Why not 'evolution' instead of filling in the hollow on The Old Course's 7th?

[Mark Bourgeois]

Mr Dawson's program of change, which as you know he has admitted are the most significant in a century, includes filling in a hollow on the 7th.

The charge against the hollow was golfers kept hitting into it, disturbing the turf and causing the area to be declared GUR.

Leaving aside the issue of not playing the ball as you find it -- so much for that Scottish notion and hello America -- why couldn't Dawson just have left that ground alone, take away the ropes, and let it 'evolve' into a bunker?

That would have been cool to watch. With this group of wing nuts you could have sold tickets. A webcam and time lapse photography could have been employed. It would have been a great media story. EVERYONE would have tried to hit in the hollow, just as they hit out of the Road Hole Bunker. But unlike the latter, the former would have been welcomed.

Comparing it to that bunker, we could say Dawson had demonstrated his architectural genius and marketing skills: he changed it from a bug to a feature, took lemons and made lemonade, offered the modern golfer a priceless lesson in the origins of the game, especially the way the Scots play (used to play?) the ball down vs the Americans, who are about GUR, ropes, preferred lies -- and, yes, showed us the golf-correct meaning of 'evolution'.

And we could have had a naming contest!

What do you think of this notion to let the hollow 'evolve'? If you support it what would you have named the bunker?

My vote: 'Darwin'. If we can't have an Englishman then 'Wallace' it is. He was Welsh.

PS Full credit: the kernel of this idea came from -- who else -- Tommy Naccarato.

[Rich Goodale]

I'd vote for "Naccarato's Folly."

Surely even the Tommysaurus himself can see that the depression that is being filled in was dug out by humans within the last 100-200 years.  Or maybe not....

[Mark Bourgeois]

I think he'd be honored!

You and Mr Dawson worry about restoring the course to how it was 200 years ago. We're focused on restoring it to 25 November.

[Rich Goodale]

Were you and/or Tommy there on the 25th of November, Mark?  If so (or even if not so) what particularly was (or did you think was, in case you were not there) so great about the course then that needed to be preserved forever?

[Mark Bourgeois]

Who said I'm in favor of preserving the course as-is forever? I most certainly am not.

And I'm not against all the changes -- well, I don't think I am. Sadly, there's been no public process, no release of master plan, no detailed explanations posted on the R&A/Links Trust websites. So it's hard to tell exactly what's going on with some of these until they've gone out and done them.

I'm sure it's a simple oversight on Dawson's part.

[Niall C]

Perhaps Dr Hawtree is taking a leaf out of the minimalist handbook and doing it all on the ground rather than off plan ?

Niall

[Scott Macpherson]

I don't know all the sequence of conversations but I understand in the consideration for this work, Martin Hawtree asked Peter Dawson if he thought the hollow was trying to become a bunker. But it was the Links Trust who wanted to fill the hollow to rectify long-term and ongoing maintenance issues. There seems to be only 3 options here;

1) Don't change it, and let all the maintenance issues continue,
2) Make it a bunker,
3) Fill in the hollow.

We are aware of the decision that was made.

I think some care is required when attributing bouquets or brick bats for the individual changes. No one person was involved. This was a collaborative process and it seems they are almost overwhelmingly supported by the Towns Golf Clubs and golfers.

[Jeff_Brauer]

Scott,

You and I must present options to the client in similar ways.  If you ID a real problem, and list potential solutions, it seems to make decisions easier for them.  Usually, one of the options is the "do nothing scenario" and the result is more of the same, which in this case, might be ground that is rougher than when the sheep were actually huddling there back before golf!

I doubt they would have let it "evolve" into a bunker, without speeding up the process.  Who these days wants to wait a hundred years?

That leaves filling the hollow as the means to get the results you want, eliminate a long standing problem.

One thing rarely considered is if the thought process is similar to the old days, even if the result is change.  That is, when Old Tom was in charge of the links, and made changes, did he make them based on the same kind of considerations?  Wasn't he a "progressive" for his day in the changes he made to the links?

Second thought.  While these have been called the most significant changes in 100 years by some, where would adding irrigation in about 1978 rank in all of this?  I played there in 1980 for the first time, and recall the caddies and locals wailing back then that the course was "ruined forever."

[Ed Brzezowski]

Played TOC four times and have been in that hollow every damn round, allowing it to become a bunker is a great idea.   Filling it is not. It really adds character to the fairway.