Having just visited this fine peninsula town and not having played its namesake and finest golfing track, I thought best to revisit my archives from mid-decade and relive post facto some of the pleasure that is San Francisco Golf Club. This would be Tillinghast’s most notable ‘best-coast’ effort of course, with a little love from Renaissance Golf over the years to reclaim, renew, and reuse. This particular vantage is up the valley that includes the 7th and 8th holes, and was of course the site for the famous Terry-Broderick bout of ‘59, America’s final pistol duel. Ironically, the short seventh hole calls for what Senator Broderick was apparently lacking–a decisive and accurate shot to a small target. He died, and at the hands of a state Supreme Court Justice no less. I thought Congress was the check/balance to the judiciary, but not in this case. I fortunately had terrific company on my round, although tensions briefly rose as we went in-pocket to repair our pitch marks on the green. The short par-4 8th up the way is no slouch either, I love this place. Recent revisions have brought back the Tarantula bunker, but I have yet to make its acquaintance.

A BEAUTIFUL APPROACH AT THE 14TH

I was fortunate enough to make it out to Cherry Hills this year to see the work that Renaissance Golf completed last fall. Cherry Hills has never been my favorite course. When I lived in Denver, I attended a caddy orientation class there but opted to loop at Denver Country Club because I liked the course better. Renaissance led by Eric Iverson redid every bunker on the course, altered the third and thirteenth holes, and cleared a select number of trees. The work has started to reveal the potential of the place and I hope that the membership will realize that with a more aggressive makeover, the pride of Denver golf could leap to the upper echelon of  William Flynn designs.

The routing on this course is very solid, with the front nine occupying the interior of the property and the back working around the outside. The first few holes, after the famous opening tee shot, are relatively flat. The new third is short par-four that requires a well stuck tee shot to avoid the myriad of bunkers. The green is elevated and surrounded by tight mow. The course starts to hit its stride at the fifth and never really slows down after that.

The tree clearing that has been completed only illustrates how much more is necessary. There are still a number of spruces that should be removed both for aesthetics and for playability. The clubhouse sits above the course on a hill and should have spectacular views of the mountains. While the Rockies can be glimpsed here and there, they are often blocked by unnecessary trees. Cutting down trees should help with drainage and getting the course to play firmer and faster.

Additional tree clearing will help the course but the thing that will make Cherry Hills stand out, would be the renovation of the creek that winds through the course. Old photos show the creek as a sandy wash that was natural and rustic. This creek has been channelized and is now devoid of character. Surrounded in blue grass and removed from the line of play, the creeks are an afterthought in their current configuration. An aggressive stream restoration would vastly enhance the uniqueness of the course and add to the strategy of the golf holes.

Take the 14th pictured at the top of the post. This is already a very good hole, but imagine the creek on the left as a sandy wash, darting into the corner in front of the green. The hole could become all world. While Cherry Hills has been adding length to combat altitude and advances in technology, bringing the creek more into play would have a more tangible affect on the difficulty of the course.

Renaissance Golf, working off some thorough research from Mark Fine, has done a splendid job restoring some of the luster to jewel of Denver golf. I hope that they are given the opportuntiy to really make it shine.

GOLFERS EJOYING A BEAUTIFUL EVENING AT COMMON GROUND

The game of golf is at a crossroads. We can chose to continue develop costly and overdone courses that are too difficult and too expensive to play or we can look for new solutions. At Common Ground Golf Course near Denver, Tom Doak and the rest of the Renaissance team have reworked an uninspiring and dull course into a compelling design filled with both subtle and bold strategies. And they did it all for $4.5 million. The average guy  pays $50 or less to play a course that engages the mind and body. While this is not Tom’s greatest course, it is one of his greatest achievements.

I was able to stop in at Common Ground in the the spring of 2008 while the course was still under construction. Eric Iverson, Renaissance’s lead design associate on the job, gave Kyle Franz and me a tour around the site. I captured some video as we discussed Renaissance’s plans for the course and some of the inspiration for the feature work and look of the place. I returned this past spring for a round and was blown away at how well they had executed their vision for the place (Video after the jump)

I will go into more details about the course in a later post, but the bottom line is that this a fun golf course that has not been dumbed down for the masses. There is a good mix of wild and relatively subtle greens. The bunkers are expertly placed to make the golfer think about every tee shot and every approach. The conditions for this young course were superb, with the dwarf-bluegrass playing firm and fast.

While golf course aficianado may be studying some of Doak’s better known works like Pacific Dunes and Ballyneal eighty years from now, modern golf course architects should make a point in studying Common Ground today.

ONE OF THE MANY BUNKER STYLES AT OLD MAC

In the second part of my interview with Jim Urbina from this past February out in Bandon, Jim talks about the bold features that the team incorporated into the design at Old Macdonald. The greens are some of the wildest that I have ever seen on any golf course. The sixth hole at the National Golf Links of America is one of the craziest in golf and it would struggle to stand out if it was on Old Mac. Jim points out that this boldness in contour was very much something that they wanted to do from the beginning. These contours, combined with the size and scale of the green, are probably the most striking features of Old Mac. (video after the jump)

The other thing about Old Mac that really jumps out at the first time visitor is the eclectic bunkers. Jim talks about the thought process that led to this look. The idea was to take things back to the game’s roots in links golf and show the various types of ways that early bunkers were created and formalized. At Old Mac, this means that there are bunkers that are small scrapes, revetted, wrapped with sleepers, grass faced, natural blowouts, and the more typical Renaissance Golf style. The result is a little jarring at first, but as the bunkers weather they will start to come together as a more cohesive group.

For the first part of the interview with Jim Urbina see here.

WAVES BREAKING AT THE SHEEP RANCH

My first job in golf course design and construction was on the business end of a rake at the Sheep Ranch just north of the Bandon Dunes Resort. I returned there in February for the first time in seven or eight years and was really pleased with what I found.

The Sheep Ranch consists of thirteen greens, a handful of bunkers and fairways that meander all over the place. The idea behind the place is that there is no set routing, but that the winner of the hole in match play gets to decide which green to play to next. There  are endless ways to play the course, although I suspect that most people hug the coast which juts out into the Pacific, creating amazing views both up the coast and back down towards Old Macdonald and Pacific Dunes. (video after the jump)

The greens shaped by the team at Renaissance Golf were in perfect condition and were even more interesting then I remembered them. Built to be approached from multiple angles, they often have one large contour and a number of smaller ones. They remind me of some of the great greens at Prestwick.

The best things about the Sheep Ranch are the solitude and pureness. The only other person on the property was the superintendent, who was knocking around a bunch of balls, practicing his game. He (I am ashamed that I did not catch his name) informed us that play was limited to two foursomes a day, and even that was rare. It is quite a contrast to the resort next door, which was bustling, even in late February.

The Sheep Ranch does not have irrigation and the only water it gets is from Mother Nature and an old fire truck that has been there since construction. I can only imagine how cool the play must be in the summer when it browns out and you have to play approach shots seventy yards short of the green downwind. I understand that they will be filming Golf in the Kingdom there this spring and I cannot think of a place in the U.S. that is more appropriate.

Access to the Sheep Ranch is through Bandon Golf Supply.

Jim Urbina has quietly been Tom Doak’s right hand man on such projects as Pacific Dunes, Apache Stronghold and the Rawls Course at Texas Tech. At Old Macdonald, which will fully open in 2010, he has been elevated to the title of co-designer. I have had the pleasure of working with Jim on a number of occasions (Sebonack, Pasatiempo, Aetna Springs) and have learned a lot about how to build world class golf courses.

I caught up with Jim in February, as he and the Renaissance crew were putting the finishing touches on Old Macdonald. This video (after the jump) is the first of three from my talk with Jim and includes some video and photos of both the completed holes and those still under construction.

I was somewhat surprised by what I saw out at Old Macdonald. I guess I expected to find the National Golf Links west, instead I found a golf course that looks very little like Macdonald’s masterpiece but does incorporate its central element- fun. Old Macdonald looks like it will be a blast to play- wide fairways, wild greens and a fair bit of quirk. Instead of adhering to a strict interpretation of Macdonald’s template holes, Jim and Tom, along with the rest of the committee that consisted of owner Mike Keiser, Macdonald expert George Bahto, and writer Brad Klein, looked for land forms and areas that would allow them to mix in elements of these templates. This is how Macdonald approached National, where he often combined different parts of the holes that he studied in Great Britain to ultimately form truly original holes. Walking the property, it was difficult to put names to holes with the exception of the obvious like Short, Redan, Road, Biarritz and Eden.

I believe that there is enough there to keep Macdonald lovers happy but also enough originality to keep those who despise the template idea from criticizing it as a copy-cat course. At the end of the day though, Mike Keiser’s “retail golfer”, who knows little about C.B. Macdonald, will have a great time and hopefully be intrigued enough to figure out why the course was named for the Father of American Golf.

For a more in depth review see Robert Thompson’s review.

Looking down the eighth

The video in this film (after the jump) was shot early one morning in late April. It shows the holes that go away from and come back to the clubhouse. Ballyneal is a truly special place and this is just a quick little video to give you a taste.

Rupert O’Neal (founder/owner) and Dave Hensley (superintendent) have done a great job of getting this place really humming. The clustering of buildings form a small village and add to the experience. The course played firm and fast when I returned there in June. The fescue has matured and the greens are now up to speed.

The music is for Rupert