Links Golf Club @ Spey Bay

[David_Tepper]

6-minute video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FQLQWRhtFC4&list=PLPtisOTJpApORncl_4wwp8npeIHGDxp5p
 

[Steve_ Shaffer]

Moray coast of Northern Scotland.



Transforming Spey into a world-class golf destination. Clayton, DeVries, and Pont (CDP) will renovate the course. The partnership consists of three of the world’s foremost architecture practices that have helped to deliver some of the world’s top-rated golf courses including Cape Wickham Links, Barnbougle Dunes, Kingsley Club, and Greywalls at Marquette.

• 
  Mike Devries and his team will be transforming these traditional links into a fully reversible 18-hole championship layout with up to 22 greens and 5 different routings. This will be a truly unique experience in the birthplace of golf.
  
  
  
  
  https://www.links.golf/speybay

[Thomas Dai]

It’s a delightful location and the two ridge-lines parallel to the shoreline would seem perfect for a elbisrever course.
It’s a popular whiskey making and river fishing area too which might be of additional interest to some venturing there.
I hope the situation has been taken into account of the locals who have long played the course to enable them to still do so at a reasonable price?
I also wonder if it’ll be open 12 months of the year like it always has been or if it’ll move to a 9-month open season like some of the other ‘resort’ courses in the are?


Atb

[Niall C]

whiskey ?!


David


The members of the old club appear to still have some sort of ownership although judging by some of the accents I'm not sure how local they are. Good luck to CDP, they have taken on quite a challenge considering the expectations.


Niall

[David_Tepper]

Here is a much longer (almost 60 minutes) and more recent (Nov. 27) discussion of the project:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rxxwnx7PmFU&t=53s

It is audio only. I have not listened to it yet.


"The members of the old club appear to still have some sort of ownership"

Niall -

I am pretty sure Spey Bay was most recently privately owned and operated as a commercial (for profit!) business. In addition to daily green fess, it may have sold annual passes to people wanting to play the course often, but there was not a members club that owned the course.

I am not sure how Links Club will operate the course going forward and what sort of access they will provide to folks who are not Links Club members. As you well know, there are plenty of other golf courses along that coastline, so the locals will not have to travel too far to find another place to play.

DT

[Niall C]

DT


Correct. It wasn't a members owned club/course but there was a club affiliated to it where you get a membership. I understood the new owners were going to retain the club in some fashion, or perhaps subsume the club members into the Links membership in some fashion ?


Niall

[David_Tepper]

Niall -

Yes, I would expect (hope) that the Links Club will make some effort to include the locals in the mix other than as daily fee players. The current website for Spey Bay gives no specific info in that regard.

It will be interesting to see how they manage play on the course once the ambitious renovation work begins. 


DT

[jeffwarne]

Any word on the project?

[David_Tepper]

Jeff -

There is a 41-minute recording of the  July 25 Links Club online meeting here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pkP_lPS4a90   

There is commentary from a couple of guys who visited Spey Bay recently. Their sense is the change of ownership has been received by the locals quite well. It sounded like some work has started on changing the course.

DT   


p.s. Membership info here:   https://www.links.golf/speybay/membership

[Tony_Muldoon]

Called in at th end of June and was given a very warm welcome from the very experienced Bert Mackay.  Nice compact set up and good feel. Very quiet with a couple of lady menbers there on a friday lunchtime.

The only course plan was an A4 high on a wall that showed me few details.  Work on gorse clearance was evident and there was talk of new greens.

Land is very flat and lacks main features.  However I'm intriqued by the idea of a reversible course and will return...

[jeffwarne]

Called in at th end of June and was given a very warm welcome from the very experienced Bert Mackay.  Nice compact set up and good feel. Very quiet with a couple of lady menbers there on a friday lunchtime.

The only course plan was an A4 high on a wall that showed me few details.  Work on gorse clearance was evident and there was talk of new greens.

Land is very flat and lacks main features.  However I'm intriqued by the idea of a reversible course and will return...

I played it in 2019.
While the land may appear "incredibly flat", it is not, with many rumples, dips and hollows.
It is an attractive piece of land.
No doubt it needed a freshening, but the bones are/were there IMHO to resurrect and create a fine hybrid of what was there and what could be.
I'm not really enamored with the reversible course idea, but.....
I do know if they create a destination worth playing that there are many nearby local compelling courses, and it could be an excellent attraction an area that is nearly always passed over by the tourists.
I look forward to returning.

[Adam Lawrence]

I was at Spey a few months ago and wrote it up in July’s GCA. It is a really amazing piece of land actually — yes, there is very little actual elevation change across the property as a whole, but I have almost never seen so much micro-contour, or rumple on a piece of land. Most of it has been covered by gorse, but I think there’s a ton of potential there.

[David_Tepper]

Adam -

Do you have any idea of what sort of regulatory/environmental hurdles will have to be cleared to make changes to the course/property?


DT

[Niall C]

Adam,


It's probably been more than a decade since I was there but I have played the course a number of times, back when the course (and the clubhouse) was at its most basic. That was before the previous owner to the Links Club had it. What I recall and is that the newer holes furthest away from the water at about the middle of the course ie. the middle bit between the 1st tee and the furthest green, was quite boggy in part. I note from google maps that the Speyside Way runs quite close to the southern boundary. Presumably they have managed to agree to reroute that or perhaps the additional land being taken in is basically the old driving range ?


Niall

[Thomas Dai]

Recent video piece showing the initial stages of the reversibility - https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5SfkBw185Ks&pp=ygUNU3BleSBiYXkgZ29sZg%3D%3D
Atb