CHARMLESS COURSES

[Brent Hutto]

Tom,

One last followup. Who were you with the day you played Birkdale? I am far more open to being "charmed" during a friendly with someone like Sean Arble or, what the heck, Tom Huckaby than left alone to my own device so to speak. I was fortunate enough to get paired up with a very compatible American chap who was teeing off as a single right ahead of me. But aside from small talk we were pretty much doing our own thing.

Although he did make me laugh by saying not once, not twice but at least half a dozen times in all seriousness as balls hit the ground 15-20 yards from a bunker "That's going to get by just fine" when in fact not a one of them ever did avoid the Event Horizon.

[Lester George]

Archie,

Funny... I thought of Carnoustie as well and I have been there.

Lester

[BCrosby]

"... when in fact not a one of them avoided the Event Horizon."

Brent -

In the hope that you haven't already applied for the copyright, I intend to steal your line. Good stuff and thanks in advance.

Bob

[Tom Huckaby]

Tom,

One last followup. Who were you with the day you played Birkdale? I am far more open to being "charmed" during a friendly with someone like Sean Arble or, what the heck, Tom Huckaby than left alone to my own device so to speak. I was fortunate enough to get paired up with a very compatible American chap who was teeing off as a single right ahead of me. But aside from small talk we were pretty much doing our own thing.

Although he did make me laugh by saying not once, not twice but at least half a dozen times in all seriousness as balls hit the ground 15-20 yards from a bunker "That's going to get by just fine" when in fact not a one of them ever did avoid the Event Horizon.

I was with a group of 12 of my best friends on this planet.. college buddies.. so yes that too might have helped.  We do have some fun together.

And I too enjoyed the "event horizon" term....

 

[Brent Hutto]

"... when in fact not a one of them avoided the Event Horizon."

Brent -

In the hope that you haven't already applied for the copyright, I intend to steal your line. Good stuff and thanks in advance.

Bob

Consider any copy right to be donated in perpetuity to my GCA brethren. Use it in good health. Especially next time you're visiting Southport.

[Philippe Binette]

Muirfield to me is just a golf course, in a good way... simple and elegant, I like the property at Muirfield... but it's not cute or spectacular... maybe it's not a lot to discover at Muirfield, only flawless design hole after hole... it might be too good from an architecture standpoint.

North Berwick is just wild...

I feel Lytham and St.Annes is full of charm, with it's little corner and angles and a smaller scale.


If compared to woman, which appeal to members here

Muirfield is a tall brunette with a slim silhouette wearing a black classy dress and a diamond necklace

North Berwick is a black haired girl with enigma in her eyes dancing in a pub

Lytham and St.Annes (or some other charming course) is a small blonde a bit shy whose smile will conquer you


enough of this: I need to find a girl... instead of wasting my time writing on this site

[Bill Shamleffer]

Bellerive might be the winner of this category.  It is a brute of a course that is a challange for all 18 holes, and usually produces a very good champion (Holtgrieve, Player, Price, Jacobson & Villegas).

However, give me 50 rounds between St. Louis Country Club and Bellerive, and I will not need more than 1 hand to count the number of times I will play Bellerive.

I remember caddying for a member in the 1980s who had played The Country Club quite a few times and loved that course, well this person had played Pinehurst #2 a few years prior (so mid-1980s) and found the course to be bland to his taste.  I have never been to Pinehurst but I always believed I would very much enjoy #2.  If not for its recent US Opens, is this a course the average to occasional golf fan finds uninteresting, but the GCA fanatic is likely to love?  Is #2 charmless to one who does not enjoy the chipping game?

[Mark Pearce]

Mark -

I was hoping to one day. Why, are you saying I shouldn't? What's the deal - is he one of those guys who comes off good in print, but is a stinker in person? I hope not. He writes such bloody good course profiles!

Peter

Peter,

You absolutely should.  You'll have a ball.  You'll learn.  You'll want to play with him again.  I don't think you'll be charmed, though.  I guess this whole thread comes down to what we mean by charm.

For my mind, trying to liken Muirfield to a woman is a bad starting point.  Muirfield reflects the members of HCEG - it's an Edinburgh gentleman, it's smartly presented, slightly stern and rather reserved to start with but as you get to know it and the conversation goes on, it warms, shows a little (still reserved) humour, though the stern side is still there (no 10 makes that clear).  Enough character comes through the reserve, though, for the charm of the individual to show.  It is, of course, impeccably mannered.

[Mark_Rowlinson]

OK, I'll retract Royal Dublin, but it has in common with Seaton Carew and Cleveland an unfortunate background, and what I always say about Seaton Carew is that as soon as you get out on that course you quickly forget about the background.

On the human side of life there are charmers and charmers - one lot who flatter you to extract what they want from you, the other lot who are such warm personalities that you want to share everything with them.

On the golfing front, a charming course, for my taste, is an engaging one which makes you want to play your shots, both handsome and pretty, yet with an independent mind and unforced resistance to scoring.

New Zealand, West Hill, Falkenstein, The Creek, Meadow Club, Elie, Kennemer, Royal Belgique, Royal Antwerp, Clitheroe, Alwoodley, Gog Magog, West Cornwall, Parkstone, The Berkshire, Beaconsfield, Ilkley are a few more that spring to mind.

And a few more charmless tracks: John O'Gaunt (pace Paul Turner), Altrincham Municipal, Antrobus, Carden Park, Dinsdale Spa, South Herts, Mount Murray, East Sussex National, London Club, Herons Reach, Leicestershire, Withington, Bidston, Leasowe, Southport & Ainsdale, Royal Cromer (apart from the holes around the lighthouse), Alsager, The Richmond (the marvellous clubhouse notwithstanding), Roehampton, Forest of Arden (Aylesford course and front nine of Arden course), Malton and Norton. I'd better stop before their lawyers get onto me!

[Tim Leahy]

I can't find much charm in SoCal municipal courses like Woodley Lakes or Victoria.
Flat, wide, bland, epitome of dull and charmless.

I was having a hard time thinking of a course with no charm at all until I saw you mention Woodley.  Definitely fits the bill, minimalist golf with no frills or charm.
I have to disagree with Torrey being charmless, but I do think it grows on you with more play. After my first round there I thought it was disappointing, but the more I played there the more charming it got.

[Chris Cupit]

I'm in the Muirfield as charmless camp as well.  I'm not saying there were any bad holes but I found the fairways mostly flat and uninteresting--my favorite tee shot was #11.  The par 3s all played the same length.  The rock wall on #9 didn't seem remotely in play and #18 tee shot was so pinched in between the bunkers and waist high rough that it was a lay up off the tee.

The people inside couldn't be nicer and the greens were as good as any I have played oversees.  For fun, give me N. Berwick anytime.

I'd also nominate Royal Liverpool as a charmless brute.  I found the cops an annoyingly gimmiky approach to OB.  Oddly enough the only hole that the cops kinda worked was on the par 3 7th ? and by the time I played there I think they had moved either the cops or green slightly away?!  I'd put the cops hard left of that green and blow them up on #1 and #16.

#1 with the cops hard right off the tee and green and the waist high rough al down the left is just a bit much for me for the opening tee shot (this was the third hole in the Open a few years ago).

With Winged Foot it is brutish from tee to green and if you look at the placemat it seems like the greens are a repetetive series of "bunker left, bunker right to a green pitched steeply back to front" BUT, the "charm" I have found at WF (east and West) is how unique and different each of the 36 greens really plays.  I can really recall the green contours better there than most any course I have ever played.

Baltusrol, too, has enough quirk for me to keep it off the charmless brute list.  Varied par 3s, Nice combination of varied par 4 lenghts and doglegs and a cool 5-5 finish.  17 and 18 are pretty cool (well the first 450 yards of 17 is pretty bland but the sahara hazard works great and puts a bunch of pressure on the tee ball).

Oh, I might add Butler national to my charmless brute list.  I hadn't played there since college and maybe I'm still bitter about always palying their in late October which guarranteed a rising stroke average, but I would get real tired of shooting 80 every damn day (if I played well)

[Doug Wright]

Sean,
For lack of charm I suggest Royal Lytham - great test of golf, but it's hard to love it; West Lancs - good course but bleak; The Belfry - which is testing enough, but still feels like a potato field; The Oxfordshire - just a blot on the landscape, however probing it may be; Prestatyn - very good golf course, but an unattractive place; Royal Dublin, perhaps?

I happen to think Royal Dublin is full of charm.... Playing out and back along Bull Island after crossing the old wooden bridge to a lovely clubhouse...

There are more charming courses certainly... But I don't think it deserves to be on the list.

I concur with Ally.  Royal Dublin's flat course and industrial backdrop isn't for everyone, but I was charmed by the presence of an old-fashioned links in the middle of such a large city (as well as by the elements Ally mentioned).  The extremely friendly staff didn't hurt either. 

Tim/Ally,

When I saw this thread title, one course immediately sprang to mind--Royal Dublin. Now it's been 14 years since I played it and I probably owe it another try, but I found the course totally lacking in character or interest, ie charmless.

I can't believe Muirfield's even being mentioned on this thread.

[Chris Cupit]

Sean,
For lack of charm I suggest Royal Lytham - great test of golf, but it's hard to love it; West Lancs - good course but bleak; The Belfry - which is testing enough, but still feels like a potato field; The Oxfordshire - just a blot on the landscape, however probing it may be; Prestatyn - very good golf course, but an unattractive place; Royal Dublin, perhaps?

I happen to think Royal Dublin is full of charm.... Playing out and back along Bull Island after crossing the old wooden bridge to a lovely clubhouse...

There are more charming courses certainly... But I don't think it deserves to be on the list.

I concur with Ally.  Royal Dublin's flat course and industrial backdrop isn't for everyone, but I was charmed by the presence of an old-fashioned links in the middle of such a large city (as well as by the elements Ally mentioned).  The extremely friendly staff didn't hurt either. 

Tim/Ally,

When I saw this thread title, one course immediately sprang to mind--Royal Dublin. Now it's been 14 years since I played it and I probably owe it another try, but I found the course totally lacking in character or interest, ie charmless.

I can't believe Muirfield's even being mentioned on this thread.

I've played Royal Dublin as well and I wasn't real impressed.  More than charmless, it was just ugly.  Muirfield has many charming aspects about it and I appreciate its bunkering and innovative routing for the time but it moved me not

[JMorgan]

Sean Arble, come on, Man! 

Surely you know that Muirfield or Hoylake or Lytham or Carnoustie lack charm.  You knew that going in.  Charm is a St. Enodoc or a Pennard or Woking or Huntercombe or bloody Notts. Charm is Wolf Solent contemplating the song of the peewit on the border of Dorset and Somerset.  (Heh heh.) But what's your REAL point, huh?

I'll tell you what it is: it's the Soul of Golf you're asking after.

That's what you want to know.  Where is the Soul, and what is His Name?

I'd tell you, but it's almost bedtime in NYC.

[Sean_A]

Sean Arble, come on, Man! 

Surely you know that Muirfield or Hoylake or Lytham or Carnoustie lack charm.  You knew that going in.  Charm is a St. Enodoc or a Pennard or Woking or Huntercombe or bloody Notts. Charm is Wolf Solent contemplating the song of the peewit on the border of Dorset and Somerset.  (Heh heh.) But what's your REAL point, huh?

I'll tell you what it is: it's the Soul of Golf you're asking after.

That's what you want to know.  Where is the Soul, and what is His Name?

I'd tell you, but it's almost bedtime in NYC.

J

I've long known where the soul of golf is and I can, without a hint of doubt, say it doesn't rest with golf courses.  The soul of golf resides in golfers; past, present and future.  Ah, but the charm of the game only lives in players in so much as everybody has an opinion - as this thread demonstrates. 

I ask the question about charm and championship/famous courses because all courses have some element of charm to those you know them well enough.  However, I was curious to know why, after a play or two, folks know the charm is either there in spades or it will take some digging to find it.  What is even more curious is that I think Sandwich has bags of charm, but it can also break your back - a most unusual combination imo.  I was also curious to know if it is the total package of the course, the club, the house, the history which blend together to lend itself to charm.  Personally, and I have always felt this way, I think the extras exert more influence (is this where circle connects in knowing charm when we see it?) on golfers than they like to admit or even realize.   

Hoylake?  The more I get to know this place the more I find myself moving from begrudging respect to genuine admiration.  Though I am not yet ready to say it is a charming course.  Could it be that Hoylake doesn't need charm to get all of its messages across?

Ciao   

[Mark Chaplin]

Sean - You've hit the nail on the head, the whole package is what makes charm. Few links courses have charm in poor weather and a gusty wind. N Berwick and Pennard are the closest. Sandwich is a bute of a course but a charming overall package as is Lytham.

I know you'll disagree but Princes scores in every department for lack of charm, all the holes blend into one and the clubhouse is straight out of Travelodge central casting.

[Sean_A]

Sean - You've hit the nail on the head, the whole package is what makes charm. Few links courses have charm in poor weather and a gusty wind. N Berwick and Pennard are the closest. Sandwich is a bute of a course but a charming overall package as is Lytham.

I know you'll disagree but Princes scores in every department for lack of charm, all the holes blend into one and the clubhouse is straight out of Travelodge central casting.

Chappers

Rain can rub the charm off any course!  The folks who invented golf should have made a deal with God (or the devil if need be) not to allow rain to fall on course during daylight hours. 
 
Princes is an interesting example of what I was trying to say on the previous post.  As it is now, Princes certainly couldn't be called charming, but I don't think that has anything to do with the course.  Stick it in the same situation as say North Berwick running up to a marvelous town and enjoying some of the off course delights in a fine house and Bob's yer uncle. 

I hold Princes and Southerness, perhaps a few others, dear to my heart because they are essentially the last of a generation of grade level designs.  After these few courses, architecture takes a turn, sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse, but nearly always for the more expensive.   Its funny how you think all the holes blend together and yet I can envision all of them in my mind's eye as I type.  I accept that I am one of the few that regard Princes highly - I have never been one to go for bells and whistles.

While I am here, I would like to nominate Brora.  It has a simple charm which I have lot of time for - and this is despite the less than appealing house.

Ciao

[Rich Goodale]

Sean

You are making some very good points, some original and some a more clear articulation of what we on this DG have been trying to express for some time.

As for the latter, this statement.....

"I've long known where the soul of golf is and I can, without a hint of doubt, say it doesn't rest with golf courses.  The soul of golf resides in golfers; past, present and future.  Ah, but the charm of the game only lives in players in so much as everybody has an opinion - as this thread demonstrates."

.....expresses well perhaps one of the great dichotomies on this site, i.e. what turns you on?  Golf as a fascinating and dynamic game played and enjoyed with other people?  Or, golf as a means to study and appreciate very individual pieces of architecture?  Of course, the simple answer is "BOTH!" but an honest one would find most of us trending to one side or the other.

This ties in closely to the Whisper Rock/Gary McCord threads, and as others (including us) have said before, and even on those discussions, another what turns you on question, anmely--would you rather be a member of a club populated by a**holes but with a great course attached, or a club of copasetic souls playing over an average (or slightly above average) course.

As to your other points, I think that trying to understand the charm of relatively flat venues like Southerness and Hoylake and The Old Course (to be honest) leads to a better understanding of the relationship of venue and architecture to our predilections and sources of enjoyment.  To put it another way, if you strip out the "eye candy" how enjoyable is a golf course to play?

Finally, your Brora example is interesting.  At first glance there is little if any eye candy there, particularly if you have played Dornoch previously.  Vista wise and design wise and maintenance wise Brora is Dornoch-Lite.  But....it's starkness and simplicity grows on you over time, and you find out eventually how seemingly featureless holes both demand strategic thinking and punish sloppy thinking and/or poor execution.  As for it's clubhouse, it is one of the poster children for the horrors of eschewing minimalism.  25 years ago it was small and comfy and very friendly and after a tournament round the bar would be hoaching with players swapping stories and glancing over their shoulders out the small window to see what was happening on the great short finishing hole.  The new one, built with the dollars and euros of increasing visitors is more elegant, but much less charming, at least IMHO.

Cheers

Rich

[Brent Hutto]

Ah, someone mentioned Brora!

My first impression on leaving the car park and seeing the course was one of clutter...but in a charming way. Sort of like those overcrowded knick-knack shops my wife and mother find endlessly appealing. It took a moment for me to even sort out what was the first tee and where the ball should be launched from it. After a couple of holes it gradually opens up and you see can more of more of the course at one time as you play outwards. But there's always a little rise or slope to focus your attention on less than the full layout. Coming back in you reach that ridiculously crowded area full of greens, tee boxes, burns, bridges, sheep, whins and who knows what all. It's all quite a fun house experience the first couple times around. Oh, and that big hill with sixteen green and seventeen tee on it...nothing earlier in the round quite prepares you for that.

But granted the clubhouse at Brora is a charmless barn.

Regarding Princes, I haven't played it but have watched the Amateur contestants have a couple of rounds there. I think it may maximize the potential for good golf on such a at-grade layout. Between the small furrows and rolls providing uneven lies for approach shots and the use of rough as the "contouring" feature any charm Princes contains has to do with be a surprisingly challenging and consequential course with no large-scale features to work with whatsoever.

[Tom Huckaby]

Rich:

More great thoughts in your post to Sean. However, does it really have to be so either/or?  Does one have to make a choice between great friends and great course? (You sure don't at Dornoch, right?)  And why would one ever want to strip out views, so negatively stated as "eye candy"?  Is one going to play the course with blinders on and/or in constant fog?

In this "charm" discussion I tend to go with you; I most definitely see a lot of charm in Muirfield, for example.  And why?  Because of the history of the place, but more importantly the fascinating shots to be played - which occur most on the holes you listed before.  The place put a magic on me without a doubt; it quite literally "charmed" me.  And that to me is the best way to look at this question.  To that end though I have not been to Brora, I absolutely understand how it is indeed charming.

However, I am also charmed by Pacific Grove Muni, which asks not nearly as difficult of questions and provides quite less charming shots to be played.  Why?  Because the turf and the feel and how the game is played is quite different there from the usual local fare; but yes, on top of that, the views are very cool. 

And finally, I am nearly always charmed by my home course, the relatively featureless Santa Teresa.  And you of all people know why... it's the closest thing I have to a golf home.  I know people there and they know me.  So there, it's quite more about the people than the course.  But one way or the other, Santa Terea to me is also charming.

Each of these are valid forms of "charm", I'm sure you'd agree.  Am I really forced to choose one or the other? You didn't really mean it that way, did you?

TH

[Rich Goodale]

Agreed, which is why I said.....

"......what turns you on?  Golf as a fascinating and dynamic game played and enjoyed with other people?  Or, golf as a means to study and appreciate very individual pieces of architecture?  Of course, the simple answer is "BOTH!" but an honest one would find most of us trending to one side or the other."

.......rather than "either/or."

[Tom Huckaby]

That's not really what I was asking about - my apologies, it is difficult to explain.

The either/or I see is about HOW we find courses charming.

Is it not viable to find charm in the several different ways I have listed?  That is, even if one honestly trends one way or the other, to be able to find courses charming in many different ways?

To me your take seemed to have ruled out courses that would primarily feature "eye candy"; or that do not ask difficult enough questions; each of which I might say are less charming perhaps than others, but also can exude a charm.  Please correct me if I have that wrong.  I likely do... but that's why I'm asking.

TH

[Bill_McBride]

It's obvious that one's reaction to a golf course is intensely personal.  I personally was "charmed" by my day at Muirfield, in some parts by the golf course and its demands, but also by the clubhouse, the unanticipated hospitality within, and the entirely ridiculous but eventually appreciated in and out of jacket and tie!

The entire experience at Muirfield is charming.

And Hoylake?   Royal Liverpool is absolutely charming in the same way, it's the overall experience.  Walking in the footsteps of Bobby Jones during the year of the slam, seeing his portrait in the clubhouse with the portraits of all the scarlet-clad captains of the past......this is the essence of golf's charm.  The course itself with the interior out of bounds and the cops bordering it, inviting you to cut the corners if you dare.  Wow.  The dunes portion of the course is mystical.

North Berwick, St Andrews and Dornoch just take charm up a notch, as do Pennard and Painswick.

[Tom Huckaby]

BINGO, Bill.  Methinks you and I see this quite the same.

[Tim Pitner]

Doug Wright and Chris Cupit,

I understand your takes on Royal Dublin (and agree to some extent), but I just can't bring myself to call it charmless.  Maybe I just had a good day there.  I took a city bus to the course and walked across the bridge; I experienced at least 3 seasons during the round; I randomly got paired up with some great guys; and the people at the club couldn't have been friendlier (especially for a course with a "Royal" designation). 

As for the course, I thought it was a good, solid course--not great, not especially interesting.  The fact that there is a links course in that location that's any good at all is sort of amazing--"links by the docks."  In a way, I was charmed by the incongruity of it all.  I also agree with Ally that the bridge to the club, Bull Island and the clubhouse provide some charm. 

I know there's been quite a bit of work done at Royal Dublin recently--was it by Hawtree?  I haven't seen him post in a long time but fellow poster RT worked on Royal Dublin.  EDIT--a quick look at Royal Dublin's website suggests that the bunkering and greens were reworked extensively.  http://www.theroyaldublingolfclub.com/royaldublin/golf.links.do