I just listened to Clyde on the NCG podcast. Very intriguing. Any photos of recent changes?
Ciao
Sean,
I played a few holes at Seacroft tonight, though most of these pics are from April:
Hole 6 - Probably my favourite change, based on a drawing from Ken Cotton in the 1960s. The green angles a little more from front-right to back-left now, with the cross-bunkers a little tighter to the front. The bunker in the knoll on the right has been filled-in, and the slot left of that widened and held-up a bit to give an aggressive drive a chance of getting on. There's now a whole bunch of room on the left, but the best angle in, a ridge to the right, is defended by another bunker (short, out of shot.) I really like how the hole looks now - the shed behind the green has gone, and a bunch of buckthorn cleared down the length of the 15th.
Hole 9 - I've added a few bigger pockets of naturalised sand across the course, but only in larger landforms, where it would make sense. This one is taken from a Harry Rowntree painting in Darwin's book.
Hole 11 - The tedious flanking bunkers have been done away with. A pair of pretty small pots on the angle now defend a ridge/saddle from which you will find the ideal angle to pitch down the rippling, fall-away green...especially now the front-right bunker eats a couple more feet across its front.
Hole 14 - There was some re-contouring/naturalisation of the carry to make the tee-shot a little more dramatic. Pictured, a couple of award little pots have been replaced by something that sits a little tighter to the green, with a run-off behind...there's room to edge out the green in behind this too. You can now see from the 13th green through to the 16th green...it's a compelling look. Hole 16 - The tees have gone tight to the fence on this one, which now makes for a tricky and tempting drive. As a bonus, with the old tee re-naturalised, a miss-left of the ridge top 3rd will finish much further beneath the green. The most controversial of any of the works will be the 16th green!! There used to be a funky hollow in the front of this, which was talked about a fair bit by older members, the committee etc. - I found the old level, and broadened it out to get a narrow line of pins. It will confound the unimaginative golfer when the flag is down there, but I particularly like what it does to the hole locations around it's upper edge. There's sea views from this green now, too.It's a long term, (very) low budget program, but they're slowly capturing the full potential of what is a really nice set of links greens...and pushing the fairways out too.