...under Courses by Country and Architecture Timeline.
People are drawn to golf and to certain courses for different reasons. In Australia, golf architecture junkies frequently sight Royal Adelaide at or near the top of their personal country list. There literally may not be a single person in the world that thinks that the property could have yielded a better set of holes, so gifted was Mackenzie’s use of the dominant sand dune in the middle of the property. Other, more normal
golfers say, “Are you kidding? No way does Royal Adelaide compete with New South Wales Golf Club and its spectacular setting.” Debate ensues, hopefully over many pints of Victoria Bitters.
Ala Royal Adelaide, there is something enormously appealing about a course where the overriding sensation is that everything has been done right. A friend of mine here in Pinehurst says that every time he returns from Friar’s Head. Such courses/clubs are so very few and far between that when you find one, it is time to rejoice. This is the feeling that Philip Gawith, Rick Holland and I had as we left Saint-Germain.
Architecturally, it shows Colt’s talent as an architect as well (and probably better) than any course with which I am familiar. At Portrush, was there really not four better holes to be had than the fifteenth and in that we play today?
Maybe, maybe not. However, at Saint-Germain, I defy anyone to come up with a better design on this flat site that has a rail line running through it. You decide for yourself but under the Holes to Note section, seven holes can be fairly labeled as great (the fourth, fifth, seventh, tenth, fourteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth). That’s an astonishing number for a course located on a piece of property that had limited potential. Better yet, there are no dullard holes either. Architecturally, in terms of getting the most out of a site, Colt gets a perfect ten out of ten here, at least by me.
What are some other such courses? They might not be the architect’s best course but the design yielded the absolute best sequence of holes from the property. Kapalua Plantation and Yeamans Hall fall in that category for me. Of course, The Old Course at St. Andrews and Merion - what are other examples? The Sacred Nine but I have never been there
to see for myself.
Cheers,