Augusta National Golf Club

No, I haven't played it yet. I'm just inspired after going to The Masters. Augusta National never fails to impress. It has a sacred feel to it, especially the beauty and solitude of Amen Corner. There can't be three better consecutive golf holes in the world. I had forgotten how quiet and reverential the patrons are, going to Augusta is a very civilized experience.

Watching the Masters in person is an experience every golfer should have at least once in their life. In the same way that people often comment that the terrain is steeper than it looks on TV, the sensation of watching the tournament unfold when you are there, in slow motion, is also pronounced. You can't really get a feel watching TV, with its continuous leaderboard, how exciting it is to hear the distant roars, wait in anticipation as the manual scoreboard is changed and visually see the running score of each of the leaders. I have a real sense of admiration for how the tournament organizers have been able to keep the tournament firmly rooted in tradition.

Now, to the important stuff. I have to focus my efforts on playing the course. I've got a couple of seeds planted to get onto Augusta, and as this quest has taught me, you never know which one will come through, so it's always a good idea to have a couple of options, in case one or the other doesn't pan out.

Option #1 is playing with one of the titan-of-industry members that I know either first or second hand. I already have the visual image complete: Flying down on their Gulfstream G550, having a 1982 Chateau Haut Brion with dinner, staying in one of the cabins on property, watching old Masters re-runs all night, playing thirty-six and flying back without ever going through an airport security check-in line. Both of my connections know I want to play, but protocol demands that I not ask directly. So I'm being patient. But it's killing me.

Option #2 requires patience. To be precise, a five-year wait. I have to wait for my volunteer duties to come up at The Masters. Volunteers are allowed to play on a day in May ("Play Day"). This explains why even the guys who have pulled bathroom duty greet you happily as you enter the mens room at the Masters. Wouldn't you be willing to clean toilets to get a chance to play Augusta? I'm hoping I get assigned rope duty on the 16th hole, but will take whatever they assign me.

One of life's great simple pleasures is a pimento cheese sandwich at The Masters. The $1.50 for this underappreciated treat on white bread is one of the greatest bargains in the world. We can all learn a lot from the best organized and run event in the world, including how to control your brand down to the smallest detail, like your own chocolate, chips, ice cream and moon pies.

Although I haven't played the course yet, one of my fellow blogging golf fanatics has, and I am including his link here so you can get a good feel for what it is like for a mortal to play the course.

The European Club

"STAY AWAKE - GET AROUND IN 4-HOURS - YOU ARE AN ATHLETE!," the scorecard at The European Club (ranked #98 in the world) shouts at you. The European Club is the masterpiece of Irish golf impresario Pat Ruddy. Ruddy's iconoclastic style and unique personality come through strongly at the European Club.

I first played the European Club six years after it was opened, in 1998 with a group of friends, and it was my virginal experience on a links golf course.

Ruddy's very Irish sense of humor is also present on the bottom of the scorecard where in addition to your actual score, there is also a place on the scorecard for, "What my score should have been." Local Rule #1 is: "Do not be a links lawyer. Play the ball where it lies when possible."

In his book describing "The European Club", Fifty Years in a Bunker, Ruddy explains that the name European Club was meant to be grandiose - "A Big and Brave Name - Claiming the golfing continent of Europe".




At the time we played, they handed you a little blue and white card, seen above, which talks about their philosophy of the game: "Our approach to golf is fundamentalist. Accordingly, you will not find fussy furniture on our links. You might take it to be spartan while we think it is akin to the way the game was at the beginning and as it should be now. Take your clubs, card and pencil and go out and do battle with the golfscape that requires no artificial adornment."

We met Pat Ruddy when we arrived at The European Club on our first trip. We walked into the austere clubhouse, and he immediately shot a good natured insult at us: how all Americans looked like clones. He was right: all six of us had on brown khakis and logoed wind-cheaters. The decor and ambiance of the clubhouse at The European Club are on a par with that of a motor-vehicle agency. Actually, less ambiance than that of a motor-vehicle agency, because at least DMV's now have TV's. As Ruddy explains, he doesn't believe in "trumpets and brass knobs." It's all about the golf.


The Golf Course

The golf course is adjacent to the Irish Sea Links, on Brittas Bay, in County Wicklow, about 40 miles south of Dublin. The bunkers on the course are lined with railroad ties (sleepers), and Ruddy's design philosophy is to use optical illusions as a hazard on the course. There are hidden dips and hillocks shielding fairways, and his use of mounds and other hazards are meant to put a golfer off his game by creating confusion and rewarding clear thinking. The course is unconventional in that it contains two loops of ten holes instead of two loops of nine. You actually don't play all twenty holes during a round. Holes 7a and 12a, both par threes, are put into play at various times in favor of some of the other par threes. When you receive the scorecard, the two holes that you aren't playing that round have a line put through them. The course offers views of Brittas Bay on fifteen holes. The European Club offers solitude, peace and tranquility. There are no houses, no highways and no low-flying planes.

Par four 3rd hole

The third hole is 499 yards from the blue tees and is typical of the style of links golf at The European Club. The hole plays downhill among the sand dunes. As with any links course, one of the major defenses is the wind blowing in off the bay.

7th hole

The seventh hole is the #1 handicap and has a small burn in front of the tee and down the entire right side. The left side of the hole has a reed-filled marsh jutting out as an illusion. The correct strategy is to favor the right side of the hole, but off the tee it looks like you should favor the left. Parts of the fairway are concealed behind the reeds in a brilliant use of optical illusion. Ruddy employs what he calls the "Reverse view telescope" effect on this hole; that is, everything looks further away than it is. I'm not sure how this sleight of hand is achieved but it works beautifully. The hole is 470 yards long and a bear under good conditions. Into the wind it is one of the hardest on the planet.

8th hole

The eighth hole is a narrow par four that plays 415 yards from the back tees and shows the classic links feel among the sand dunes.

The 12th hole at the European Club

The 12th hole at The European Club is a 459 yard par four. What makes the hole unique is that the green is 127 yards deep. For sake of comparison, this is longer than the length of the entire world-class seventh hole at Pebble Beach and longer by nine yards than the widest double green at St. Andrews. It creates that unique problem of a pin placement being anywhere from 412 yards when on the front of the green to 515 yards when on the back. Potentially a three or four club difference, without factoring in the tricky winds!

Hole 12a is a par three, reverse image of the 14th hole at Royal Portrush, "Calamity". At Portrush, there is a huge fall off on the right side of the green, where a mis-hit shot goes into an unfathomable void. On hole 12a, all the trouble is with the abyss on the left side. It is a heroic hole that plays 166 yards from the tips.

13th hole

The thirteenth is a long 596 yard par five, with four strategic bunkers on the left side of the hole and the bay on the right. When Tiger Woods played at The European Club he hit the green here by hitting a driver off the fairway.

16th hole

The 415 yard par four sixteenth hole shows off the inland scenery at The European Club. Similar to the beautiful Perthsire hills that surround Gleneagles in Scotland, the richly colored mountains that surround the European Club add to the overall idyllic beauty of the place.

The finishing hole used at The European Club used to be a weak hole. A 477 yard par four that plays back toward the clubhouse, it had a pond in front of the green which was out of character with the rest of the course. It was an anti-climactic finish that received much criticism. Ruddy converted the pond into a burn a couple of years back; his inspiration was the Barry Burn at Carnoustie, after watching Van de Velde melt down at the 1999 Open Championship. It makes for a much better finish.

I got the opportunity to play The European Club again two years ago on a golf trip to Ireland. The contrast between the first time we played and the second was stark. It took us several hours to get to the course from Dublin since the capital city has prospered so much in the intervening years. This is despite the fact that there is now a highway south of Dublin which should make the trip quicker. There has been so much development and population growth that we sat in traffic most of the way.

Despite the admonishments on the card, we also had a painfully slow round the second time. We played on a Saturday afternoon and had to wait on EVERY shot. I also thought that the course conditioning needed an uptick, particularly the bunkers. When The European Club first opened, there was no clubhouse, and Ruddy and his family used to sit in their car and take the 10 pound guest fee through the window of their car. The visitor fee is now 180 Euros a round. The price of success and a top 100 world ranking has begun to spoil it, no doubt.



Pat Ruddy

Pat Ruddy is a unique figure in the world of golf. He is the owner, architect and operator of The European Club. Part of the secret of his success was that he did much of the work at The European Club himself. He didn't have to pay architect design fees. He drove the bulldozer himself when shaping the course, had a minimal crew and built it without frills. He was also smart enough to build in stages, stayed within his budget, didn't spend on a clubhouse and basically did it as a pay-as-you-go venture, pacing his development of the course to coincide with his cash flows. Ruddy is a self-made man and self-taught golf course architect. He started his career as a golf-writer and evolved into an architect. Based on the brief time I met him and reading his book I found him to be an affable, sarcastic and witty man with a sharp sense of humor and a visionary.

The European Club was arguably the first course built to rate as a top 100 course. Ruddy had a passion to build a world-class course and do things his way. He chartered a helicopter to fly him around the Irish coast looking for an appropriate piece of land on which to build a proper links course. Ruddy's feat would be difficult to repeat today. Part of the secret of his success was good timing. At the time he started his venture the Irish government was giving out grants to spur tourism. Even for private clubs such as The European Club, as long as they allowed visitors, they could take advantage of the grants. Also, in the intervening years, and with the formation of the European Union, the Irish economy has exploded upwards, and Ruddy was no doubt a beneficiary of this.

While there have been several visionaries who have followed in Ruddy's path (Mike Keiser at Bandon Dunes, Herbert Kohler at Whistling Straits and Mike Pascucci at Sebonack), this jocular fellow did it the old-fashioned way, without the benefit of being a gazillionaire. I congratulate this Irishman, excuse me, European, on such a brilliant accomplishment. I like his attitude.

Ruddy also designed the Glashedy Links, located in Ireland's God's country - County Donegal. If you even get the chance to go there, I recommend playing both the Old Course and The Glashedy Links.

The European Club's Website

Cabo Del Sol (Ocean) Golf Course

The Corona warehouse came into view as our plane made its final approach to land in Los Cabos airport. It was an early sign that it was going to be a good trip. My mid-winter flight from Newark brought me to our friendly neighbor in the south for a welcome break. I was bumped to first class on the flight down and enjoyed the show from a group of big cleavage, silicon breasted, botoxed women and their oversized husbands with leathery faces on their way into the sun. All I had to do was put on my gold chain and my sweat pants and I would have felt right at home. There is a reason The Sopranos was based on a New Jersey Mafioso family.

The flight was uneventful and we arrived in Mexico to experience one of life's simple pleasures. That is, flying from a cold climate in the winter, arriving in the tropics and walking out of the plane directly onto an open stairway, with the warm sun beating down on you. It is a redeeming experience and is a much better way to arrive than walking through a jetway, through an air-conditioned terminal that is hermetically sealed.

It has always been a curiosity to me why no desert golf courses are ranked in the world's top 100 golf courses. There are many fine courses in Arizona, Nevada and Palm Springs that provide an enjoyable, different type of golfing experience -- that of target golf. The name of the golf course ranked #68 in the world threw me off -- Cabo Del Sol (Ocean). In reality it is a desert golf course laid out with islands of both green and fairway set among the desert.

I played the Jack Nicklaus-designed Cabo Del Sol (Ocean) under fine conditions this past February: seventy degree weather, a mild breeze, in the first group off the tee, with the sun rising over the water. It was my first round wearing shorts in six months and it felt great to play in such a nice location. You can see the brilliant day unfolding at Cabo del Sol below, with the cacti providing a nice frame to the sunrise.

The summary of the landscape at Cabo del Sol is: The desert meets the ocean. The summary of the golf course is: Jack Nicklaus-style forced carry shots and fast greens.

The first tee shot of the day, seen above, is typical of what you face all day at Cabo Del Sol: a forced carry over the desert.

The approach shot to the 4th green

Often times, shots to the green at Cabo del Sol also require a forced carry over desert as well. The approach to the par five fourth hole, above, requires you to hit a shot over about 60 yards of desert and over a ravine, to an elevated green.

Cabo del Sol is located in the Mexican state of Baja California in Cabo San Lucas. Baja California is a peninsula of land between the Pacific Ocean and the Gulf of California. The course overlooks the Sea of Cortés and was opened in 1994. The course starts away from the water on a desert plateau and then gradually plays downhill until it reaches the water at the par three sixth hole.

The par three 6th hole

This 165 yard par three is situated in a dramatic setting among the craggy rocks right on the sea. The setting is made even more spectacular by the whales that fill the expanse behind this hole. Grey whales migrate the 12,400 miles to Cabo in the winter from Alaska to mate here. Whales are clearly an intelligent species spending their winters in Mexico! The water immediately offshore is extremely deep, which is what attracts the whales here. As you play the holes along the water, and this one in particular, you can see them continually jumping up in the water and also shooting plumes of water into the sky. I suggest playing Cabo del Sol between December and April so you experience the whales while you play.

The par 3 6th hole

The par three sixth is one of the prettiest of its kind anywhere in the world and for my money rivals Pebble Beach's seventh for scenic beauty.

From behind the 7th green

The dramatic par three sixth is followed by another par three, the seventh, which is a 137 yard hole that plays at a ninety degree angle to the sixth and is parallel to the water. You can see the curious juxtapositions at Cabo del Sol, above, where Cactus plants in the desert meet the ocean. The sixth and seventh are the only holes along the water on the front nine. You don't return to the water until holes sixteen through eighteen, which finish along the sea. At this point, the course is routed back inland and plays up the plateau and then back down it again for the closing stretch of holes.

The view from the 11th tee

The 11th hole is a classic risk-reward hole. A very short par four at 328 yards, the hole offers a generous lay-up area down the entire right side. What is tantalizing, however, is that you can hit your drive just short of the green by hitting over the vast desert area on the left. Take the risk and you will have a very short shot to the green and a very good angle of approach. Miss it and you'll be down in the sand for a bit. Jack Nicklaus's courses can sometimes be overbearing and too difficult to play. I didn't find that to be the case at Cabo del Sol. As with this hole, the overall course is a nice bit of Nicklaus design.

Approach shot to the 12th green

The twelfth hole is a 473 yard par five and the picture above is the approach to the elevated and well bunkered green.

The downhill par 3 13th hole

The 171 yard downhill par three 13th hole, seen above, again demonstrates the forced carry present on every hole. The greens at Cabo del Sol are among the best I have played in all my travels. They were in ideal condition when I played and were very fast.

A desert hazard at Cabo del Sol

The signature 16th hole

The sixteenth hole is the signature hole at Cabo del Sol and is featured on its scorecard. It is a 342 yard par four that plays downhill. The approach shot to the green should obviously not be long.

The par three 17th

The seventeenth hole, pictured above, is another forced carry to a beautiful, small green perched between the ocean and the desert. It is somewhat reminiscent of Pete Dye's Casa de Campo where he built several holes into the water. Golf Magazine has also compared this hole to the sixteenth at Cypress Point.

The par 3 17th hole 

The eighteenth is a disappointing hole that plays along the water but doesn't really take advantage of the great terrain and beautiful setting. According to its website, Jack Nicklaus calls Cabo del Sol "the best three finishing holes in all of golf." I don't agree. Carnoustie is the clear winner here, followed by Merion and the National Golf Links of America.

You must take a cart at Cabo del Sol because the walk between green and tee is often quite long. The greens fee is steep at $325, but then again, you are playing one of the world's best golf courses in a dramatic location. Cabo del Sol was the first time I had tacos for breakfast, at the half-way house between the nines. It know it sounds unusual, but they are included in the cost of your round, and they are delicious.

Cabo del Sol is a worthy desert course among the world's top 100. Similar to Pebble Beach and Turnberry, Cabo del Sol also has a hotel on the property and I suggest staying there to soak up the experience and enjoy the great views.

The Cabo Del Sol web-site

P.S. My business took me from Cabo to San Francisco so I was unlucky enough to fly Alaska Airlines again. They practice flying the old-fashioned way: Run your flights late, lie about the delays, charge extra for inedible food, cram an extra 15 seats onto the plane and take an extra hour to unload the bags. Bravo.

Spyglass Hill Golf Course

Spyglass Hill Golf Course (ranked #81 in the world) is located on the Pebble Beach peninsula, adjacent to Cypress Point and a short drive from Pebble Beach and Spanish Bay. Spyglass is without question one of the top public golf courses in the U.S.

The following excerpt is a nice summary of Spyglass taken from its web-site: "Spyglass Hill Golf Course takes its name from Robert Louis Stevenson's classic novel, Treasure Island, published in 1863. Local legend maintains that Stevenson once wandered the Spyglass area gathering ideas for his novels. A unique aspect of this course is that the holes are named after characters in Treasure Island. Hole names such as "Black Dog" and "Billy Bones" are hints for the unwary. As players attempt to master this difficult course, they may hear the laughter of pirates in the distance.


Spyglass Hill was designed by Robert Trent Jones, Sr., as a part of the master plan for the Pebble Beach ocean front. S.F.B. Morse, founder of Pebble Beach Company, and chairman of the board of Del Monte Properties, envisioned a string of golf courses around Del Monte Forest's shoreline. Morse commissioned Jones to design a course between Cypress Point and Pebble Beach."

The exciting first tee at Spyglass Hill

Spyglass is really the tale of two courses. The intoxicating holes along the bay (1-5) are dramatic, wide open and exposed to the elements. The inland holes (6-18) are difficult, tree-lined and play on terrain that slopes uphill.

The opening five holes at Spyglass are dramatic. I would be hard pressed to think of a golf course that has a better opening stretch of holes than Spyglass. The first hole, named Treasure Island, is a downhill sweeping par five that offers tantalizing glimpses of Monterey Bay through the trees as you stand on the tee. As you proceed down the hill, the hole sweeps to the left and the bay provides a wondrous backdrop for the green.

Spyglass Hill first hole looking down the hill

The second hole, a 349 yard par four named "Billy Bones," is one of the finest holes I have played in my travels. The tee shot is through an opening between a line of trees to a narrow fairway that slopes downhill and left to right. It is a classic risk-reward shot that rewards the more dangerous shot to the right with a shorter approach to the green.

Spyglass Hill second hole from the tee

What makes the tee shot on the second trickier is that if you want to play it safe to the left, the shot requires extreme precision. If you hit it too long to the left, your ball will end up in the ice plants (part of the carpetweed family, which tells you all you need to know), which is almost like an automatic lost ball. The short shot to the oblong, elevated green requires intense concentration due to the severity of the slope in the fairway.

Spyglass Hill second hole from fairway

The view of the bay from the second green is as good as you'll find anywhere, with the clubhouse at Cypress Point visible on your left. Overall, the hole has everything a great hole should have - dramatic scenery, great risk-reward characteristics, multiple options for low and high handicapper alike and a superb use of the terrain.

Spyglass Hill second hole looking back from the green

Spyglass Hill second green

Spyglass Hill par three third

The third hole at Spyglass Hill, named "Black Spot," is a tricky par three that plays downwind and downhill toward the bay. The nice views of the ultra-private Cypress Point and of the bay are an added bonus to this exciting hole, which sports a small green.

The fourth green (hole named "Blind Pew") is an oblong, multi-tiered green set within a sand dune, close to the bay. The green is reminiscent of the sixth at Kingsbarns or any number of greens at Cruden Bay. The 370 yard hole plays downhill the entire way with a huge sandy area down the left side.

The first five holes are truly invigorating, and if you play Spyglass, enjoy them, because the easy part of the course is now behind you.

Spyglass Hill fourth green

After the fifth hole, the course changes dramatically. The fifth and remaining holes play away from the bay, and there are no more views of the water. The rest of the course frankly feels more like Pinehurst than it does Pebble Beech. It winds its way through pine and cedar trees on the rolling terrain, leading to a difficult round of golf. When the AT&T Pebble Beach golf tournament is held each year it is played over three courses - Pebble Beach, Spyglass and nearby Poppy Hills. The pros complain about Spyglass generally, because it is such a stern test of golf. Holes six, eight and sixteen rank among the toughest on the tour each year.

My round was going very well at Spyglass until I reached the seventh hole, when, out of nowhere, on my second shot, it happened. Without mentioning the word, I will quote from two great golf writers who will explain my predicament eloquently. "It is the most demeaning shot in golf, and perhaps in any game," writes Henry Longhurst. "The ball shoots off knee high and almost at right angles to the intended line."

The next three holes were a living nightmare.

Bobby Jones explains how the affliction acts upon the mind. "Because of the fear of doing it again, by contracting the swing, the evil is cumulative, living upon itself."

I won't disclose my score on holes seven, eight and nine, but I am including a picture of the plane I flew home on, below.

Mercifully, I regained my composure on the back nine and finished with a respectable score.

The eighth hole at Spyglass Hill ("Signal Hill")

The eighth hole feels more like nearby Olympic Club, with its big elevation changes, uneven lies and narrow fairways. As with many of the inland holes at Spyglass, it plays a lot longer than the card indicates, due to the uphill terrain.

The tenth green at Spyglass Hill ("Captain Flint")

Notice how heavily wooded the back nine is in these pictures compared to the openness of the first five holes. There are several interesting features about the inland holes at Spyglass. The holes generally play longer than the yardage on the card indicates due to the continually rising terrain. Jones laid out 6-18 so that almost all the par fours play uphill and the par threes play downhill. As a result, the par threes are generally short, but still tricky, because the prevailing wind makes them play downwind, making club selection difficult.

The sixteenth hole tee shot at Spyglass Hill ("Black Dog")

The sixteenth hole, the #2 handicap, is a good example of how narrow some of the tee shots and fairways are on the back nine at Spyglass.

Overall, I really enjoyed Spyglass.

I look forward to my return to the Monterey Penninsula to play the last remaining course I need to play in California. With my round at Spyglass complete, I drove past the entrance gate to Cypress Point, the world's #2 ranked course. The entrance to Cypress Point is right off of the Seventeen Mile Drive. It looks like a tantalizing place, and I have now set my sights on getting an invitation there sometime soon.

Pebble Beach Golf Links

Pebble Beach Golf Links (ranked #7 in the world) is an iconic golf course located on California's Monterey Peninsula. Fact is, anyone associated with golf probably knows all about Pebble Beach, so only a light course description this go around. Because of its high profile stature, Pebble Beach is a difficult course to analyze and put in its proper context. I have changed my view of the course several times as I have been exposed to more of the world's great courses. I have ruminated for the last three years over how good a course it is and have now crystalized my thoughts enough to offer my view.

One of the defining characteristics of Pebble Beach is its small greens. They are, along with Inverness and Harbour Town, some of the smallest to be found among the world's great courses. The first three holes at Pebble Beach are inland and serve as a good warm-up for what's ahead. I think the course routing makes sense at the start. That is, start with some less-than-dramatic holes to get the adrenaline under control and allow a golfer to get into a rhythm before tackling the challenge along the cliffs that lie ahead.

The 7th at Pebble Beach

Pebble Beach has some very dramatic scenery and some wholly interesting golf holes. In particular, I liked the short (less than 100 yard) par three seventh hole which plays downhill with the majestic vista of Monterey Bay in the background. I would be hard pressed to find someone that doesn't like this hole.

I also think that the eighth hole is one of the best in the world. It is a 416 yard par four that is a dog-leg to the right and plays along precipitous high cliffs. From the tee you have no real sense of how difficult the hole is going to be. Your view off the tee is blocked by a slight hill. The eighth hole falls off dramatically on the right hand side where the edge of the hole meets the cliffs and produces vertiginous views if you get too close to the edge. Unfortunately, two people did drive their golf cart off this cliff once and met their demise. Shots that go too far right will find a similar fate. A safer tee shot is down the left side. Your second shot has to carry 170 yards over a giant chasm to the tiny green, with a safer play being to the left. Pebble Beach is such a good course because it offers many of these risk/reward choices during the round.

The next three holes, seven, eight and nine, are some of the most beautiful in the world. We'll get to the middle of the course in a minute as we jump ahead to the finish. The seventeenth hole is a bit disappointing and looks better on TV, since, in reality, it's not actually set that close to the water, and the figure eight green shape is a bit tricky.

The 8th at Pebble Beach

The par five eighteenth is a spectacular hole. This is the ultimate heroic hole in golf, which asks the golfer how much risk they are willing to take hitting over the water and thus potentially they can be rewarded with a shorter shot to the green. I can't think of a better finishing hole in all of golf.

The Other Pebble Beach

One of the reasons why I hesitate to unequivocally pronounce Pebble Beach as one of the absolute top courses straightaway is that the holes away from the water - eleven through sixteen - are not very good or exciting holes. They are in marked contrast to the holes along the water. To emphasize my point I quote Robert Trent Jones from The Complete Golfer: "Unfortunately, the 'inland' holes at Pebble Beach are not in the same class with the holes that follow the bay. The course is, in fact, a complex of ordinary holes and thrilling stretches. The first three holes are adequate. After the tenth green, the course leaves the bay and becomes somnolescent again, for none of the next six holes is above average and their difficulty is not organic. While the architects of Pebble Beach deserve acclaim for the intrepidity with which they seized the opportunities the headlands afforded, it remains an enigma to me why they did not invoke the same shot values for the interior holes."

Jones sums up the weaknesses of Pebble Beach perfectly, getting extra credit for using the word 'somnolescent,' and ten points of extra credit for using it in the same paragraph as 'intrepidity.' His ivy-league repertoire of expressive prose is as vast as his body of work designing courses.

17th at Pebble Beach

Thus, you can begin to see the dilemma of rating Pebble Beach. Is Pebble Beach overrated, or are the water holes so good that even with nine weak holes, it still ranks as one of the top ten courses in the world?

Is Pebble Beach Overrated?

You hear often that Pebble Beach is the most beautiful setting in the world for golf because of the dramatic views. I have found in my travels that there are many courses that have as good or better views than Pebble Beach. I can name ten courses that are as scenic without much thought: Pacific Dunes, Bandon Dunes, Kauri Cliffs, Old Head, Cape Kidnappers, Turnberry, Kingsbarns, Sand Hills, The National Golf Links of America and Royal County Down. As you can see from the pictures here, the scenery is breathtaking. My point is not to disagree with this obvious fact, but simply to point out that it is not unique in this regard; and thus, beauty alone is not justification for a top ten world ranking.

14th at Pebble Beach

Saying that Pebble Beach is the most beautiful course in the world is like saying that the best looking girl in your home town is the best looking girl on the planet. As far as your world goes, it may be true. The problem is, once you get out and see the wider world, there are prettier girls and dramatically more beautiful golf courses. So it is with Pebble Beach; once you've seen Royal County Down or Turnberry, it's hard to go back and say that Pebble Beach is the prettiest in the world.

My view of Pebble Beach has evolved over time. I used to think that Pebble Beach rates so highly because for many people it is the greatest course they have ever seen. If only more people had seen some of the other world-class scenic courses, Pebble Beach wouldn't rank so high. I used to think that my well-honed view gave me a superior position to judge these courses appropriately, since I have seen a lot of the world's top public and private courses. Essentially, my view is more informed than the un-educated swine masses who have only seen one dramatically beautiful course, Pebble Beach, and naturally think it's the greatest in the world. The problem with this position is that once you actually put it down on paper, it is intolerable. Since my aspirations in life don't include sounding like Prince Charles, I have moderated my position.

8th hole looking backward

One gaping hole with this "pompus ass" theory of Pebble Beach is that the Golf Magazine rankings, which are done by some serious, learned and experienced people, including many professionals and architects, rank it the seventh best in the world. This group has seen the world's best and have a good basis for comparison, so it's hard to argue the point and have a sense of superiority over this group. One's upper lip can only be so stiff, after all.

I used to tell people, when asked, that I thought Pebble Beach was overrated. However, when I actually put pen to paper and try to rank courses myself, it's hard not to put Pebble Beach near the very top. In fact, looking at the top 100 list, I would move only Merion, Royal Portrush, The National Golf Links and Sand Hills ahead of Pebble Beach, but not many others. So, ok, maybe it should rank as #12 in the world, but the basic point remains, despite its flaws, Pebble Beach is one of the best places on the planet to play golf.

The reason the course is so highly ranked is that the holes along the water are so well designed and strategic, in addition to being so visually dramatic. By way of comparison, the land at Old Head in Ireland is equally as dramatic as Pebble Beach; however, the design and routing of the course puts Pebble Beach ahead of its peers.


The Pace of Play

It can be difficult sometimes to separate out the experience of playing the course from the course itself. Pebble Beach is not the fastest place in the world to play golf, and it is a bit touristy. Pebble Beach used to be famous for its annoyingly slow pace of play, with a six hour round being not uncommon several years back. It now has the opposite problem: an annoyingly fast round. An annoyingly fast round is one where a marshal tells you to play fast every two holes even though there are groups all around you. It does help improve the pace of play to a more tolerable level, but it is annoying. The problem here is everyone wants to stand around and take pictures, and that slows down the round. This is not the type of golf I like. Because I have a grandiloquent and boastful manner, I much prefer playing in isolation at a place like Somerset Hills, Morfontaine or Woodhall Spa, where you are playing fast because you are exhilarated and because you can, and not because someone is pushing you.

To separate out the course from the experience, it can be helpful to imagine for a minute that Pebble Beach is a private course. Visualize yourself teeing off at 7:00 am in the mist and you are one of only a handful of groups playing the course that day. It completely changes your perspective of the place. Now, it takes on an entirely new view. Also, to fairly judge the course's place in the golf world you also have to understand the history of the the epic struggles contested there (go, Tom Watson!) and the quality of the champions that have played on it, and how this impacts its ranking. For this reason, when you collectively look at Pebble Beach on a variety of criteria, it truly is a special place to play golf.

9th at Pebble Beach

The lodge, food and resort at Pebble Beach are all world-class, especially the Tap Room overlooking the bay. It would be tough to argue there are many better places for an apres-round cocktail. I note that in the November/December issue of Links Magazine, 43% of the respondents in a survey said that if they could only go to one golf destination for the rest of their lives, they would go to Pebble Beach. This ranked ahead of the other three choices offered: St. Andrews, Pinehurst and Bandon Dunes. No surprise to me that I'm again in the minority.

If you are planning a golf trip to the Western United States my advice is to go to Pebble Beach if you haven't already, and if you want to stay in plush surroundings, eat well and be pampered. If you're really into great golf and want to experience the game as it was meant to be played, walk at a good pace, and be surrounded by beautiful scenery and solitude, I suggest a golf trip to Bandon Dunes instead. Bandon is closer to the soul of the game, and its less commercial feel appeals to me more.

Pebble Beach's web-site has a cool feature of live web-cams.

Golf in Japan

There are three courses in Japan ranked in the world's top 100 courses. Kawana (ranked #80), often described as the Pebble Beach of Japan, is a resort course. Unless you consider the 8,000 mile flight a hindrance, it is not that difficult to get on the course and play. The other two include Naruo (ranked #75) which is located in Osaka and is a private club and Hirono Golf Club (ranked #35) also a private club, located in Kobe.

I had fun last year trying to get on the #47 ranked course in the world, Morfontaine in France. It was a learning experience to try and play a course in a foreign land without any contacts. I received a lot of good feedback about my many aborted attempts to play this ideal French course and I was ultimately successful. So, I'm at it again.

This time, I am trying to gain access to the top ranked courses in Japan. As usual, I am aiming high, trying to get onto the best private courses in the land of the rising sun. I did a Google search for both Hirono and Naruo and found the phone numbers for both. I figured a good first try would be to just call them up and see if I could schedule a round. I was steeling myself for a tough time. My odds of this being successful are low, however, given the language barrier. I'm not too worried about breaking through eventually, since I've been rebuffed, turned away and put in my place by some of the best private clubs in the world. I have become very resilient and feel that when I put my mind to something I can achieve it.

With my calling card in hand, I decided to ring them up and give it a try. Since so much can be lost in translation, I have included an actual audio transcript below of my first attempts to play a round at Hirono and Naruo. Well, as you'll hear, the language barriers between Japan and English are high.

I'm still not quite sure whether she told me 'no' or whether it was 'no problem' and I actually have a date and time when I'm supposed to play. My guess is the former. Japan is a country with a lot of customs, traditions and protocols. Perhaps asking directly for a tee time was the wrong approach at Hirono. Maybe I need to be more polite and respectful of their customs first.

My phone call to Naruo took a different tact. Naruo is one of the oldest and most distinguished private clubs in all of Japan, so I thought rather than asking for a tee time directly, I would ask to be introduced to a member. Still a disaster. A total breakdown in communication, even though they could hear me.

Apologies about the herky-jerky nature of the recording. I went to the Richard Nixon school of tape recording management.



Clearly, I've got to find someone who speaks Japanese for my next attempt. I think having someone who better understands the nuances of Japanese cluture better would be in an easier position to help me arrange a round.

As I continue on this quest, I'm getting excited as I learn the differences of playing golf in Japan: the multi-tiered driving ranges, the white-hooded female caddies, a long break and massage after nine holes, and learning how to yell "fore" in Japanese.

I've also decided to learn some basic Japanese so I can at least show some respect when trying to ask to play the course. I've already learned that Japanese people tend not to say things directly. For example, it is impolite to directly say "no," so they have developed an elaborate ritual and process around saying no. They are much more obtuse and circuitous than Americans. I see that there are actually ten ways to say no in Japanese: "iiya, non, ina, ie, iie, ieie, no-sankyu, nain, hi, iya." What's curious is that two of the words, "iiya" or "iya" also mean yes. My new goal is to at least get an "iiya" and "iya," instead of the more serious sounding "no-sankyu" and hopefully I can turn the ambiguity into a round of golf. I'll keep eveyone apprised as I continue my attempt to golf in Japan...

Golf de Chantilly

It is hard to describe Golf de Chantilly properly without describing its location. You get there by taking the A1 motorway north, out of Paris, and then by driving through the thick forest in Chantilly. It is a centuries old town with the perfect french château in the middle, surrounded by a moat. As you leave the forest, the streets turn from pavement to cobblestone. You then approach a big cobblestone round-about, and the famous race-course is directly in front of you. To your right, down the hill is the imposing château. You have to drive past the château and through the old town gate to get to the golf course. Like at Morfontaine, you have to pass through an electronic gate to get into this private course. The château and the great stables at Chantilly were featured in the James Bond movie A View to a Kill. Chantilly has the world's largest concentrated area for trainers and racehorses.

I played at Chantilly this past October, during the week of the races, and the area has a regal atmosphere. It is a spectacular sight to see the locals on horses galloping through the beautiful surroundings and forest. When we were at Chantilly, there were elegantly dressed people on horseback riding through the narrow allées carved in the forest. One guy was decked out in all his Sunday best, including a curved hunting trumpet strapped around his chest.

Although Chantilly is not ranked on the world's top 100 list I am playing, I jumped at the chance to play this beautiful course when offered. As my readers know from my Morfontaine experience, I am a huge fan of France. Chantilly was also designed by the same architect as Morfontaine, Tom Simpson, whose courses I absolutely love.

The chateau at Chantilly

Like most of the elite french courses, the history here is intertwined with the aristocracy. Golf de Chantilly was founded by a local prince in 1909. Baron Edouard de Rothschild was the president of the club from 1927-1940.

Like at Morfontaine, Chantilly doesn't open until nine o'clock in the morning. Perhaps it's related to the 35 hour work-week the french have, but it seems a bit odd to give up a couple of great dawn hours when you could be playing. C'est la vie.

The Golf Course

Golf began at Chantilly in 1909, when a nine hole course was laid out. Tom Simpson was brought in to re-design the original course and design a new eighteen hole course in the 1920s. Unlike Morfontaine, Chantilly was heavily damaged during the Second World War, and nine holes were abandoned as a result. In the 1980s Donald Steel designed thirteen new holes and integrated them in with nine holes from the earlier Longeres course. There are 36 holes at Chantilly today: the Veneuil course, which has most of the original Simpson holes, and the Longeres course. They play championships on a composite "Vineuil Old Course" which is made up of fourteen holes from the Vineuil course and four from the Longeres. The course has hosted the French Open championship ten times. Nick Faldo won twice at Chantilly. Other winners include Roberto de Vicenzo, Peter Oosterhuis and Arnaud Massy.

Chantilly 1st hole

Some courses ease you into the round, and it takes awhile for you to find the courses' charms. Not at Chantilly. It announces right away that it will be a great round of golf. The opening par five hole shows the strategic use of bunkers that are present throughout the course. The three bunkers on the right side make the only safe shot one that lands in the middle of the fairway, right of the clump of trees guarding the left side of the hole.

3rd green at Chantilly

The 159 meter par three, third hole shows off the great bunkering at Chantilly. The routing at Chantilly is varied and interesting, and although you are in a dense forest the fairways generally aren't choked with trees (the fifth hole below is an exception).

The tee shot on the narrow fifth hole

The World Atlas of Golf describes looking down the fairway from the fifth tee (seen above) as the golfing equivalent of looking down a gun barrel. It plays as the #1 handicap at Chantilly and is a tough hole through a tight chute of trees. I was very pleased with my par.

The dog-leg right seventh hole reminded me of playing at Garden City on Long Island and Myopia Hunt Club in Massachusetts, with its flat terrain, fescue and bunkering.

8th cross bunker

 

13th green 

Both the front and back nines at Chantilly have back-to-back par fives. The back nine is the clearly superior of the two, with the six stretch of holes twelve through seventeen being very good. The thirteenth hole was my second favorite on the course (after the 17th). It is a 400 meter dog-leg left (below) that demands you hit your tee shot over two large cross-bunkers. Your second shot is then to an elevated and well-bunkered green.

Like at Morfontaine, the feeling on the course is one of complete solitude and isolation since it is located in a dense forest.

The sixteenth hole is a dogleg left that starts out simple enough. As you walk up to your ball you see that you have to hit your second shot over a ravine to the green. The ravine is interesting, it is about 50 yards long and, unusually, has a fairway at the bottom of it. The second shot plays through the trees toward the clubhouse in the background.

16th approach to green over ravine

Chantilly now offers a startling discovery. It is hard to describe just how good the seventeenth hole is at Chantilly. For those that remember the original Planet of the Apes movie with Charlton Heston, remember the sensation, the chills, and sense of surprise you got when the camera pans over and you see the top half of the Statue of Liberty. The same type of feeling overtakes you here when you realize there is a hole located where the seventeenth is. Shock and awe. It is a stunning par three that plays 199 meters from the back tees down into a tight tree-lined valley.

Par three 17th from the tee

There is an extremely steep hill on the left side of the hole and a large slope on the right side. It is somewhat reminiscent of the par three fourteenth hole at Pine Valley, but without the water in front. Chantilly is basically a flat course, but when you get to the seventeenth tee, the hole is at least sixty feet below you in an enchanted setting. Like both the Valliere course at Morfontaine and Cruden Bay, it shows off Simpson's absolute genius in hole design. How he pulled this off is amazing. The World Atlas of Golf describes this hole as being located in a "secret dell," and I think it is an apt description. The prior sixteen holes give no hint of what the seventeenth hole will be like. It really is surprising and inspiring.

Unfortunately, I got stains on my pants when I dropped to my knees after seeing the hole and started to shout, "Damn you, you maniacs...," but there were tears of joy running down my face!

17th par three as seen from the side

The next hole, the par four finishing hole, has the most difficult walk to a tee box anywhere in the world (you can see it in the back right carved into the trees in the picture below). The walk to the tee box is without the benefit of a stairway. You have to walk up a steep mountain to a tee located behind the seventeenth green. There is a small rocky path winding up through the trees that gives your calves a workout. After you hit your tee shot over the seventeenth green to the fairway on the other side of the valley, you have to navigate your way back down the sharp incline, across the valley and then up the other side of the steep hill to get to the fairway.

After playing seventeen, eighteen is a bit of an anti-climactic hole, but none-the-less, Chantilly is a great place to play golf.

The rustic Chantilly locker room

Chantilly dining room

Chantilly clubhouse

Like at Royal Dornoch, Chantilly only allows two balls before eleven in the morning. It really is a great way to play and the pace of play is fantastic. I played some of my best golf at Chantilly, and our two groups were essentially the only four people on the course in the morning. It was easy to get into a rhythm playing this fast with no distractions. We played on a damp, misty and un-seasonably warm autumn day shrouded in heavy fog that lifted about halfway through the round. Although I shot a good score, the other two people on the trip with us, who were playing in front of us, played off-the-charts. How is a 64 from the back tees? Well done, Mark!

Either French people don´t play a lot of golf or Morfontaine and Chantilly are really exclusive clubs, since we barely saw anyone on either course during our mid-week rounds.

We stayed for lunch after our round, and although the clubhouse at Chantilly doesn't have the same charmed feel as Morfontaine, it is a nice quaint clubhouse that overlooks the vast property. In England or in the U.S. you often see people having a couple of beers after a round, in Scotland during the round, and in a classic French move, here, it's a bottle of Bordeaux after the round. While we lunched on French fries with vinegar several members were lounging around having a leisurely lunch over a bottle of red wine.

Chantilly's web-site is helpful, but a bit rough on their translation into English. Among other things stated in the dress code are "no long-line bra nor straps for women."

Perhaps short-line bras or strapless bras are permitted?

Hello?

Vive la France!

Golf de Chantilly's web site