O h to be in England now that summer’s here. A perfect summer evening (once the sun broke through) with a great partner and two guys swooning over the course they are playing/battling/smiling at.
Great to meet you Chris and I’m delighted your excellent adventure got off to a solid start. As you said if there’s 94 courses over here better than the Addington then what a time you’re going to have.
The course was beautiful, more F&F than any other inland course I’ve seen. Brown, green, red and yes purple heather in bloom (with a lot more than I remembered to come). Chris said it was livelier than the Sandbelt which surprised me a little. It’s high up and drains well, and with no fairway irrigation in place this is how it’s meant to be. TEP says a drive should bounce 15' in the air and then run on 70 yards; well we saw that last night.
By my standards I played the back nine ‘mighty fine’, but on the 16th I didn’t pay the course enough respect. The fairway moves first R-L then in the landing area for your second shot R-L. For my second shot I hit a respectable 5 iron, with maybe a hint of fade that landed in the centre of the fairway; the roll took it off the fairway, down the hill to an unplayable position on hardpan under a canopy of a large tree looking at a vertical slope. Is that unfair or should I have hit a 7 or 9 iron?
A sign on the wall says they are in the 4th year of their 5 year improvement plan and they have had the chainsaws out. However there’s still a lot more that could be done. In the above example I would have had a sight of the green in the old B/W photos posted early this year, with just a semi blind uphill chip as my punishment.
The greens were much better than at the start of the summer and even though they played fairly slow there was quite a lot of movement. ON the 3rd the pin was immediately behind the false front, hitting long to get on, left a really scary putt back!
Sean the 8th. (The tee shot seen here wearing spring green)
It is a value judgement whether this is unfair or not. Last time you described it as controversial and I’d accept that. However a well struck 3 wood with a draw would give you pole position. So there is a shot - you’ve just got to be able to execute it. However it’s a good way over that ‘tumuli’ and there isn’t a bail out option. I popped my 7 wood on top of the mound and Chris’s slightly pushed 3 wood stayed out of the trees but didn’t leave him with a line to the green
Finally “some people just don’t get it”.
We followed a 3 ball, who as they moved off immediately offered to let us play through as they said they weren’t going to hurry. To allow time to stretch ECT we declined as we didn’t feel like rushing. They eventually called us through on the 8th green when two of them were looking for balls that had just rolled through. I spoke with the nearest one who had a long face. He called it “a bit odd”. It turned out they were the local county team practicing for a match this Sunday. As we came off the 10th tee he came up to us and asked if we’d seen or heard his ball land near the 9th green? (A 90 degree blind dogleg), we hadn’t - he’d just lost another complimentary PROV1 attempting to drive the green. To cut a long story short after playing the 10th he went home. Later his playing companions confirmed he’d seen enough and as one of them said with a smile he’s yet to see the 12th.
Keep us informed Chris (I believe he’s at Lords at he moment.) and good luck.