Glashedy Links-Ballyliffen

Posted on July 1, 2011 by moegolf

Pat Ruddy and Tom Craddock did a first rate job with a first rate piece of land. This course is routed through the mountainous dunes north of the Old Links course where the terrain offers lots of elevation changes and visual feature. It was a challenge to start and end the course in the flatlands by transitioning up the towering dunes in the middle of the property and then back down to the clubhouse. Both on the front and back ramp up slowly to the dunes through a series of par fours and then bring you down precipitously fast with one abrupt and dramatic downhill par three. It seems to me that the holes have the right proportion no matter the wind direction-it is evident that certain bunkers are upwind bunkers and others are downwind bunkers.

A fan reflecting the Irish Open held at Ballyliffen in 2018

Embed from Getty Images

Much like the European Club the flow of the holes to the land is marvelous-it just seems like the links belong there. Plenty of room to play in, the dunes just seem to frame the holes without being overly threatening like at Tralee or Enniscrone. They demand plenty of penance for the wayward shot so you must carefully choose your shot lines of approach. The bunkering is just stupendous-mostly the curved edge collection type that seem to gather any approach shot played without conviction. The bunkering is not overdone-usually a few framing the driving area and two carefully placed ones around the greens. The greens are sizeable and have plenty of slope so you are going to get those long sweeping breaks whether you like it or not.

Staring down the dramatic drop on the Par 3 7th at the Irish Open

Embed from Getty Images

The difficulty in scoring is primarily in the sequence and proportions of the holes. Just three five pars and three par threes makes for a stiff challenge on those pesky par fours. Only one par three on the back gives you two runs of four long holes on that side. The par threes are visually stunning holes-you will not forget them. Make sure to consider the wind when picking your tee length for the day. It is no crime to play at the whites when the wind is up-and that is pretty much all the time. It is plenty hard and more enjoyable if you do not have to kill yourself with 400+ par fours.

170 yard downhill Par 3 5th with Glashedy Rock accent in the background

If there is any criticism of the course is that the end is not that strong. Back in the flatlands the last four holes are a longish par four, two medium par fours and a medium five. Clearly the wind can make these harder but they are not memorable holes for such a distinctive course.

This is just a jewel in the links tiara of Ireland-a must play for anyone who appreciates links golf. Go out of your way to play this one.

Ballyliffen, Northern Ireland

Architect: Pat Ruddy and Tom Craddock (1995)

Par Yardage Rating

Gold 72 6884 73

White 72 6466 71

(Click to see complete Glashedy Links hole-by-hole descriptions)

Old Links-Ballyliffen

Posted on July 1, 2011 by moegolf

The Old Links name is a bit of a misnomer since it actually dates back only to 1973 when the famed Irish links architect Eddie Hackett expanded nine holes into a classic old style links course. What makes it old style is the lack of elevation changes but there is just enough hide and seek of the landing areas to keep you off balance. Distinguishing characteristic of this course are the uneven fairways-there is not a level stance to be found. You get the full washboard effect-rumpled wavy fairways, undulating and full of wrinkles and furrows that will do unexpected and unpredictable things to your bouncing golf ball.

Nick Faldo heaped the highest praise on this course when he first visited it in the 1990s. He fell in love with the course and offered to buy it, but was turned down. The club did employ him to make changes to the links renovating bunkers and moving some tees. The par 5 14^th is his original and it is one of the really distinguished holes on the course.

What this one lacks in feature it makes up for in pure links tactics. Since the land is relatively flat and there are not any high dunes to block the wind you get maximum effect from the winds that seem to blow constantly off the Atlantic. A low lofted club is a must here to keep it under the wind and help manage the length of your shots. If you have an old one iron in the closet, bring it with you for this day because it will serve you well.

(Photo from http://www.ballyliffingolfclub.com/gallery)

The green settings are pure links as well (see number three pictured above). Generous when they need to be to help control the low struck approach depending on the wind direction. The bunkering is not overdone but landing in them has it’s price to pay so maneuver the ball carefully. What I found more than anything is that the raw distance means nothing here it is a circumstantial shot makers course-you have to carefully consider all the factors before planning each shot. At the end of this round you are mentally exhausted from the tribulations of the day.

This venue is way out there on the end of the Inishowen Peninsula about as northern most as it gets in Ireland before falling off the island, but it is well worth the trek. This is one of two great courses at Ballyliffen and you need to play them both.

Ballyliffen, Northern Ireland

Architect: Eddie Hackett (1973)

Par Yardage

White 71 6612

(Click to see complete Old Links hole-by-hole descriptions)

iPing Putting App

Posted on June 30, 2011 by moegolf

Ping has introduced an application for your iPhone4 or iPod4 that allows you to attach your device to the shaft of your putter and monitor three key elements of your putting stroke-stroke type, impact angle, and tempo. Using the iPhone’s accelerometer and gyroscope the app produces data so you can see the consistency of your stroke in these three elements and even calculate a Ping trademarked Putting Handicap.

First thing you will need to get over is the fact that the application is free but you have to hand over $30 in your local golf shop for a plastic clip that cost them around 30 cents to produce in China that allows you to hook your phone up to the shaft. The new commerce paradigm in the digital age!

Second thing is that there are no “right” numbers in any of these putting parameters. This is a tuning mechanism-you are trying to find consistency in each category and determine what tweaks in your putting method can give you the consistency you are after.

The “Stroke Type” will measure the arc of your putting stroke, telling you whether it is a Straight, Slight Arc, or Strong Arc measured in degrees of face rotation. This can be used to help you get the right match of putter type to your putting stroke. The “Impact Angle” is the face angle at the moment of impact measured in degrees open or closed. The “Tempo” is the ratio of duration of backswing to forward swing to impact. This is particularly important to distance control.

The application allows you to measure these in practice mode where you can see all three parameters on each stroke or isolate it to one or two parameters if you like. In measure mode you have 5 putt sessions where it measures all three parameters and produces an on screen depiction of your averages in each.

You can even compare these sessions to the performance numbers of Hunter Mahan, Angel Cabrera, Bubba Watson, Mark Wilson, and a number of other Ping PGA, LPGA, and European Tour players.

I have found there is nothing about this application that is a panacea for bad putting. But for those of us who toil on the putting green hitting stroke after stroke it does provide empirical data to use from practice session to practice session to determine if there are some obvious inconsistencies in your putting method. It is the kind of corroborating evidence every golf wonk is looking for in the endless search for the perfect putting stroke.

July, 2011

Stimpmeter-Better Used To Stake A Tomato Plant

Posted on June 30, 2011 by moegolf

Americans seem determined to calibrate everything in their lives, simply to be able to say that their whatever is better than the other guy’s whatever. In this spirit, have Stimpmeters made us so obsessive about fast greens that the game has suffered? Frank Hannigan, former head of the USGA thinks so…….and so do I.

(Click here to read Frank Hannigan’s article on the Stimpmeter)

Found on http://www.popeofslope.com

The European Club

Posted on June 29, 2011 by moegolf

This course is owned and operated by Pat Ruddy and his family and, as one of the premier modern architects in Ireland, Pat has created here his personal testimony to golf course architecture. If you know anything of the man, Pat is a bit obsessed with the a traditional spartan approach to course presentation-no yardage markers on the course, a yardage book without user friendly features, and actually twenty holes to play. When I asked his son who runs the golf shop about the “twenty holes” he simply said, the rest of the world will catch on eventually. He even provides a cursing stone next to the 10th fairway. In Katharine Dyson’s review of this course she explains that legend has it you can put a curse on a person or thing if you revolve the seven small stones on the top of the rock in a counter-clockwise direction. I am guessing an inordinate amount of these have been heaped upon our host.

The yardage book reveals Ruddy’s respect for links golf design. As he says, “The links have been designed to perpetuate and modernize the traditional values of links golf. The combination of rugged dunes, deep bunkers, sea breezes, and large undulating greens calls on the golf to display strength of character, an ability to think, and shotmaking skills.” The design makes generous use of “calculated deception aimed at inducing white knuckles on the club” in an effort to play with the golfer’s mind and impinge his effort to swing out and hit precise shots.

This is a knock your socks off track-very difficult-not for the faint of heart. Breathtaking vistas, cleverly placed bunkers, huge rolling greens, and the links type serpentine tracking along the coast built on true links land. Straight driving off the tee is essential to handle quite a bit of optical illusion created by the tall dunes and long corridor fairways. Proper fairway positioning is crucial to get the most advantageous angle and some very difficult green complexes.

Since over ten of the holes are in breeze shot of the Irish Sea the wind influence is significant. This leads to a couple of weather changes a round so be prepared for lots of dressing and undressing of your fair weather gear. The good news is that like most links courses there is open access to most of the greens. When the wind is up, and that is most of the time, the bump and run becomes a very effective method to getting your approaches close to the flag.

Sometime in the early 2000’s Pat must have intercepted a freight ship full of pressure treated railroad ties because the bunkers have more vertical sleepers than any Pete Dye course I have ever seen. I think Pat has fire extinguishers placed throughout the course in case a contagious sleeper fire should break out and threaten to burn down the course. This look of the vertical sleepers makes deep bunkers even more intimidating by articulating the potential pitfalls to the player from a long way out.

My favorite Pat Ruddy touch is on the scorecard where at the bottom next to the total score he has a huge oversized box which is simply labeled “What My Score Should Have Been”. It is clearly his testimony to the delusional nature of all golfers who love to tell big fish stories over a Guinness after the round.

Wicklow, Ireland

Architect: Pat Ruddy

Tees Par Yardage Rating

White 71 6690 72

(Click to see complete European Club hole-by-hole descriptions)

(Check out the Renton Laws travel video on The European Club from The Gallery section)

(Read a wonderful article about Pat Ruddy the owner/architect of this fine links)

Pat Ruddy’s Lair

Posted on June 29, 2011 by moegolf

As Renton Laws says in this short video, plodding around the east coast of Ireland you are likely to stumble on a diamond in the rough called “The European Club”-Pat Ruddy’s personal contribution to the rich trove of links courses on the Emerald Isle. As an accomplished international course architect, Pat is unique in more ways than you can imagine. His playful personality make his courses creative, challenging, and downright fun. Just check out the scorecard at the European Club-20 holes and a slightly larger box next to your total score for “What my score should have been”.

(Click here to see the Hidden Links Golf Tour European Club video)

You can read Moe’s full review of this Pat Ruddy gem in the Road Trips section under Ireland.

(Click here to see Moe’s review of The European Club)

Somerset Hills Country Club

Posted on June 28, 2011 by moegolf

Somerset Hills represents the old and traditional with a discrete clubhouse and civilized and understated approach to everything. At Somerset Hills, they don’t have to try to impress, because they are the genuine article. The small clubhouse, pro shop and outdoor deck fit perfectly into the New Jersey small town landscape and have an aura that can’t be bought and only develops with age and a respect for the past. The course has a number of perfectly manicured grass tennis courts, confirming its gentrified and genteel approach as a private club. Even the halfway house is just some bottled drinks, ginger snaps, crackers with add your own cheddar cheese or peanut butter. Pick up the yardage book-it is a collectible relic all to its own.

An appealing aspect of A.W. Tillinghast’s work is, strangely enough, the lack of identifying characteristics. The player would be hard pressed to tell that the same architect designed the courses at Winged Foot, Baltusrol, San Francisco Golf Club, Bethpage (Black) and Somerset Hills. Think of the striking features of each: Winged Foot (West) with its length, raised, severe greens and deep bunkers; Baltusrol (Lower) with its low-profile look; San Francisco with its flashy bunkers stylishly spread at all sorts of angles in the broad fairways; Bethpage (Black) with its huge, sprawling scale and Somerset Hills with its terrific set of greens and its charming layout. Tillinghast’s style (or lack thereof) is an indicator that, unlike many of today’s architects, Tillinghast was not hell-bent on leaving his ‘mark.’ He fit the course onto the available land without forcing his imprint onto the land.

Variety is the key to Somerset Hills- variety of terrain, variety of length of holes, variety of approach shots and variety of greens. With the fairly open front nine laid out on and around an old racetrack and the back nine through rolling wooded terrain with streams and a pond, one would think the course would have a Jekyll and Hyde character. However, the course flows well, the par threes are perfectly balanced at 175, 220, 145 and 165 yards while the par fours have several big two-shotters (the 1st, 4th, 7th and 13th), several short ones (the 5th, 17th and 18th) and those very appealing ones in between. Par fives may be the weakest holes but they are not without feature interest themselves.

These greens are unlike anything we see today-they are severe, almost random in their severity-full of odd humps and bumps and an occasional unplayable section. To play well here a player must pay attention to the specifics of each green and know where to leave it and where not to leave it. If the greens are carrying any speed the day you play them this goes double.

For the really discriminating golf mind this is a very special place to play. It is just a delightful sequence of interesting golf challenges and it is totally playable even the first time out. It is simple, unchanged from its original intent, just a bottled piece of the past.

Bernardsville, New Jersey

Architect: A.W. Tillinghast (1917)

Tees Par Yardage Rating Slope

Blue 71 6659 72.2 132

White 71 6235 70.1 127

Red 72 5643 73.8 138

(Click to see complete Somerset Hills hole-by-hole descriptions)

Crooked Cat-Orange County National

Posted on June 28, 2011 by moegolf

This place is a real golf factory facility with two championship golf courses, a 360 degree grass driving area the size of Nebraska, and a golf shop that will make you feel like you are in Nordstroms. The place has hosted the final stage of the PGA Qualifying School a number of times. Coupled with how many pros and wanna-be pros living in the Orlando area you are going to see lots of sticks out there practicing and honing their games.

The fare is reasonable for a facility of this quality and the golf and related accommodations are very much what you would expect. The golf shop is humongous with every major line of apparel represented-if you cannot find something memorable to add to your wardrobe you are either blind or too picky.

This course is one of two that were designed by the team of Phil Ritson, Dave Harman, and Isao Aoki. They moved a lot of dirt to get the sculpting and landscaping they were after but the result is a course that is very challenging but totally playable. The variety of the holes is it’s strong suit. There are the typical Florida holes with adjacent water or environmental areas but there are even a few with an Irish lilt thrown in. The handicapping of the holes is very realistic-three of the five pars are the 16th, 17th, and 18^th handicap holes and two of the par threes are the 4^th and 5^th handicap holes. They put real thought into which holes needed the handicap assistance rather than just looking at length to determine it.

If you look carefully at the GPS images of the holes the lines of play are fairly obvious. Most of the sculpted areas of the fairways are still fairway it is just that hitting from them is a less advantageous place to play from relative to the green. As with most good courses, driving the ball on the proper line and in the short grass is the best way to get aggressive places to play from. The greens are plenty large but segmentation and tiering require proper planning on the approach shots to avoid three putts.

The yardage book in the shop is major old school-hand drawn with lots of particulars. Problem is that it is virtually unreadable to a non-tour mortal so you are better off saving the $7 and just go with the provided GPS in the cart.

This is a very enjoyable afternoon of golf. As always, play from a tee length with hole distances that are comfortable for you. The challenge you seek is here at whatever length you choose to play at.

Winter Garden, Florida

Architect: Phil Ritson/Dave Harman/Isao Aoki (1997)

Tees Par Rating Slope Yardage

Green 72 73.7 132 6927

Blue 72 71.4 126 6432

White 72 68.8 122 6020

(Click to see complete Crooked Cat hole-by-hole descriptions)

Larry David – Stages

Posted on June 27, 2011 by moegolf

This is a very amusing piece written for The New Yorker by Larry David of “Curb Your Enthusiasm” fame. Certainly a familiar process every one of us who has ever picked up a seven iron can relate to. Only question remains is the one my friend posed to me, “What stage are you in?”

(Click here to read the Larry David article)

Larry David

The New Yorker magazine

July 2011

Bay Hill Golf Club

Posted on June 27, 2011 by moegolf

Bay Hill is synonymous with Arnold Palmer as his winter retreat and the host venue for the golf tournament that bears his name. The facility was built in the early 1960’s by a group of Nashville businessmen who hired Dick Wilson-one of the prominent architects of the day-to build a championship course in the middle of nowhere. Arnold came to the recently opened course in the mid-sixties to play an exhibition match with Jack Nicklaus and fell in love with the quality of the course as well as the reclusiveness of Orlando. In the early 1970’s through the connections of Mike McCormick and IMG, Arnold put together a group of investors to buy Bay Hill from the original Nashville businessmen who put it together.

Winnie and Arnie made sure all the players would not miss their tee times

The rest was history as Arnold began to spend more and more time at Bay Hill with Winnie his wife and her Golden Retriever Riley and they put their personal stamp on every aspect of the operation.

Arnie and one of their Goldens

The casual character of this first class destination facility is clearly a reflection of their personalities and values. Arnold and Ed Seay have continually tweaked the course itself to keep it up to standards to challenge the PGA touring pros that play there every spring. Yet it remains totally playable to the large contingent of members and guests who play it every day.

(Click on any picture to get an enhanced view of the image)

The first impression of the course is that it is not as macho as you would expect after seeing it year after year on TV. The who’s who of winners over the last 30 years shows an amazing diversity of players win here-from Andy Bean, Gary Koch, and Tom Kite to Freddie Couples, Phil Mickelson, and Tiger Woods (6 times).

Wharf arrangement on the Par 5 6th rewards tactical restraint and precise execution.

The course itself is not particularly brutish in length but it is technical enough to require really good management of ball flight and distance. The greens are quick and undulating so it takes tactical planning with approach shots and aptitude with the flat stick to score well.

The Par 4 8th is not long but it is very demanding..especially on the approach.

The topography is actually un-Florida-like so you have your share of up and down holes to deal with. The par fives are not particularly long-at least two are reachable if you crank your driver-and there are not really many stout par fours of 425 or longer. The shorter par fours are the most difficult to me-they all have a good measure of Arnold’s favorite risk-reward thinking to them. The overall variety of holes is it’s strongest suit-no two holes feel remotely alike. Fairway bunkers are sprawling but tactically placed.

Bunkering on the Par 3 7th is, as Goldilocks would say, just right!

You cannot help but notice the artistry of the shaping and vistas of the bunkers-they are in the right places to make you think hard before taking the aggressive line on most holes. Greenside bunkering is not overdone but they are very steep sloped so you can get some very challenging exit paths, especially if you short side yourself on an approach miss.

The iconic rock trim carry into 18 has made many a tour player take pause and reflect

This is clearly a course where knowing when to attack and when to back off make a real difference in your final score. Thoughtful aggressiveness is the mantra here. You have to go for it when the odds are in your favor because you need some low scores to balance the few paybacks you are likely to render through the day.

A locker room with showers, gin tables, and a bar..how old school!

A locker room with showers, gin tables, memorabilia, and a bar..how old school!

Do not miss the men’s locker room-it is a throwback to the days before political correctness dominated our lives. It is a place for men to unwind after a round-have a drink, play some cards, and settle all the bets of the day. The memorabilia on the walls is enough to fill a museum.

Orlando, Florida

Architect: Dick Wilson (1963) Arnold Palmer/Ed Seay (since 1970)

Tees Par Rating Slope Yardage

Green 72 75.4 142 7381

Blue 72 73.7 139 6895

Yellow 72 71.6 134 6437

(Click to see complete Bay Hill hole-by-hole descriptions)

(Click to see the moegolf Bay Hill Charger Nine review)

(Click to see the moegolf Bay Hill Short Game Area review)

(Click to see more photos in a Postcard From Bay Hill)

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