None of the Irish courses are as good as their nearby older cousins

Mark

How about:

Loch Lomond
St. Andrews Bay (Torrance and Devlin)
Roxburghe
Southern Gailes

And, if you are gong to include major renovations (a la Kintyre):

Portsalon

Mark,

I think Enniscrone would qualify as it was a basic 9 hole course until Eddie Hackett came in 1974 and did a full 18, with Steel doing a subsequent revision of Hackett's 18. While I have not played them, I would think that Enniscrone would rank above :

39.K-Club
40.Mount Juliet
41.Druid's Glen

when was cape cornwall built - near land's end on the southeast corner of the uk?

It's funny not to see Moor Allerton on the list - when it opened to huge acclaim  I remember pundits saying that was the way we should be going in the UK - replacing our old-fashioned ground game courses with  modern American-style layouts that eliminated the element of chance. (In Moor Allerton's case the membership left their MacKenzie original for 27 holes by Robert Trent Jones Snr).
So has it fallen so far it doesn't even make the 50? I've never been but have signed up for an open there this summer so I'm no longer  the only person on this board who has never played a RTJ course.

Mark

I think the Duchess at Woburn is easily good enough.

Anyone played those really remote Eddie Hackett links, called (I think) St Patricks and St Margerets?  They look interesting.

Queenswood designed by Bandon's David Kidd?

I suppose one could consider St Andrews Jubilee - how much of a makeover did it get (Donald Steel, wasn't it?)

Mark:

I saw Doonbeg at #49 and have to wonder if you've been sipping a bit too much since it is St. Patrick's Day! I played the course last year and although I will frankly admit I don't have the details on the new courses like you do I can't see how Doonbeg can be thaaaaaaaaaaaat low.

I also played Celtic Manor (Wentwood Hills) and it is simply bloody awlful. It's nothing more than an American course shipped over to the Welsh countryside.

The European Club was one layout I did play during my last trip across the pond and I don't see what all the fuss is about. It surely doesn't compare to the older courses and I'd take Doonbeg over it quite quickly.

One last question -- you don't list Oxfordshire (Rees Jones). How does that layout compare -- I've not played it but friends of mine were mixed on it?

Dan, Matt, Johnny,

Interested to hear about Linden Hall - I'll be going that way soonish so I'll pop my head in.

Doonbeg is only at #49 because they're not in any particular order of merit, just the order they came into my head.  As I said, it is just a list to be shot down, torn apart and then reassembled, but if you leave the list blank it's so much more long-winded a process.  I'm sure Doonbeg would finish up much, much higher in the list.  But first we'll delete a number of inadequate courses and then add in all these serious suggestions.

I didn't include the Oxfordshire because I thought it a great waste of a perfectly decent corn field.  It's vulgar.  If you think Wentwood Hills ghastly you'll think even worse thoughts about the Oxfordshire.  I know I included it in my Globetrotter Guide to England and Wales, but that is not an architectural guide book.  I need to cater for a wide variety of tastes amongst potential readers.

I'm interested in what you say about Celtic Manor because, of course, it is an American course - that is what they wanted, as with Loch Lomond, Oxfordshire, Wisley etc and many of the Irish layouts.  Just because they are in an American style, does that necessarily make them unworthy of consideration?  They still have enormous fascination for the bulk of competitive golf club members because that is what they found when they winter holidayed in Spain or Portugal, Florida or the Carolinas and now they can get much the same thing (but not the climate) at home.  You'd be amazed how many members of good links courses in North Wales (including my own, Conwy) make the pilgrimage to Wentwood Hills and come home raving about it and why can't we have something like it nearer to home.  That they are competitive golfers doesn't mean that they are good judges of architecture - a great many really active club golfers can't stand links courses - they look for other attributes.  But this is an architecture site, and I'm sure your views will win the day.  Just keep the arguments going a little longer....

Mark:

I had the pleasure in coming to Wales on a golf media visit and after one plays Royal Porthcawl, Pennard and Royal St. David's, to name just three, the "opportunity" to play Wentwood Hills at Celtic Manor is indeed a major league drop-off in quality. Now, I am well aware Celtic Manor is inland and it was designed specifically to be an "American" style course but the green shapes are simply large and unimaginative. The bunkering style is akin to a large scooper just taking holes out of the ground without any real connection to what golf shots are supposed to be about. Just dreadful stuff -- one can only hope the proposed changes for the 2010 Ryder Cup will be beyond what's there now.

Thanks for your comments on Oxfordshire -- I have not played it but those who have disliked it echo your comments.

P.S. I echo Bob's last comment -- send those who love Celtic Manor to Florida and they'll find many other great architectural wonders there too!

I placed a review of Wentwood Hills in the uk golf guide site a couple of years back and described it as a thoroughly artificial Americanised slog. May have been a little harsh but I seem to remember leaving a drive on #10 a fraction right only to see it be thrown further right off some mound, bounce on the ludicrously placed buggy path and disappear into the sea of uncut ryegrass never to be found again and that was on one of the better holes. It was perhaps significant that at last years Welsh Open Ian Woosnam, Sam Torrance and Colin Montgomery all failed to make the cut. It is a painful walk round and if you happen to be something other than a supreme specimen of male athleticism then the course, especially that mountain climb on the last few holes, can be a bit of a chore. I think the reason why so many extol its virtues are because it is so different to anything else in the area and so a single visit can have a certain novelty value. I wonder how many would appreciate it so much if forced to play it for the rest of their lives and that could be the cause of one or two of that ilk such as East Sussex National, The London Club and The Oxfordshire, all ending up as financial catastrophes.

Mark, you invited argument on the Edinburgh at Wentworth. Well I have played it a few times and have always enjoyed the experience. I appreciate that the environmentally forced tight fairways can limit strategic options but I would argue that thought is still required throughout the course courtesy of the doglegs and the relative constraint on length. So often one has to decide whether to launch one over the trees, or to place to the corner or to turn it around with a controlled fade or draw and I love that in a course. Perhaps I could best illustrate my thinking by going back to 1999 and that Seniors Tour event they hold each year. It was won on that occasion by Neil Coles, a man I had the pleasure of caddying for at Stoke Park. He was probably just about the best controller of a ball there has ever been and it was a delight to see him manoeuvre his way around those doglegs and basically outwit the course through control and thought. He was never going to power his way round as he was a couple of months short of his 65th birthday but he still claimed the title with a total of 10 under par. And I wonder how many courses would have given him that opportunity. Certainly if they had played that tournament at Celtic Manor he would have been going home on day 2.

Anyway, back to that great list. Saunton West? It was rebuilt in the 70’s having been lost in the war.    

Yes the first and last 2 holes were fitted into the practice range and short course, and to that extent I agree they are out of character.
I suppose what you mention about chopping it round can influenece our opinions so much. Was that the great Doyle Davidson (DD) you were playing with? Enough to destroy anyones game.