Did CBM do a better job at Chicago than National?

[Mark Chaplin]

NGLA is truly a wonderful golf course on a stunning piece of land. There can barely be a better piece of land for golf on the planet, National has everything water, rolling land, good drainage and marvellous vistas. I am sure the land played a great part in the design of the links.

Wheaton however gave CBM an oblong, flat and pretty uninteresting piece of land yet a classic course was fashioned.  What little slope there is is used to good effect creating a subtle test of golf.

Given the land did CBM perform a miracle at Chicago Golf Club?

[Bill_McBride]

NGLA is truly a wonderful golf course on a stunning piece of land. There can barely be a better piece of land for golf on the planet, National has everything water, rolling land, good drainage and marvellous vistas. I am sure the land played a great part in the design of the links.

Wheaton however gave CBM an oblong, flat and pretty uninteresting piece of land yet a classic course was fashioned.  What little slope there is is used to good effect creating a subtle test of golf.

Given the land did CBM perform a miracle at Chicago Golf Club?

No, but Raynor did.   CBM designed the original, Raynor the current version. 

[Jeff_Brauer]

What Bill said.  The first CGC wasn't nearly as good as the Raynor version is now.

[Jim Nugent]

Mark's question still holds.  Given the land, is Chicago a more impressive design than National? 

[Anthony Gray]

Back to the original question please

[J_ Crisham]

Yes- the National is on a tremendous piece of ground and obviously the routing is quite special. CGC is unfortunately laid out on  very typical Chicago  topography. Other than Olympia Fields, Beverly, and the ravines at Shoreacres, we have very little movement to our ground. Hard to criticize a specific hole at CGC. They are all pretty well designed and more importantly preserved.
                                                                                                                   Jack 

[Jud_T]

Quantifying this type of exercise always strikes me as a bit murky.  Yes a Doak 8 on a Doak 5 piece of property is a better improvement on mother nature than a Doak 10 on Doak 9 land, but which would you rather play?  And how much better could National have been anyway? (My course goes to 11... )  If someone builds a Doak 3 out of the toughest piece of property on the planet that noone else thought was even possible are we supposed to pull our beards in approval and move heaven and earth to get on?