dethroneability of courses with history/ majors, whether raters are afraid to be outliers when they turn in their scores, etc. 

I guess a further way to boil it down would be to turn it into a bet.  Say, if the odds were even money, would you bet that a course built after 2023 will attain the #1 world ranking in Golf Magazine, Golf Digest, or Golfweek by the year 2060 or would you bet that it won't happen?

Realistically this is the way to have a discussion of it, good idea Peter.


My bet is it won't happen by the year 2060. I just think that history and tradition is too powerful. I don't even think a course newer than the 1930s will ascend to that ranking before 2060 (excluding the Golfweek modern of course).

[Bradley Anderson]

I have to qualify my answer to this by the fact that I have not visited Pine Valley, NGLA, Merion or the Old Course, but have walked Yale, Chicago Golf, Augusta and Cyprus Point and I have played Oakmont, Holston Hills, French Lick, Kirtland, and Camargo…..golf courses which profile the master architects in their prime.


For my money Cypress Point is unsurpassed and the greatest golf course yet built: you have every variety of shot demands in the opening holes of 1-5. And then there is arguably the heart of the golf course, in holes 6-13, where the skill of hitting to targets that are set in unmodified native vistas, over deflecting approaches, onto greens where 3-6 foot elevation changes are met.

14-17 are just the most beautiful golf holes anywhere on planet earth. The cypress trees on 14 appear to have dictated the green and fairway placement, and when you walk through that alley of trees it’s as close to heaven this side of glory that you will ever experience.

[MClutterbuck]

Sand Hills has come closest of anything in recent years to achieving this impossible goal, because it is a perfectly playable natural site for golf. 

Are the sand hills of Nebraska really a natural playable site for golf?  Without irrigation would the mixed grasslands really be suitable for golf?  Thinking about trying to find and play balls that I hit outside of the irrigated areas on courses I've played in the sand hills and it wasn't very pretty.

There’s definitely a reason that golf started on links land in GB&I. It is perhaps the only climate and geomorphology that could encourage the game before any tools were available.

I grew up playing a dozen common bermuda courses on heavy rich soil with no irrigation. Some built as early as 1907. I would challenge your statement, unless you qualify it further for quality. 

[Tom_Doak]

Are the sand hills of Nebraska really a natural playable site for golf?  Without irrigation would the mixed grasslands really be suitable for golf?  Thinking about trying to find and play balls that I hit outside of the irrigated areas on courses I've played in the sand hills and it wasn't very pretty.

Joe:


I missed this question earlier, but the answer is no, not really.  There are a few courses in the sand hills that are unirrigated, with some buffalo grass and other weird types in the fairways, and sand greens, but it's not like you could just mow out the course and have it be in good condition without irrigation.  The only site I've ever seen like that were in the UK and Ireland.  St. Andrews Beach was close, but again, not without irrigation for the greens. 

[Thomas Dai]

Are the sand hills of Nebraska really a natural playable site for golf?  Without irrigation would the mixed grasslands really be suitable for golf?  Thinking about trying to find and play balls that I hit outside of the irrigated areas on courses I've played in the sand hills and it wasn't very pretty.

Joe:
I missed this question earlier, but the answer is no, not really.  There are a few courses in the sand hills that are unirrigated, with some buffalo grass and other weird types in the fairways, and sand greens, but it's not like you could just mow out the course and have it be in good condition without irrigation.  The only site I've ever seen like that were in the UK and Ireland.  St. Andrews Beach was close, but again, not without irrigation for the greens.

And not just links courses either. Hilltops, heathlands, downlands, uplands, moorlands etc and landscapes historically grazed by animals provide similar conditions. And likely playable by an aged person with just a putter.
Atb