The 18 holes which most deserve to be copied

[peter_mcknight]

Par 3s:
SVCC Old 11, 175 yards
Seminole 17, 175 yards
Royal Melbourne 3, 180 yards
NGLA 4, 200 yards


Par 4s:
Merion 1, 360 yards
Brookline 17, 380 yards
Shinnecock 10, 410 yards
Pine Valley 1, 430 yards
Winged Foot 1, 450 yards
Pinehurst 12, 450 yards
Bethpage 15, 460 yards
TOC 17, 460 yards
Riviera 18, 475 yards
Oakmont 1, 480 yards


Par 5s:
Prairie Dunes 17, 500 yards
Crystal Downs 8, 550 yards
Pebble 14, 575 yards
Olympic 16, 610 yards

[Tom_Doak]

I haven't had a lot of time to spend on this the last couple of days, but here's my first team:

Par 3's:
short:  16th Royal Melbourne (East)
medium:  11th St. Andrews
m-long:  4th National Golf Links
long:  3rd Rolling Rock

Par 4's:
short:  10th Riviera
     12th St. Andrews
     7th High Pointe
medium:  16th St. Andrews
     5th San Francisco Golf Club
     6th Royal Melbourne (West)
long:  10th Highlands CC (N.C.)
     18th Phila. Cricket Club
     13th Pine Valley
     2nd Lost Dunes

Par 5's:
short:  9th Royal North Devon
     8th Royal West Norfolk
medium:  16th Shinnecock Hills
long:  10th Pinehurst No. 2

There are a lot of holes mentioned above which I would like to include, but I don't think it's very feasible to think you could place them on a nondescript site.  The 8th at Crystal Downs is fantastic, but where are you going to find another piece of land like THAT?

[Tony_Chapman]

I certainly don't attest to the knowledge most of you have, but a few of my "recreations" would include:

Par3's: 4 and 11 at Wildhorse, 2 at Prairie Dunes, 17 at Sand Hills.

Par 4's: 16 at Pasatiempo, 8 or 9 at Prairie Dunes (although not real flat), 7 at Sand Hills, 15 at Wild Horse, 3 and 5 at Pinehurst #2.

Par 5's: 10 at Pinehurst, 1 at Sand Hills and 14 at Pebble    

[Chris Kane]

Here is an alternative list of Australian holes!

Yarra Yarra #11
Peninsula North #2 (RMW#5 is a blatant copy of this design )
Commonwealth #9
Royal Melbourne West #16

Royal Melbourne West #10
Portsea #13
Newcastle #5
National Moonah #11
Kingston Heath #6
Commonwealth #16
Commonwealth #11
Royal Adelaide #3
Royal Melbourne East #1
Victoria #8, as a par-4 with the rhs trees gone

Kingston Heath #12
National Moonah #2
Newcastle #13
Royal Sydney #7

[gookin]

I figured out my Par's.  Limited by where I have played and being able to duplicate on any property

13 - Merion
12 - Augusta National
11 - Mountain Lake, it's redan.  I would take #6 at Fox Chapel but wanted to avoid two 3's that favored a cut.
8 - Oakmont - I needed a long one.

[T_MacWood]

Par 3's:
short:  14th Engineers
medium:  Old 12th Garden city
m-long:  Cleopatra-Jasper
long:  Maiden-Sandwich

Par 4's:
short:  Old 7th ANGC
    10th Riviera
    7th CC of Havana
medium:  6th Sunningdale-New
    4th Sea Island
    4th Ponte Vedra
long:  Simpson's Lido
    MacKenzie's Lido
    5th Boca Raton-South
    14th Timber Point

Par 5's:
short:  4th Lido
    11th Lakeside
medium:  12th Hollywood
long:  Tillie's Sahara

[scratch]

Par 3's

- 5th at Royal Melbourne West
- 11th at St Andrew's Old
- 10th at Pine Valley
- 11th at Yarra Yarra
(- 16th at Cypress Point - couldn't help myself!!!!)


Par 4's

- 6th at Royal Melbourne West
- 13th at Pine Valley
- 17th at Royal Lytham
- 9th at Cypress Point
- 17th at Royal Melbourne West
- 6th at St Andrews Old
- 18th at Sand Hills
- 11th at Commonwealth
- 11th at Royal Adelaide
- 4th at Pebble Beach

Par 5's

- 4th at Royal Melbourne West
- 5th at Cypress Point
- 6th at Cypress Point
- 14 at St Andrews Old

[Doug Siebert]

Mark,

IMHO, if a hole is only great because of where it is in the order of holes, it isn't truly great.

I think the Road Hole would be equally great if it were the second hole -- a mistake there could have you working the rest of the day to make up for your mistake!  If it were the 10th hole, the sequence of 10, 11, and 12 on TOC would be more famous than Amen Corner as the defining test of your round at the course.

However, the Road Hole wouldn't be as famous because it wouldn't have gotten all the TV time over the years from when only the last few holes of TOC were shown.  

[Brian Walshe]

Tom,

Question, why 16 East ahead of 5 West?  5 West just lays so beautifully on the land and the right hand bunkers are a work of art.  16 East is a beautiful hole and probably the best down hill hole I've ever played at disguising the true size of the green.  It looks a lot smaller from the tee than it actually is but 5 West is just so hard to go past.  Has Mr Clayton's copy of it on the 2nd at PN put you off it?

Chris,

Newcastle 13???  Please tell me you are winding the Aussies up.  10 at Newcastle I could understand but 13 is probably the poorest par 5 there.

Brian  

[Robin_Hiseman]

Without first looking at what the rest of you have put, here are my suggestions.

3's

Redan - well, you can't leave it out
Sitwell - to be outrageous
Postage Stamp - dare to be short
Winged Foot (west) 10 - just a great looking hole

4's

Riviera 10
Crystal Downs 5 - I really want to play this
Seminole 6 - Just classic strategy
Cypress Point 13 - see above but in reverse
Mid Ocean 5 - classic Cape
Duff House Royal 15 - for Mackenzie's brilliant optical illusion with the bunkers - very, very clever and thought provoking
Painswick 11 - 246 yards long, but a perfect strategic hole
Ballybunion 11 (old) - for the terracing effect that gives a great drive an added kick forward
Royal Melbourne 4 - for making an uphill blind drive interesting
Pinehurst 3 - for the bunkering around the green that dictates the drive position.

5's

Cruden Bay 13 - for the angled dune defences at the green
TPC 11 - for its wow factor
Augusta 13 - draw, then fade, great use of natural features
Cypress Point 6 - right to left DL, but best line way out right - clever touch


I'll take a look at all yours now.

[Tom_Doak]

Brian:  I haven't seen Peninsula North.

The 5th at Royal Melbourne West is a great hole in a great setting, but there's nothing particularly unusual or strategic about it.  I'd put the 17th at Sand Hills in the same category.  If you try to reproduce those, you'll fail, because the setting is a lot of the golf hole.

The 16th East is a bit different.  I don't think it would be too hard to reproduce it.  There is a very wide variety of hole locations, and I like the variety presented by the two alternate tees.  Perhaps I included it just because everyone else always overlooks it, but for me it's right there with any of those famous par-3's in Melbourne, and there are a bunch of them.

[wsmorrison]

Tom MacWood,

The 5th at Boca Raton South was originally intended to be a short par 5 of 457 yards.   Of course, today it would most certainly play as a par 4 as there was no room to move the tee back more than a few yards.  With a prevailing wind in the winter, this would have caused the large bunker and mound field on the right side to really have come into play on the approach shot.  What a great hole, one of many really fine holes on this course.  

This NLE Boca Raton South design along with Shinnecock Hills, Indian Creek, Cascades, TCC, Merion, and Huntingdon Valley will get an especially comprehensive review in our book project for various reasons.  We will also compare the design Flynn submitted to the CC of York with the Ross design that was accepted and exists today.

Regards,
Wayne

[Paul_Turner]

I still think Royal Worlington's 5th is a better and more original choice than The Eden (also considering that noone appears to be able to pull off a great replica of The Eden).

Darwin thought that The Eden was "child's play" next to Worlington's vaulting horse 5th!

[Tom_Doak]

Since there's a lot of duplication above, and since no one really cares exactly which 18 holes are in anyone else's list, I suggest that from here out people should add just one hole at a time for consideration.  What hole would you copy onto a new course?

Paul:  You won't get any argument from me that the 5th at Royal Worlington & Newmarket is a great hole, and it might be one of the hardest par-3's in the world.  I have a hard time visualizing a copy in bermudagrass, though ... the long grass to either side of the green is key to its success.  And I don't know many shapers who could recapture that green!

[SPDB]

Tom - One I think could work well and could be built anywhere is #4 at Misquamicut. The only alteration I would make would be to make it more tempting for people to try and go for it, by opening the front a bit more. But the green end is magnificent. The length of the hole always makes people try and go for it, but when you walk up to the green and see the tilt from front to back they realize how futile it was.

I might also add #7 at TCC for a par 3.

[Paul_Turner]

Tom

As for the 8th at RWN; what would you use instead of the marshy waste RWN?  A waste bunker?  Rough?  Lines of bunkers?

[ed_getka]

Speaking of Royal Worlington, how far is that from Painswick?

[Doug Siebert]

Tom Doak,

First you ask for 18, now we have to cut it down to one?  Talk about pressure  If I think of the question as suggesting one hole I'd like to see you copy in one of your designs, knowing you aren't going to "force" it and might be willing to take some risk of people not liking but do it anyway, I think it would be pretty cool to see a TOC Eden along some other coast...or, just maybe, in the middle of nowhere in Nebraska -- it'd only be a 10 hour drive for me, I think it would be worth the trip!

[T_MacWood]

I believe everyone of the holes I chose has merit, I'm not certain I would want single out any of them.

My reasoning in choosing these particular holes was ease in recreating and/or the fact they are lost, endangered or never built. And they were mostly man-made creations. Also many of these designs pushed the envelope, which doesn't hurt either....the fun factor would be high.

[A_Clay_Man]

No one has mentioned the third at SFGC. The tarantula bunker alone, is worthy of plagerism.

[Mike_Cirba]

Good One Adam!!

I vividly recall sticking my approach shot right into the upper face of that bunker.

[Jimmy Muratt]

A great short par 3 that hasn't been mentioned yet and seems like it could be built almost anywhere is........

#16 Riviera

[Pete Buczkowski]

I wish there were more par 5's where the entire hole strategy is decided on the tee.  Two examples that come to mind are:

WW PB #4 - over dramatic topography but the design theme can be imitated
TPC Sawgrass #11 - over flat land

I am sure others with wider course exposure can suggest more examples.

Pete

[Mark_Rowlinson]

Ed,

Royal Worlington is about 3 to 4 hours' drive from Painswick assuming clear, accident-free motorways, (M5, M4, M25, M11) but if you've friends in the USAF you are not far from Fairford at Painswick and Mildenhall is just down the road from Royal Worlington....  It's worth the effort to play there - a great little course.

Mark.

[A_Clay_Man]

Sheryl and I just came from a meeting with a gallery director. The subject; Plagerism. Not hers, but some others have won awards, and they turned out to be copies.

The accepted protocol when copying anyones work is to give credit to the original. Even inspired pieces should make reference to the original.

One thought that was interesting, was how much of a piece can be copied and still be considered original work?

One surprising answer was 55%.