A number of "25" is just too "listy-dogmatic" for me to
A. NGLA - too early, too fundamental, too explicit of style, not to include
B. Fisher's
C. Yale
D. Blind Brook :
I respectfully disagree with those posters who have said..." One or two CBM-Raynor-Banks-Templates and that is it." Both on an interest level and whatever "educational" purpose this list might have, there is I think a requirement that the full breadth and variation between the iterations of repeated Templates be included. The Templates are not "seen-it-once" copies; (there are no copies of a golf hole) they are discoveries of principles within the originals...principles of diagonals, of risk and reward, of distance control, of judging ground, of having discipline to fly a ball to a target that is not the hole and the creativity to "feel" a roll out or a result that you cannot interpret empirically..of what it is (for each player) to control your golf ball. If this list were to be meaningful to some future persons, I would want them to experience the two iterations of the Biarritz (not found at NGLA) that are at Yale and Fisher's...both retain the A. chasm properties, B. 210 - 225 long chasing hit. C. extraordinary visual combination of beauty and intimidation...but in largely different ways, in vastly different sites, the front pad maintained in different manners, one plays largely uphill, the other slightly down... Similar comparisons abound between all three courses - I think it's vital for the purposes of such a list to get as full experience of this fundamental style and how its applied inland, at the shore, and with as many of the 26, 27, 28 (?) identifiable templates as there are, for they all end up examining a different sort of Golf conduct.
To amplify this desire to really "show" someone something with my list I included Blind Brook, perhaps the most unique of all "First Engineered" styles, for Blind Brook is, by intent, the Template course in gentler miniature. Conceived as an older gentleman's walking course, it is the softer, more purely fun version of the shot demands found on the established Raynor tracks. It's Cape is 276 uphill yards around a Willow pond...It's Short is semi blind to volcano green with a bathtub-style thumbprint. It's Road plays downhill over the most appealing sweeping bank. It's Punchbowl has its actual putting surface banked into the rear wall of the bowl, creating a tier shelf. It has a double-fairway/Raynor's Prize dogleg that is only 375 yards, it's Alps is nearly a Drive and Pitch. Don't get me wrong, it's Redan still plays 200 into a headwind and is the toughest "3" of its kind, and these shorter, gentler versions create their own challenging delights; however as to unique takes on the templates, which reduce their "rigor," Blind Brook should be seen by the benficiaries of such a list.
E. Harbour Town
F. Sawgrass
Following on the historic importance of the Template courses and the Engineered style, Dye's landmark work, which is now enmeshed with golf's elite history, is a necessary visit for anyone using this list to understand innovation and contemporary re-imagining of a fundamental style. It is a style too, to which the public responded favorably (or at least with interest) and thereby became a whole new language that impacted design at probably hundreds of anonymous or lesser known courses in a sublime manner. If I knew Dye's work better, I suspect I would include at least one of his inland courses to show off these properties when NOT on the SE coast.
G. Siwanoy
H. Pinehurst 2
I. Aronimink
J. Seminole
Donald Ross and his work are a synonymous with GCA as a profession as any name can be. My choices are made to demonstrate his scope and value by: A. his most intact work of an early vintage (1913), that holds most of the genetic code of his extensive subsequent work, recovered fabulously in restoration; B. his lifelong pursuit of perfection, its historic and popular reputation for meeting that standard, and bringing such a course to bear out of pine forests; C. a course of great challenge and reputation with unique holes for his canon, of which he was most pleased; D. his artistic mix of wind and sand on a premium canvas. for completeness and variety I thought about including both Wanamoissett and Shennecosset (a public in New London) but these four (4) need little administrative help.
K. Winged Foot West
L. Winged Foot East
M. Bethpage Black
N. Bethpage Red
O. Quaker Ridge
On each of the first two properties, it would be kinda silly, both, practically and expositionally, to not include the second course. First and foremost the East and the Red are fantastic courses with delightful challenge, and certainly WFE could be in Cucamonga and be held as a fine exemplar of AWT's signatory work. The Red is admittedly less so, but it has an altogether unique virtue in that the course finds such unique, maximizing use of the ground; it forced Tillinghast to find and route holes that don't often appear in the AWT canon (1, 4, 5, 16). The "middle stretch" of the course...8-15 is an almost unyielding (only 12 is a par 3) stretch of demanding 2-shotters that can grind you into a medal ball or keep a match close to even, as both parties are likely to give way a couple of times within. The Black of course is Tillinghast's Pine Valley, allowing him the most monumental palette he ever used.
WF West has received adequate support for worthiness to be on such a list and needs no further detailing, but the East is an absolute "must" if its my list. Interesting? If "Greens" are any part of that, then WFE is the hothouse of extraordinary AWT green design. There is something that makes you smile and say "Holy shit" about every single green on the course; and in one-to-one comparison with the bigger brother, the green style isn't as ubiquitously "back to front, triangular;" it's much more varied in its function with the green surrounds and approach requirements. Owing to this, the East permits -- nay, invites -- many more run-up and ground strategies than the West, allowing much more liberally creative play around the greens than "just miss in front or yer dead." - which the West commands as dogma. Then there are the individual holes like 2, 4, 5, 10, 12, 13, 15 and 17 which shouldn't be missed, where everything fuses together in refreshingly different, but still "AWT," way. The recent Hanse-led reclamation of time-encroached green territory, replete with original "square" perimeters, has only made the East that much more capable of being on a worthy list.
I am as severe a critic of Quaker Ridge as anyone (primarily because of the routing and the 2-7 "OB" rights, the slightly pedestrian finish and the 13 hole gap between 500 yard+ holes) but I cannot deny that the course needs to be seen in what AWT was able to produce with what I feel is a pretty constrained piece of property...4, 8, 9, 11, 13-15 and 17 are Tillie gems, the novelty of back-to-back 3s around the turn and the changes in pleasant meadow-glen property are worthy of my list. I feel just in those 800 acres that comprise all three courses separated by Griffen Avenue, you can demonstrate 2/3rds of Tillinghast's larger oeuvre that will both wow and educate the neophyte and seasoned GCAer. I gave both Baltusrol courses as well as Hollywood, Essex County, Somerset Hills, Ridgewood, and Hollywood consideration, but if there's any bottling of the list, I thought it could be done with what I put down and know best.
P. ANGC
Q. Pine Valley
S. Oakmont
I visited all three, but never played or advised a player on the grounds. Their scope, their scale, their historic position and the fact that both OV and Oakmont are among the first standards of "Elite Challenge" -- well documented as intended to be so -- make them courses anyone in this realm will eventually be interested by. Augusta National is something different; but with such a notorious design and renovation history, as well as precise tracking of changes and arguments for and against them, the course is frankly naked in its interest. It's intended to be interesting and it succeeds - owing to the Masters, Jones, Mackenzie, Roberts or the developed standard of maintenance perfection is inconsequential. It is a beautiful property, with beautiful fun holes on it.
T. Cypress Point
U. PebBle Beach
V. Riviera
I was taken aback that Riviera appeared so few times as an appended or substituted course on the first slew of responses. I think its the most interesting course of them all. Even if we forget how well it excites play by the elites, there's such an artistic perfection about Riviera -- in use of unique property, in bunkering, in (now) turf, in its figure-eight/shoelace routing along the canyon slope to the floor and in unforgettably frank and challenging holes. Among them, 4,5,6, 10 and 18 are such gorgeous things as to make Riviera included just for their appearance. The barranca-crossing holes have sort of that old penal steeple-chase feel to them. All of these elements conspire to make the very air enchanting; that this sprightly fragrant private valley holds such a thing as a golf course.
S. ANGC
W.. Garden City
X. Kapalua Plantation course
Y. Stone Harbor (a Desmond Muirhead in South Jersey)
Z. Muirfield Village
AA. Friar's Head
BB. Doral Blue
CC. Trump National Briarcliff
DD. Merion
I love some of these; I really hate two of these (should be no small guess as to which) but each of these are architecturally interesting in their successes and in some cases failures. This group tests the perimeter of GCA's imagination, with theories old and new, beautifully natural or painfully wrought into being; lake, sea, inland, neighborhood courses, fake islands, trump l'oeil waterfalls, stone abutments and venerated paths... Sublime, classic scales and outrageous literal design. Little greens defended by contour and drives hectored by arcane hazards and 4 club deep behemoth complexes with oceans of sand and bulldozed hazards. Some fit in a handsome development, some quirkily stand apart from the development that's grown around them. This latter group is variety.
So it ended up being 30, but if I got around more, I would include many more courses that I've not yet even walked, no less played. Only Harbour Town, Cypress, Kapalua, and Seminole were listed, where I haven't set foot but admired from afar. That's why some of the, I'm sure) interesting courses that have been offered do not appear.
I'll make an essential 12 sometime later if the thread and discussion bears it.
However, if you got this far, like me, you'll exhausted.
cheers
vk