[Sean_A]

Tommy Mac

There is one flaw with your money making scheme.  People have to care enough to restore courses, maintain them and play them with proper equipment.  Otherwise why bother restoring to some "golden age"?  So far as I can tell, there isn't much call for this type of golf.  That is why these were modernized in the first place.  

By the way.  There is call for producing objects using original decorative methods and tools.  I make a modest living producing and selling items of this nature.  However, my products are mainly valuable to those who do care about proper restoration-no matter the inconvenience.

Ciao

Sean

[T_MacWood]

Tom like you I admire the restraint with which NGLA and other courses that continue to garner respect: consolidate, repair, restore and rebuild.  But with every step they also loose something - that indescribable something. And this process by definition will not stop but must continue with time.

Re-read what Viollet-le-Duc's said, I don't think you understand his point. What has the NGLA lost by removing trees, re-establishing fairway width and lost green surfaces?

If this group were, for the sake of argument, to really put it's mind to it and agree another rating, a list of 100 important classics and define the year at which each course was in it's peak condition, would we then have  a responsibility to argue for keeping those courses at this peak?

If you have been following this subject for the last couple of years, you would know that I’m not in favor of widespread restoration and never have been. What are you talking about keeping 100 courses at their peak?

 NGLA is one of the top 10 (IMHO) of these courses, and yet you seem to be happy with it as a course today and as a course 5 years after Macdonald designed it.

I am happy with the course today. ‘..and as a course 5 years after Macdoanld designed it’…you lost me there. What are you talking about?

 For a grade A example of what we are talking about both can't be valid, can they?  Surely a top 10 on this list deserves scrupulous attention to detail, every effort expended to maintain it’s key values and an end to compromise and staying with the times?

I think your rating system would be a bad idea. A better idea would be to identify the relative small number of courses that might benefit from a restoration. Bring attention to and expain why those courses would benefit from a proper restoration. And publicize and praise those club’s who have already benefited from good restorations.

What changes already made are acceptable and what changes in the future can not be, before too much is lost?  

Like everything else that is a subjective matter, requiring thorough research, thoughtful study and expertise. Every course is different; every course has their own unique history.

In other disciplines the current thinking seems to me to be to restore using original methods back to, as near as we can identify, to the original, particularly for important examples of an art or craft.

The majority of restorations involve removing trees, re-establishing fairways and lost green surfaces. I don’t believe the methods are an issue. Regarding restoring bunkers…there seems to be a good number of men today who are adept at crafting bunkers like those of the golden age. I know there is good deal of handwork involved, but I would not prevent them from using modern technology when necessary.

I fully accept that NGLA today is no museum piece but I also believe she is not the same as seductress who challenged the golfers of 1914.

How do you know? What was more enjoyable about the course then, than today?

Many believe the well preserved (and thoughtfully restored) NGLA of today is a very special golf course. There are very few modern courses or vintage courses that are its equal…very few. I don’t know what point you are trying to make, but if you are advocating a modern architect remodel this course in hopes of capturing your lost seductress, you would be involved in a criminal exercise bound to fail.

Is it important to look at what we've lost and how they’ve changed or just to celebrate that the old beauties still have charm?  I just believe that with golf courses there’s no real chance of going back and there’s no future in trying to hold the fort.  I think we agree on the need for sensitive development of courses but disagree on whether restoration is desirable or even possible with a golf course.

I disagree. I think it is important to preserve and protect great art…including great golf courses. The modern art of golf design is benefiting from going back and appreciating the work of the past. Many of these young designers thankfully disagree with you, and are attempting to hold the fort and when possible restore, so that future generations will also benefit. They’ve discovered what their brethren in architecture discovered long ago…. preserving, protecting and when appropriate restoring the great works of the past is extremely important to the future.

The questions in my mind remain, why would you want to resore and to what would you want to restore?

Why? Improving golf courses from both golfing and aesthetic aspect. Preserving and protecting the very best work for future generations to enjoy ,study and emulate.

What would I want to restore?

Off the top of my head: Hirono, more openness at PVGC, the 12th at GCGC and the lost holes at SFGC.

[T_MacWood]

Tommy Mac

There is one flaw with your money making scheme.  People have to care enough to restore courses, maintain them and play them with proper equipment.  Otherwise why bother restoring to some "golden age"?  So far as I can tell, there isn't much call for this type of golf.  That is why these were modernized in the first place.  

That's not a problem...that's an opportunity. You can use your craftmanship to hammer out and sell gutties. There is no reason to be so negative.

By the way.  There is call for producing objects using original decorative methods and tools.  I make a modest living producing and selling items of this nature.  However, my products are mainly valuable to those who do care about proper restoration-no matter the inconvenience.

How ironic.

Ciao

Sean

[Tom_Doak]

Tom MacWood:  I've got half your wish list on my wish list, with the prospect of doing something about them.

Others:  All this stuff about having to restore the original maintenance conditions or the original shot values to make for a true restoration, is nonsense.

A GREAT golf course is designed to be great for ALL classes of players ... INCLUDING the great players yet to come.

The only corollary to this is that a truly great course does not have to add new tees every other week in order to remain a great course.  Only an architect who is too focused on one particular template of golfer would agree that a course needs to be updated regularly.

Mr. Macdonald might be bummed out that technology has advanced to the point that the National is no longer a great CHALLENGE for the best players in the world.  But, he would be happy to see that it is still a great COURSE for them to play, irrespective of the scores they might shoot today.

[Patrick_Mucci]

SPDB,

I don't think anyone looks at a restoration in the context of perfection, down to every last blade of grass.

Will subtleties be missed ?  Probably.

Will subtleties be created ? Probably.

But, if the research it extensive and the pursuit dedicated, you'll get somewhere around 90-95 % of it right the first time.
The balance can be fine tuned over time as best as is possible.

It's a committment to, and the puritiy of the effort that's critical.

[Patrick_Mucci]

I do think the way maintenance has changed over the past 150 years has made profound changes to the architectural features known as greens.  

NGLA is 95 years old.

I've played NGLA when the greens stimped at 6.
So, how have the architectural features changed over the intervening years when the green speeds have remained the same on given days ?[/color]

I would argue that on this site green speeds are second only to bunkers as a subject of debate on architectural features.


That's an argument with little or no merit, ignoring the myriad of architectural features other than bunkers, especially at NGLA.[/color]

I’ve referenced this before but Bobby Jones’ ‘perfect’ round at Suningdale had 33 putts.  
Most weekends the winner of a PGA tournament has what 28 putts per round?  This has more to do with the changes to the maintenance of the green than equipment or training.

No, it's got to do with the size and quality of the field.[/color]

I believe that if you went back a further 30 years before Jones, the greens added at least a further 5 shots per round.  

Why ?

What was the difference in green speeds between 1930 and 1900 or 1923 and 1893 ?[/color]

That is why I ask if you want to restore NGLA will you go back to the maintenance practices of Macdonald’s days.

Do you know what those maintainance practices were ?
Do you know the pace of the greens during MacDonald's reign ?  [/color]

If you don’t, I believe you are playing a different course to the one originally conceived.

How is it different on the days that NGLA stimps at 6  ?[/color]

For a start I think with the ground game it was easier to attack the pin when the greens rolled slower.

How would that be true if the pin was cut to the left rear of # 4 and the rear of # 18 green, to mention just two examples ?[/color]

[SPDB]

Pat - Getting 95% of NGLA's subtleties, quirk and features would be a triumph. I'm just not sure that it would be possible, even with extensive research. It's just my opinion, but there is so much going on there that makes the course great, I just don't think it could be replicated or restored.

Maybe, like Gib, the thought of an obliterated NGLA is too much for me to bear.

[Patrick_Mucci]

SPDB,

That's what I don't get.

How could CBM, with rudimentary equipment create such a great golf course with all of those subtle as well as glaring features, yet, today, with all of the modern technology, architects are either incapable of such feats, unwilling to create them, or have their ability to do so muted by the owner/developer.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Tom Doak,

Forgetting about the Pros,
While TEPaul will disagree, adding tee length to # 7 at NGLA would bring the "hotel" bunker complex back into play for most decent to good golfers.

The ability to ignore that feature diminishes the architectural quality and merits of the hole.

The same can be said about the 8th tee and preserving the strategy on the tee shot.

Other holes at NGLA have natural impediments that prevent unrestricted length.

[Sean_A]

Tommy Mac, Pat and Tom D.

Perhaps our disconnect is down to definitions.  Having a look in the dictionary I find:

1. a restoring or being restored; reinstatement

2. a putting back or bringing back into a former, normal, or UN IMPAIRED state of CONDITION.

3. a PRESENTATION of the ORIGINAL form or structure

These definitions would seem to support what I was thinking of.  I would still contend that you lot are advocating a restoration to whichever period that you think is best rather than to an original state.  

That is not to say it isn't important to restore a course back to its original state, but is this what yourselves and members really want?

Ciao

Sean

[Tom_Doak]

Sean:

I have restored two courses back to pretty much their original state:  Camargo and The Valley Club.  Both projects seem to have been a success.  At both clubs there was some debate about the necessity of restoring bunkers that were only 160 yards off the tee, but when we did, we found that the bunkers fit into the landscape beautifully and did add interest for a segment of the membership.

I guess you could quibble that they are not at all in their original state -- the clubs don't want to mow the fairways 75 yards wide with gang mowers, they don't want to mow the fairways at 3/4 inch, etc., etc.  But the point is that when the architecture is back to its pure original state, the course gains a feeling of perfection that it hasn't enjoyed in decades.  There are some synergies of design on great courses that you just don't see when you are analyzing the course from the perspective of your own game.

My problem with all of these arguments is that everyone seems to assume the golf course architect is designing every feature for the best player of that day, and therefore the course must evolve to keep up with the best players of today -- witness Pat's question about the 7th at National.  But I do believe that Macdonald might have envisioned the day when some guys could bomb it over that hazard, and he wasn't at all worried about it, because he knew the second shot would still confound them.

There are plenty of driving hazards at Pacific Dunes that Tiger Woods could carry easily the day we built them.  That doesn't mean the course needs to be renovated.

[Sean_A]

Tom

I understand your point.  As far as restoration is concerned I am not in agreement as to separating architecture from conditioning.  If one is trying to recreate the original state of a 100 year old course then restoring the playing characteristics through the conditioning of the course is essential.  Otherwise, I think the changes are something other than a restoration.  

Renovation is probably a much more accurate term for almost any work done on a course.  I say this because the intent is to make the course like new rather than to make it like the original state, conditioning (including warts) and all.  

Perhaps I am wrong, but if I am wrong I would like to know why.  

Ciao

Sean  

[T_MacWood]

Tommy Mac, Pat and Tom D.

Perhaps our disconnect is down to definitions.  Having a look in the dictionary I find:

1. a restoring or being restored; reinstatement

2. a putting back or bringing back into a former, normal, or UN IMPAIRED state of CONDITION.

3. a PRESENTATION of the ORIGINAL form or structure

These definitions would seem to support what I was thinking of.  I would still contend that you lot are advocating a restoration to whichever period that you think is best rather than to an original state.  

Ciao

Sean

I'm not sure why you are so confused. Golf course restorations have been occuring for over a decade; it has been major topic of discussion on this website since its inception. Where have you been?

Renovation is what you do to your family room or kitchen. Renovation is what Art Hills does to an old classic course.

The best golf course restorations can be any combination of the following: preservation - rehabilitation - repair - historic or scholarly reconstruction.

When they recently restored Kent's garden design at Claremont in Surrey or The Great Garden at Het Loo in the Netherlands...do believe they should be maintained by 17C technology or 20C technology?

The only maintenance issue I can see that relates to golf course restoration is maintaining reasonable greenspeeds on heavily contoured greens.

[Sean_A]

Tommy Mac

I am not sure why keep mentioning maintenance equipment.  Can't modern equipment just as easlily maintain a course to the standards of whatever date?  

I understand that you folks talk about restoration a load.  I am debating the term Tom.  I think it is misused.  You use words like repair and rehabilitation.  To what date?  Restoration means restoring to original state.  Why this would preclude the condition of a course is causing the confusion.  For example, why is it important to reinstate (replicate is more accurate) a bunker as part of a restoration, but replicating  green speeds due to heights of grass is not important?

I am looking for answers to my questions in an earnest manner.  Or at least some reasoning as to why I am looking at the questions in the wrong way.

Ciao

Sean

[TEPaul]

I've never seen so much hair-splitting on a single thread. You all seem to be making basically the same point while at the same time continuing to argue endlessly over it.

Why bother with some hypothetical restoration question if NGLA was destroyed? It never was destroyed. The fact is the way NGLA has dealt with their golf course in returning it to the look and feel it had decades ago (around the era of Macdonald) is extremely admirable. Would it only be that other courses would follow NGLA's lead that way.

Restore the course's original agronomy? That's preposterous and anyone could appreciate that if they had even a glimmer of understanding how problematic golf argronomy was in the old days on a course like NGLA.

Furthermore, I think it's becoming more apparent every day that one of the best and most effective ways or restoring these old golf courses is to attempt to restore a form of the original "playablity" and that basically means firm and fast and primarily "through the green". That form of restoration is in maintenance and not architecture.

If one wants to restore an old course architecturally my suggestion would be to concentrate only on restoring architectural aspects that were wiped away in the past through the whole era of blatant redesign. However, if it appears obvious that some redesigned aspect works better than what was there originally then leave it alone and if it appears what was there originally would work better and be more enjoyable then restore it as close as possible to original in look.

The question of the maintaining of the strategic design intent of these old golf courses (not altering it, maintaining it) is an on-going one---it's a complex question and should be dealt with on an individual basis only as best as it can be done to maintain an original look and playability. Exact and precise restoration or preservation of some strategic design intent and playabilities may not be possible and that too should be accepted. But the question and the problems of attempting to maintain design intent and keep that aspect as relevent as possible cannot be dismissed by architectural purists. It's fundamental to all golf courses. Anybody on here who denies that has his head in the clouds, in my opinion.

A classic old golf course, including the most respected old ones in the world, probably have some similarities in an art preservation sense to a piece of art such as the Mona Lisa but they have far more differences.

[T_MacWood]

Restoration does not neccesarily involve returning a work to its original state. Often times it means restoring it to a perfected state which may have occured at any time in its history. The architectural dictionary defines restoration: The treatment of an old building to recover its PRIOR or 'ORIGINAL' condition by removing later accretions (such as Baroque additions to Gothic or Gothic additions to Romanesque).

The condition of a golf course is constantly changing....from week to week, season to season, year to year. It is impractical to include the ever changing conditions in a restoration plan--the condition of the NGLA in the spring of 1939 would be different from the courses condition in the Summer of 1940 which would differ from its condition in the Winter of 1929. Not only is it impractical, it is likely the condition of the course in those years was not the courses perfected state of maintenance.

Just like anything else there is an optimum condition...if your goal is to find or restore a golf courses perfected architectural state...why wouldn't you do the same with its condition, even if the perfected condition occured at completely different time?

When you have the advantages of modern technology and you are actively utilizing a restored work, it makes absolutley no sense to retreat to the Dark Ages. It would be just as impractical to set the rabbits loose at Machrahanish or to rip out the inside plumbing and electricity in your sensatively restored old manor house. You've got come at this subject with some intellegence.

[TEPaul]

Tom MacWood:

What do you mean by a course's "condition" or "optimum condition"?

That word is way too general, always has been. That's one of the reasons I created a detailed list of specific ideal "playablilities" and maintenance practices I call the "Ideal Maintenance Meld". Every single specific component has an ideal goal particularly in playability but also in look and they all can be specifically defined for an over-all result or goal. If one can't do that with the maintenance prectices of a golf course they'll never be agreement in how to specifically proceed.

But if someone says a golf course is in great "condition" what does that mean exactly? It can mean 100 different things to 100 different people and there in lies the problem.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Perhaps our disconnect is down to definitions.  Having a look in the dictionary I find:

1. a restoring or being restored; reinstatement

2. a putting back or bringing back into a former, normal, or UN IMPAIRED state of CONDITION.

3. a PRESENTATION of the ORIGINAL form or structure

These definitions would seem to support what I was thinking of.  I would still contend that you lot are advocating a restoration to whichever period that you think is best rather than to an original state.  

You're using the wrong dictionary.
Look in "Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary"

You conveniently left off other key definitions, such as:
"To put back to a FORMER state"
"To put or bring back into existance or use"
"To give back" Return."
"To put again in possession of something"

Emphasizing but one word "original" amongst many, to the exclusion of others, like "former" to support your point is disengenuous.[/color]

That is not to say it isn't important to restore a course back to its original state, but is this what yourselves and members really want?

What would Charles Blair MacDonald want ?

Would he want you to restore NGLA to the date it originally opened for play in 1911 ?  
Or would he want you to restore NGLA to its state after he had finished fine tuning it ?
To 1922 when it held the Walker Cup ?
To 1928 when the first professional stroke play tournament was held ? Also the date that "Scotland's Gift" was published ?
Or to 1939, the year of his death ?[/color]

[Sean_A]

Tom P.

I don't think it is ludicrous at all to include conditioning of a course as part of restoration.  People keep saying it is silly, but they don't say why.

Tommy Mac

I have no idea of when optimum conditions were for any course.  Perhaps we have yet to see optimum conditions.  As you say, courses are constantly evolving.  Often times it is for the better.

Pat M.

I don't care what CB Mac would want.  He is dead.  What the members want is what is important.

I don't think I have been disengenuous at all.  I have been the only one to offer up a concrete definition of restoration.  The rest of you have faffed about.

I have tried patiently to differentiate between "restore" and "renovate".  On this site, "renovate" is generally viewed as bad while "restore" is generally seen as good.  I have been trying to find out why.  How the terms are used on this site (especially Tommy Mac's relative value judgement on what is optimum) is very unclear.  

It has become apparent that you guys aren't going to answer the questions presented so I will stop asking.  

Ciao

Sean

[Patrick_Mucci]

Sean,

The questions were answered.
You either didn't understand the answers or chose to ignore them.

You championed restoring NGLA to its original form, a decision that CBM himself rejected, vis a vis, his alterations subsequent to the official opening day of September 11, 1911.

If CBM himself wasn't satisfied with the original design, why should anyone else be satisfied.  And, why would you reject his improvements ?  What don't you like about them ?

Tom MacWood and I tried to get you to see past your fixation with respect to restoring to the original design, the one CBM himself rejected, but, you didn't want to listen to us, or CBM.

As to your absurd position to revert to the maintainance practices circa 1911, TEPaul tried to give you benefit of his vast knowledge regarding the agronomic difficulties the golf course faced in its early years, but again, you chose to ignore his sage advice, blindly adhering to your notion of restoring to the original golf course.

If you want to learn something, open your mind and listen to prudent advice, rather than clinging to a theory that the original architect repudiated.

[T_MacWood]

Sean
Come on. You've become a poor man's Rich Goodale. Putting forth the most asinine contrarian rubbish.

It is easy enough to determine a golf course's optimum set up...it doesn't take a massive amount of historic research...simply trial and error today...monitoring and adjusting the amount of water to get the right firmness and adjusting the cutting height.  

Can you give us a single example where the maintanance of a golf course was restored to specific point in history?

You really are confused. Let me explain to you the difference between renovate and restore. Renovate is what RTJ did at Oakland Hills (your personal favorite)...otherwise known as redesign.

Restoration is what occured at NGLA: re-establishing fairways and lost green surfaces, and removing trees.

Did you miss the defintion of restoration from the Oxford dictionary of architecture? You are incorrect to claim that it requires going back to the original state...very often it is re-establishing a prior state deemed to be the perfected state (the example given was removing renovations done in Baroque style to a Gothic building...or in this case removing Trent Jones formulaic symmetrical modern renovations to Ross's classic old-fashioned randomness).

[TEPaul]

"Restoration means restoring to original state.  Why this would preclude the condition of a course is causing the confusion.  For example, why is it important to reinstate (replicate is more accurate) a bunker as part of a restoration, but replicating  green speeds due to heights of grass is not important?
I am looking for answers to my questions in an earnest manner.  Or at least some reasoning as to why I am looking at the questions in the wrong way."

Sean:

I wouldn't get too caught up in the dictionary definitions of some of these term--ie restoration, renovation etc.

Replicating maintenance practices and agronomy to the way it was in 1911 at NGLA? First of all are you aware how problematic golf argronomy was back then? Golf agronomy has made some incredible strides since then and I most certainly am not referring to over-irrigation and a total over-reliance on chemicals.

Restore green speeds to the way they were in 1911? In a word I think you'd find very few people who would enjoy that today. Depending on slope and contour of the greens of particular courses it seems that most everyone enjoys green speeds today within a differential of about 9-10.5 on the stimpmeter. I sure know I do. It's a whole lot more interesting, challenging and fun, in my opinion.

"It is easy enough to determine a golf course's optimum set up..."

Tom MacWood:

It's not that difficult to determine what a golf course's optimum set-up should be but actually getting it done and consistently is not as easy as you may think. If you believe it is easy enough please explain to me where and how you got it done at a club. What I refer to as the IMM can take a whole lot of planning, time, education and persuasion. If you have some way of promoting and effecting it easily please let us know because a lot of us are out there trying to promote it any way we can at a lot of golf courses.

[Sean_A]

Pat

I don't champion restoring NGLA to its original form.  What happens to that course is none of my business.  I was trying to find out what constitutes a restoration compared to a renovation (and compared to a resdesign).  As far as I can gather from your response a restoration takes into account what the original architect thought or what his "intent" was.  

Tommy Mac

Line up 10 knowledgeable guys and ask what are optimum conditions or the perfect state and I bet you get at least three answers.  No such animal exists Tom.  It is a matter of opinion.  This is why I have been asking about the diferences between renovation and restoration.

I don't know of any courses that have been properly restored.  Probably because not many people really want a proper restoration.  

Oakland Hills is not favorite course.  I think it is a very good course and I enjoy playing it, but my favorite course is North Berwick.  

Tom P.

Cheers.  Without being insane about replicating conditions of whatever time period, what are the key points in a restoration?  Are these points strictly architectural or do conditions have any importance in restoration?  If you know of examples of hopefully both, I would appreciate reading them.  

Ciao

Sean

[TEPaul]

"Tom P.
Cheers.  Without being insane about replicating conditions of whatever time period, what are the key points in a restoration?  Are these points strictly architectural or do conditions have any importance in restoration?  If you know of examples of hopefully both, I would appreciate reading them."

Sean:

Sure, no problem. Obviously you're asking questions that're fundamental and important to you and I'd like to see you supplied with answers that satisfy you. And your questions are good ones.

What are the key points in a restoration and are these strictly architectural or do conditions have any importance in a restoration?

In my opinion, the key points of a good and effective restoration (in play) are both architectural and also involve some necessay "conditions", as you call them.

The reason I include "conditions" (I call them "maintenance practices" not conditions) with a good "architectural" restoration is because if proper maintenance practices don't follow a good architectural restoration I don't think the golf course will play the way it was intended to play with the good architectural restoration that has been done.

If you'd like to know what I think those "maintenance practices" are for a good classic course restoration I'd be more than happy to tell you. They're pretty specific even if somewhat comprehensive, and you probably know I call them the "ideal maintenance meld". One of the reasons I use that term is because I don't think the term "good condition" is definitiive enough. If it is definitive I've never heard anyone define it except to perhaps use the term to refer to courses that are overly immaculate looking. Other than that I've never felt the term "good condition" is definitive enough to accomplish a particular look and particular "playabilities".

My "maintenance meld" is basically a laundry list of maintenance practices that define particular "playabilities". And the list is both defined and specific. It has to be that way or neither golfers nor maintenance departments will understand what you're specifically trying to accomplish in both maintenance practices and specific playabilities. If you can manage to accomplish all the specifics of that laundry list of mantenance practices I think you generally end up with a golf course that plays really interesting, challenging and exciting and enjoyable for all. And I also think it plays a lot more like most of those old classic "Golden Age" courses were intended to play.

What I do not do, however, is get caught up in the specific (or dictionary meaning) of restoration, renovation, rehabilitation, replication or whatever other words you all are constantly arguing over on here. And the reason I don't is I don't think the term used for something like this really matters. What matters is what you do, what's specifically planned and accomplished.

For instance, at my own club which by the way just went through a fairly comprehensive architectural and "maintenance practices" project, initially called what we were going to do a "restoration" but apparently some in the membership didn't exactly like the sound of that term so we decided to just call it an "improvement".

The point is we did not change anything about what we were attempting to do, we simply called it something else.

Now, if you want to know what I think the specific "points" of a good architectural project combined with appropriate maintenance practices for a classic "Golden Age" course are today I'd be happy to tell you in specific detail. Whether anyone wants to call that project a restoration, renovation, rehabilitation, replication, improvement or whatever doesn't much matter to me---it just is what it is.

And I believe what it is or should be is a project that as much as possible returns the features and look and playability of the architecture of the golf course to the way it was at a time that appears to make the golf course look and play as interesting, challenging and enjoyable for as many golfers who play it as possible.

So as to be specific I can use the recent architectural and maintenance project of my own course as an example. And I should use that one as obviously it's the one I've been most involved in and know the best, even if I'm constantly staying in touch with a ton of other restoration (as I call them ) projects.

Again, some within my membership may want to call what we did at GMGC an improvement but I call it basically a restoration, and if someone wants to argue with me about the use or meaning of that term then they'll probably be whistling in the wind because I'm not interested in arguing that point.  

[Tony_Muldoon]

Tom Paul is right this is nit picking and none of us are really that far apart.  

However this is a subject which nit picking is at the heart of, there is a whole worldwide industry of art and architecture restoration (not including refurbishment) whose work is justified by their ability to nit pick over the smallest detail.  Is NGLA worth consideration as a serious artefact?  Again why would you want to restore it? If it’s important to then surely you want to get the details right and not accept some modern compromise?  In an age where these courses are no longer able to offer a challenge to all golfers (as Macdonald originally intended) it becomes more and more important to decide what kind of experience they should be offering.

Tom Doak what you say is fine for members clubs but would Macdonald really only have been  ‘bummed out’ knowing that NGLA  was no longer relevant to the very best? If it isn’t a challenge for the elite golfer today then surely it will not offer the intended challenge for greater numbers of golfers in future?  From what I’ve read I think he would more likely be incandescent or apoplectic and if he were able to work on the course today then big changes would take place, including scrapping the Biarritz.  We’ve passed a point where a course can be historically accurate and true to all of its original aims if they include offering a serious challenge to all levels, including elite, of golfers.  The ramifications all this has for golf have yet to work them selves out. I think this debate will become more and more important in the coming years.

Thanks Pat and Tom Mac for the colour posting and the miniscule break down of my argument line by line. I’ll take it as a personal tribute and it made me smile, however as you know I don’t normally read those replies. Life’s too short; I’ve got too much nit picking of my own to do.

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