Can land be just too tough for a golf course?

[Brett_Morrissy]

In YOUR opinion:

Are their golf courses that are built on coastal sites - high raised bluffs completely exposed to the elements that are just too tough because of extreme weather conditions (wind/rain)? ...West/North coast of Ireland, North coast of Scotland - East Coast US?
If so - where are they?

Old Head in Cork? - a golf course that should never have been built? My perception is that this course is not well received because of the weather – is that correct?
Could it have been designed differently to better deal with the weather?
Bandon Dunes - this land is well balanced to the coast it seems, with some protection - does it get the worst of the West coast weather?   All 3 coast sites have lots of room, but particularly OM has lots of width and large greens to allow room in the strong wind.
Barnbougle Dunes doesn't get the worst of the weather because of it’s northerly site, if it were sited on the Sth West coast of Tassie - that would be a different matter altogether and perhaps too many days the course would be just too difficult.

Are you able to reasonably argue - that land is just too tough for golf because of weather - not because of land condition? Examples?

Or
Is your opinion that there is no such thing as too tough conditions for golf... Did Mr Keiser need to build a course like Bandon Trails for some relief from the weather for us golfers? If Barnbougle Dunes wanted to build a third course, would the wise owner build it in a sheltered site, or just go ahead and build another one of the coast?

Is it possible to have too much coastal links and strong breeze affected golf?

How do YOU define that weather, wind or rain is beyond heading out to play, or continuing your round?

[Tom_Doak]

Brett,

I know of three projects that were concerned enough about the windy nature of their sites to study it intently -- Sand Hills, Bandon Dunes, and Barnbougle.  I am happy to say all three projects went ahead in spite of the risk.

However, I do think it is POSSIBLE for a site to be too exposed.  It is not just a matter of the golfers being comfortable ... Extreme winds cause a lot of difficulty for golf course maintenance.

[Brett_Morrissy]

Tom
This is probably for another discussion, that seems like the chicken and the egg: without golfers there is no need for maintenance, without maintenance there will be no golfers - when designing, there are both obviously important, and for both reasons, I assume a project would go ahead - do you give one more weight than the other?

[TEPaul]

Brett:

I've played Old Head a couple of times and once in some really high wind. I thought it was kinda fun actually because I was forced to do some things I've really never had to try before. It was very interesting; you sort of have to swallow your pride in certain circumstances and really gear down. I remember thinking a number of times during that round of Tommy Armour's old adage: "Hit a shot that make the next shot easiest."

The other cool and memorable thing about that round is that Tiger had been there a day or two before and we had the same caddy. He shot a 73 and lost a couple of balls. I kept it under 80 and I played the whole round with the same ball.

On the back tee on #18 I actually got such an attack of vertigo I had to get down on my hands and knees trying to get off that narrow area.

[Adam Clayman]

Brett. Over coming natures harshest conditions are not only fun, as Tom points, but also exponentially more satisfying to the sportsman in us. Surely playing for score in those conditions puts added pressure but playing Match play this pressure is somehow mitigated because both competitors have to deal with it.

[Jaeger Kovich]

Adam - your/tom's point about overcoming harsh conditions being fun is good, but nobody likes playing in a hurricane everyday. We all have stories about chasing our hats backwards down the fairway and not being able to mark balls on the green, but I dont need to put on my gortex suit every time I want to tee it up.

I can see extreme sites like this working better if combined with extreme beauty as a resort/destination golf course. I have a hard time picturing a membership that is willing to take on these challenges daily to play their course. Most americans view golf a sport of leisure and relaxation, there are only certain types of golfers who willingly take on these types of conditions... personally I love, I find I am able to concentrate even more... my record low score came during a fall season hurricane at Tobacco Road!

[Don_Mahaffey]

When it comes to wind it's hard to top a course like Desert Dunes in the pass area just above Palm Springs. Anyone who has driven I-10 thru that stretch has seen all the windmills. I grew up not far from there and its like being in a wind tunnel most of the time. I can't imagine that course has done too well over the years.

[Tom_Doak]

Don,

Desert Dunes was purchased last year by a group of Canadian investors.  I'd guess they got a good deal.

I have told the story before, but when the course opened, an assistant from PGA West was hired as superintendent.  They gave him new Isuzu pickup truck for his site vehicle.  One day the wind was blowing so hard he went out to turn off the irrigation clocks, and when he opened the door, the wind sheared the door off his truck.

[Bryan Izatt]

For extreme wind conditions I have the following experiences:

1.  Pacific Dunes in February - 50 mph winds; balls blowing off greens and off tees.  Persistent horizontal rain and sleet.  Finished the round but not an experience I'd want every day.

2.  Barnbougle Dunes in summer 40 mph winds, scorching sun.  More bearable than PD in winter.  Ball didn't blow away.  Finished round exhausted.

3.  Castle Stuart in summer - 40 mph winds.  Wide fairways weren't wide enough.  Finished round but disappointed because of cost.

4.  Cruden Bay - Hawklaw Tankard tournament in 40 mph winds (as other GCAers can attest).  An NR on the card.  Exhaustion.  Too stressful to play stroke play competition in that kind of wind.

5.  Rustic Canyon - Santa Anna winds in winter.  It was so windy they let us crazy Canucks play for free.  Couldn't complete about a third of the holes.  The ball wouldn't stay on the greens.  Only rounds I can remember that I couldn't complete.

6.  Nairn - 50 mph winds in summer.  Dead scorewise after 6 upwind holes.  Lost interest, but completed round.

Now, I'd argue that the designers for these courses were pretty good and did what they could to accommodate the sometimes or often windy conditions. I'm glad that all the courses got built regardless of my windy experience on them. But, I couldn't argue that the land itself made designing a course there untenable because of the wind.  The landforms are very different from each other and are good golf land. The wind doesn't respect the topology - at those wind speeds there is no topography in the world that is going to work well.

All are wonderful courses in more benign conditions.  I guess from an economic point of view they all got built because there is statistically enough benign weather to make it work financially.  And there are enough golf nuts who will play destination courses under any conditions.  As a member course maybe they can work because the members can avoid the bad days.  From a competition point of view, I'd say that all of them would be borderline in bad wind conditions.  If you're only playing for score and you hit these courses on the wrong day, you'll  be disappointed.

 

[cary lichtenstein]

Years ago, I played Sanctuary in Denver with Jim Engh. I remember him telling me that the owners had contacted 4 or 5 other architects before  him, and all turned the project down, saying the land was not fit for a golf course and should be left to raise horses.

I think what Engh did with the land is spectular and put him on the map as the go to guy for difficult mountainous sites.

[Matt_Ward]

Agree with the comments made by a few of the folks on Desert Dunes -- situated at the mouth of the pass that fits I-10 as you head from LA to Palm Springs -- there's a big time reason why those huge fans live the side of the hills / mountains.

Playing there is an experience one can never forget or enjoy doing again !

[Peter Pallotta]

Brett - interesting topic; many good comments by those who know what they're talking about.  It just strikes me, though, that while many of us (in northern climes) accept as a given that our courses are 'unplayable' 5 months of the year (because of snow), few of us would as readily accept a course being 'unplayable' a few times (or even a few months) of the year because of the wind.  I guess that's because in the former case, we assume (rightly) that there is no architect alive who could make a course covered in snow playable; but in the latter case, assume (probably wrongly) that the architect could have and should have designed the course so that it was always playable in the wind.  In other words - if nature screws up (or screws us up) we're okay with it; but if we think an architect has screwed us up we're not.

Peter  

[Doug Ralston]

Or, of course, you could always grow/import some nice trees to line those fairways and cut the wind ...............................