No 7 at St Andrews

[Jonathan Davison]

Has anyone visited the site recently. Some photos were in Golf Monthly recently, looks very interesting.
Kingsbarn in places with a more dramatic coastline?
Would be interested in hearing peoples views or has anyone visited the site recently and has some photos?
What can we expect?

[David_Tepper]

Jonny -

George Peper's column in the Jan/Feb issue of LINKS Magazine was devoted to the #7 course. He quotes David Kidd extensively in the article.

According to Kidd, the biggest drawbacks are the lack of sand in the soil on the property and the relatively modest budget (3 million pounds) he had to work with.  Never the less, he quotes Kidd saying "We have an opportunity to do something very dramatic here, and I think we're on our way."

The course is expected to open with limited play in late 2007 and a full schedule of play in early 2008.  

You can try to find the article online at www.linksmagazine.com

George Peper's column is called 'Letter From St. Andrews.' This particular column was headlined "A Glimpse of Seven." I tried to find the column on the website, but had no luck doing so.  

[Tom_Doak]

I saw a handful of holes shaped when I was over there in October.  The contours of the land are big and broad and kind of hilly, but he's adding a lot of radical bumpy contours within the fairways, it looked pretty severe to me.

There will be four holes along the clifftops I think, but they're all 20 meters above the bay.  Really it didn't look like Kingsbarns much at all, and I don't think David wants it to, he wants to do something noteworthy but different.

[ForkaB]

I drive by the site every month or so.  At one point there were a number of large piles of dirt assembled, so there will be a fair amount of shaping (necessary, as the site was relatively flat to begin with).  Unlike Kingsbarns, the underlying geology is not linksland, and, as I understand it, the course is not being designed nor will it be promoted as a "links."  My gut feeling is that it is going to be a superb golf course, but very different in look and feel from the other courses in the area.