The look of routings

[TEPaul]

Ever notice how routings on paper look like very weird things sometimes and very often absolutely nothing or very little like anything you think they look like when you're out there playing the golf course?

I'll never forget how surprised I was when I saw NGLA's routing. It was so much narrower and longer than I ever imagined. I got so disoriented as to where I was during my first round at Pacific Dunes I got Tom Doak to draw a quick routing outline and was quite amazed.

The other day I was out at Gil Hanse's new French Creek and was amazed that it looks remarkably like Hidden Creek's routing, both of which look like a big crab with a big right claw and a small left one.

Anyone else been completely surprised by the look of a routing?

[Jim_Kennedy]

TEPaul,
Yes, Yale's. When George showed me the aerials I was completely surprised at how close many holes ran to each other, yet when on the course you might never realize this fact.

[John_Conley]

I was messing around with "TerraServer" a few years ago and looked at my house from satellite.  I took a look at a nearby private club called Interlachen and was impressed.

I'd played the course several times and it isn't my fave, but when I saw all the water I realized that the achievement was simply getting a course on the site.  There's water EVERYWHERE!

[JakaBWannaB]

Yes, it is true, Tom Paul, that the very extemporaneous nature of peering into the petrie dish of a 10th grade science class microscope, all soaked in raging hormonal discourse as it were, that the routings of which you speak just seem as such.

Amoeba.  The essence of the beginning of life as viewed through the passing viewscope of existence is exactly what one senses when first seeing the routing from an aerial perspective.  True.  Unnerring.  Absolute.  It is there for the taking.

As when a child is born or a priest enters a shopping mall carrying several lit candles so does the cape-style par 4 reveal itself, one part at a time.  Though if the resolution and the scale is appropriate it is possible to see the whole thing in one fell glance.  A glance evident enough to those wishing to envelope themselves with the richness of the fabric of the very mowing patterns that eventuallly manifest themselves upon said routing plan.  Amoeba.

[TEPaul]

Even more fantastic! The racial violent verbiage has magically disappeared! I just love modern technology--except in golf course architecture!

For interesting routing looks Brad's new Ross book is an excellent resource. I can't remember which course but Ross used one long hole to "just bam", get from the top of the property to the bottom and thereby sent the routing from clockwise to counter-clockwise in one fell swoop!

Most golfers have absolutely no real sense of the look of routings probably because they very rarely if ever see them. That would only be something the architect would see, I guess, as he's the one to do it.

What do some of the architects out there think of the look of a routing? Anything? Nothing?

[Brian Phillips]

Tom,

Muirfield must be one of the greatest routings ever.  The first nine goes clockwise which keeps all the slices within the property and then the second nine turns and goes anti-clockwise.

Of the different design courses I have attended this routing is always brought as the one to learn from on a piece of paper.

Cheers Brian

[Bill_McBride]

Brian, Sonoma Golf Club in Northern California has the same routing as Murfield apparently -- front nine clockwise around the perimeter of the property, back nine inside and opposite direction.  Tough on a hooker but gentle on the 90% who slice.