Loop within a Loop

[Ally Mcintosh]

Muirfield is the most famous example of one nine being routed around the outside of the property with another nine inside.


I see Sean has said Blackmoor GC also routes this way.


What other examples are out there and tell us why they might be really successful in the way they move you around the property (or perhaps less so for any other reason)?


Doesn’t have to be a strict 9/9 or strictly circular. For instance, the Strandhill routing employs this tactic quite successfully, showing you the variety of the whole site and making it feel bigger than it is for 10 holes before folding you in to a couple of previously hidden holes among the dunes with the last 8.


Let’s hear more. With descriptions.

[Sean_A]

Stoneham does as well. I recently came across another, but can’t remember.


Ciao

[Paul Rudovsky]

Absolutely my favorite "routing" either clockwise or counter clockwise on outside loop.   Off top of head:



1.  Quaker Ridge in NY
2.  Onwentsia in IL
but guess I have played half a dozen more

[David_Tepper]

1) Harding Park, San Francisco, where the back-9 loops around the front-9 (also also loops around the 9-hole Fleming course)
2) Sonoma GC, Sonoma, CA, where the front-9 loops around the back-9.

[Tony_Muldoon]

Brentwood Golf Course in Essex, England has a front 9 inner Clockwise routing and an anticlockwise loop surounding it on the back 9.

It was called something else but I believe it dates from 1994. Architect Reg Plumbridge, a local.

Decent surburban track with quite a lot of interest.  It got very run down but is improving. The above routing is perfect for making the most of the subtle change of wind direction as you progress.

The long time members I played against, had never heard talk of the two loops.

[Tom_Doak]

I did this on one of my early courses, Charlotte Golf Links, where the land was pretty featureless.


CommonGround has something similar: 1-2-3-4-5 run clockwise around the outside from the clubhouse, and 11-12 run anti clockwise to meet them, after which the holes loop into the middle.


I think you have to have the idea that you want to go this way at the start, or it’s unlikely to fall into place naturally.  My tendency is to try to be efficient in terms of space, which usually means I’m thinking about doubling back close to my starting holes at some point.


On our new project in TX, I first routed 36 holes with an outer course around the more rugged perimeter and 18 more inside it - I was hoping to get the second job for my associates that way, as other architects would not want to be boxed in.  But then they started talking to Bill Coore about a second course, and the client insisted I forget about the second course and find the best 18 holes I could, so that concept went out the window.

[Jim Sherma]

The original routing of Hershey CC by Maurice McCarthy in 1930 (the West course as it's known today) was a pure loop within a loop. The loss of the original first hole and moving the starting point with the building of the East Course and a new clubhouse means that it now plays as an 8-hole exterior loop, followed by 9 interior holes and then the 18th finishes the original loop. There is a different sense to the perimeter holes and the interior ones. I like the interior holes being later in the round as you can start opening up the shoulders a bit knowing that there is less threat of a big number.


Wanted to add that the outer loop has OB all on the right side. Not really tight to the fairways however and actual OB shots need to be big misses.

[Thomas Dai]

Walsall GC just north of Birmingham by Alister Mackenzie.
1st-9 outer loop, 2nd-9 inner loop.
Atb

[mike_malone]

Flynn did exterior holes that envelop an interior group of holes at Huntingdon Valley and Rolling Green. HVCC is nine around then 9 internal. RG has 1 through 8 then 10/11 on the outside with the remaining holes inside.

[Joe Wandro]

I see this gambit repeated in William Langford’s work. Spring Valley and Wakonda have front nines that make the outer loop along square property lines, with the back nines inside that loop. Chickasaw CC isn’t quite like that, but the front creates the outer loop, with 6 holes inside and the 3 finishing holes outside.

[Michael Felton]

Royal Mid-Surrey has an outer course and an inner course. I've never played the inner (and only the outer once I think), so I'm not sure how obvious it is as you play it, but I think it's pretty much entirely contained within the outer.

[Ben Stephens]

Thorpe Wood in Peterborough which was designed day Peter Alliss and Dave Thomas in 1975 the Front nine is the outer loop which goes sort of anti-clockwise and the back nine is in a inner loop more like a horseshoe.


The course will be celebrating their 50th anniversary next year (2025) and the Head Pro or Director of Golf has been the same surname for all its history - grandfather, father and son which is an unusual association with one club. 

[Cliff Hamm]

Exeter in Rhode Island:  http://www.exetercc.com/card.html


The link shows routing…

[Ben Sims]

Old Barnwell in SC had a really nice way of returning to crux locations within the nines. There are two locations in the front and back nine where a bunch of holes come together. For reasons I can’t quite explain, I find this to be an attractive feature of some courses. It feels really nice to return to a place but look in another direction? Not sure.

[Pete_Pittock]

Columbia Edgewater (Portland, OR)

[Bret Lawrence]

Blue Mound is 9/9.  You play the entire outside perimeter of the property on the front nine before working your way inside the property on the back nine.


Yale is 11 holes on the perimeter with 7 holes inside.  You play into the heart of the property on the first four holes, then ride the perimeter of the property all the way to the 15th hole before finishing up inside.  Both courses are very large in scale and perhaps this inside-outside routing contributes to that feeling. 

[Mark Kiely]

Woodhaven CC in Palm Desert does this. The entire property is almost a perfect square. All around the perimeter are holes, and then there's a smaller square formed by a residential street with homes on both sides of the street. Then within that center square between all the "interior" homes is the rest of the course.

[Chris Hughes]

Garden City GC:

"Inside" = 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 15, 16, 17, 18.

"Outside" = 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 6, 7, 8.

Used regularly during various tournaments...

[Ally Mcintosh]

Thanks for all the examples… most interested in “pure” examples that don’t intermingle the holes. In other words one loop should be folllowed by the other loop then finish.

[Matthew Rose]

Cherry Hills is front nine inside the back nine.

[Sean_A]

Thanks for all the examples… most interested in “pure” examples that don’t intermingle the holes. In other words one loop should be folllowed by the other loop then finish.

In opposite directions?


Ciao

[HarryBrinkerhoffDoyleIV_aka_Barry]

Cherry Hills is front nine inside the back nine.

Inner front 9 runs clockwise.  Outer back 9 runs counter clockwise.  Some there would like you to believe that there is not another course in existence with this configuration  .  Looking forward to learning about other examples.[size=78%] [/size]

[Ally Mcintosh]

Thanks for all the examples… most interested in “pure” examples that don’t intermingle the holes. In other words one loop should be folllowed by the other loop then finish.

In opposite directions?


Ciao

Not necessarily no…. It’s just quite a different experience if the hole sequence jumps between inner and outer… though no less valid. Would be very interested in those cases to know if the holes were originally routed in that manner of whether sequencing ever changed.


By “pure”, I mean sequential holes following the perimeter and same inside.

[Anthony Gholz]

Ally:
Since this is a Colt based thread we should remember Bloomfield Hills CC.  Harry Colt 1913-1915 over the original Tom Bendelow 18 with added 50 acres at Colt's recommendation.  Just like Muirfield, with the clubhouse at the middle of the east end rather than south.  !-9 in order clockwise around the perimeter and 10-18 counter clockwise inside.
Over time they flipped the nines and then brought them back to the original "Muirfield" routing.
Recently restored/remodeled by Mike DeVries, CDP.  Unfortunately the club missed a chance to get Colt's back to back par-3s back, as well as his 3 par 3s 3 par 5s front nine back, but oh well.  The hole numbers play in the original order.
Anthony

[PCCraig]

Pretty sure the new (old) Lido is routed that way, with the front nine on the outside.