East Lothian Golf: Musselburgh Golf And Racing

To kick off Light Posting/Celebrating East Lothian Golf Week, I’d like to direct you to a story I wrote for the July 2013 Golf Digest on making your golf pilgrimage to Edinburgh and East Lothian. Nothing against St. Andrews, which is terrific, but if you love the history of the game, want to make the essential trip for a golfer and want to take a trip to Scotland without the long drives and travel stress, this is the place to set up shop.

Having spent another week here playing some golf, seen the courses in their perfect dry state, experienced more of the eateries, hung out in Edinburgh and settled into the towns of North Berwick and Gullane as a guest, I’m even more confident in my reporting from a year ago that this is a golfing mecca like no other.

To put it another way, I had that uniquely bittersweet emotion of driving through Gullane today, happily seeing life getting back to normal for the town but so desperately hoping I will get to come back and do it all over again.

As I outline in the story there are so many places to see and while I should start with the most historic locations in Edinburgh, in honor of today’s Tuesday racing card at Musselburgh Race Course, I’d like to direct you to videos I posted previous on the site from one of my favorite days in golf: morning play at the oldest played course in the world (with hickories), and afternoon of racing. Where the turf meets the turf.

And of course, should you decide to make this journey, GolfEastLothian.com is a super one-stop-shop for most questions, planning help and even tee times at some courses.

Enjoy and may all the horses come home safe!

An overview:

And the fourth hole:

Phil On North Berwick: "The architecture, there, is exquisite."

The 14th tee view this week at North Berwick (click to enlarge)For the architecture wonks out there, Phil Mickelson at Muirfield for The Open Championship today, talking about links golf and the neighboring North Berwick:

Q. Where was the first time you played links golf? And can you tell us the best experience you've had in The Open Championship?

PHIL MICKELSON: Well, the first time I played links golf was in the Walker Cup in 1991, Portmarnock Ireland, but the first time over here was in '92. I tried to qualify for The Open Championship at Muirfield over at North Berwick, and that was really one of my first experiences. I remember that golf course very vividly. And I feel like that course had such an influence on architecture in the early 20th Century that a lot of the holes -- probably the most emulated hole ever is the Redan hole throughout the world. But some of the features, like the green on 16, some of the blind shots, the architecture, there, is exquisite.

Rose-Poulter Phone-In Redesign Of Phoned-In Duval Design!

What a world: David Duval gets some money to be part of one of the Mission Hills courses in China built by Brian Curley, and now that the course has been rebuilt and Duval is not a top player, hipper, younger player-architects are called in to...phone it in.

From Doug Ferguson's AP notes column:

Mission Hills China announced two weeks ago that U.S. Open champion Justin Rose and Ian Poulter of Ryder Cup fame will stage an exhibition match Oct. 28 to celebrate the opening of the redesigned "Rose-Poulter" course.

Brian Curley is the architect of the redesign. The course had been "designed" by Duval and was known as the "Duval" course.

Rose said in the press release, "We've had a number of discussions with Brian Curley and I look forward to coming to Mission Hills in October and seeing the end result."

Glad to see we're exporting the best of golf to China!

Videos: Above Castle Stuart

John Huggan in Golf World Monday defended Castle Stuart links, host of this week of the Scottish Open and criticized recently by Graeme McDowell (but defended ably by Paul Lawrie.)

Anyway, I stumbled on these overhead videos posted on YouTube that brought back some fine memories of one of the coolest tournament venues and settings on the planet and made me downright jealous I won't be there this week.

The first, set to Coldplay:



And a different but equally compelling view:

Pro Plays All Existing U.S. Open Courses And Wants More!

Thanks to reader Mike for Frank Fitzpatrick's superb story on Cape Fear CC professional Joey Hines playing all of the 49 existing U.S. Open courses.

He's now on a quest to now play the existing Open Championship courses and hosts of PGA's too.

But after three or four of those trips, a friend said, 'You know you've played an awful lot of U.S. Open courses.' That interested me. "I started researching. I found out there were 49 of them - actually 50, but Englewood in New Jersey had closed. So I started nibbling away." Once he gave up his dream of playing on the PGA Tour - he failed to earn a card at qualifying school on several occasions - the pace of his quest quickened. He played Open venues in bunches with friends, then began to pick them off one-by-one on his own. As difficult as the golf was at many of those exclusive venues, securing tee times was even tougher.

"They all had their rules, and you had to respect them," he said. "It wasn't easy getting on at Baltusrol or Riviera. Chicago Golf Club was brutal. Sometimes they paired you with a member. Sometimes you had to beg, borrow, and cry."

Riviera was hard to get on? They take anyone's money!

"And Merion. I've come across that road [Ardmore Avenue] five times and I've been at even, 1 under, 1 over. But I think the lowest I ever shot there was a 77. Fifteen, 16, 17, 18 have just eaten my lunch every single time." Some of the courses, particularly those that haven't hosted an Open since the event's early days, were pleasant surprises. He liked Philadelphia Country Club (1939) much better than the Philadelphia Cricket Club (1907, 1910). Among the other out-of-the-rotation "sleepers" Hines enjoyed were Myopia Hunt near Boston, the site of four Opens from 1898 to 1908; and three Chicago-area courses, Chicago Golf Club, Onwentsia, and Glen View. "Chicago Golf Club is like Merion," Hines said. "If somebody gave you a million dollars and told you to improve it, you'd go crazy because it's already perfect."

Trainwreck? Architects Selecting Their World Top 100

Golf Course Architecture magazine has surveyed 240 golf architects from 28 countries to select their World Top 100 courses and the first signs of a trouble came with the release of courses 92-100.

The amazing Fishers Island, which the Golf Digest panel puts in the top 10 American courses, is lumped in with design-light places like Shadow Creek, Torrey Pines (South) and Peachtree.

The final 10 will be released by July 12th.

GMac: Castle Stuart Too Easy, Too One-Dimensional

Shocking statements from the normally learned Graeme McDowell in justifying why he's skipping the prestigious Aberdeen Asset Management Scottish Open at Castle Stuart for the second year in a row.

Jim Black reports:

McDowell, speaking on the eve of the Irish Open at Carton House near Dublin, said: “The Scottish Open has lost its identity and its prestige. Castle Stuart probably has not been a strong enough golf course.

“Let’s see them get the Scottish Open on a phenomenal links golf course with a great purse and get a world-class field back.

“We need to be capitalising a little harder on the week before and after the Open.

“I feel bad singling out the Scottish Open, because I used to love it at Loch Lomond. It was a phenomenal tournament. Taking it to Castle Stuart was designed to get it on a links course the week before The Open and it’s a beautiful venue — but it is probably a little too wide open off the tee and a little one-dimensional.

“But Royal Aberdeen next year is a venue which attracts me. I’ve heard great things about it and it could re-light the event.”

McDowell finished T42 in his lone appearance at the too easy Castle Stuart, the year freak rains softened the course and reduced the tournament to 54-holes.

Phil Mickelson is returning for a third year to the Scottish Open and NBC is providing network coverage in the United States, a first for a European Tour event.

And needless to say, I didn't find the course one-dimensional last year when watching some of the best shotmaking and most interesting play I'd seen in a long time. Some photos from Saturday and Sunday.

Unfortunately, Royal Aberdeen is excessively narrow to offset modern distance and will be a bit too one-dimensional if not widened out. Oh wait, wide is bad GMac! I forgot.

U.S. Women's Open: Doak Stalks Creamer!

Fun anecdote from Randall Mell from Tuesday at Sebonack on the eve of the U.S. Women's Open at the Tom Doak-Jack Nicklaus designed course:

When Doak first inquired whether he could follow Creamer around, Creamer didn’t believe it.

“I asked my dad,`Is it a joke? Is someone playing a trick on me?'” Creamer said.

Creamer, who won the U.S. Women’s Open in 2010 on Oakmont’s treacherous greens, relished the chance to grill Doak on nuances of his designs.

“Why would you do this to us?” Creamer playfully asked Doak of the toughest greens. “I didn’t give him too much grief about it, but he laughed.”

Dave Shedloski talks to architects Nicklaus and Doak about the unusual design collaboration.

Nicklaus said the routing of the course is predominantly the work of Doak, but the tee-to-green strategy shows more of his influence. He figures he moved perhaps as many as half of the bunkers into more strategic locations. Doak designed the greens. Nicklaus liked them, but softened them.

“The look is more Tom’s, and the golf is a combination of both of us,” Nicklaus said. “My idea was to have good, playable golf. Tom will throw bunkers in different places for the aesthetics, so that’s the look. I think the combination turned out well. I learned a lot from this golf course; it’s given me another dimension on how to do golf courses.

There's also a nice USGA slide show of course images.

Restored Merion To Be Restored After '13 U.S. Open!

The USGA Member Clubhouse hosted an engaging, standing-room only roundtable Monday afternoon as persistent spring rains pelted the tent just off of the USGA's main "Spectator Square." Hosted by Jimmy Roberts, the hour-long discussion featured guests Curtis Strange, Merion historian/member John Capers, USGA Executive Director Mike Davis, architect Tom Fazio and '13 U.S. Open General Chairman Rick Ill.

The program kicked off a series of daily events in the clubhouse that include a Rich Lerner interview of Ray Floyd (Tuesday), a 2009 Walker Cup reunion Wednesday with Rickie Fowler (among others), Billy Casper Thursday and tantalizingly, a Thursday chat called the "USGA's Position On Technology And Golf Equipment" featuring Championship Chair Tom O'Toole and Managing Director of Equipment Standards John Spitzer.

But the real bombshell in the Merion conversation was dropped by Ill, who revealed after a discussion of Merion's decade long restoration (tree removal, bunker work, etc...) that following the 2013 U.S. Open, several of the "restored" bunkers--which were actually shifted to pinch landing areas on holes like 2, 15, 16--will be restored to their previous positions.

Also of note was Fazio's prediction that after this week, the world of golf will be having a "very different" debate about the ball because of his belief that Merion will show that a course under 7,000 yards is plenty relevant in today's game. Relevant, that is, until the restored landing area bunkers are unrestored.

McGrath's NY Times Cabot Links Travel Story

Charles McGrath's NY Times Travel story on golf at Cabot Links and elsewhere in the vicinity is one of the best travel stories I've read in a long time and is an absolute must read if you are considering a trip to Cabot. Not only are the observations and tips superv, but the overall presentation by the NY Times nearly makes up for the utterly ridiculous "Golfers are working out these days" cover story they posted earlier this week.

To match McGrath's insights, photographer Piotr Redlinski's images flesh out the presentation and he includes a video diary item as well with interviews of people like Cabot developer Ben Cowan-Dewar.

Besides the super information, this package is another one to add to the list of examples showing how the NY Times really getting this whole digital world thingy.

Jack On Muirfield Village's Heavily Bunkered 18th: "It looks like something I had to do to protect the hole."

Okay, now that Jack Nicklaus has said what we all know to be the case, the 18th at Muirfield Village doesn't look as good as it used to look. But it's not Mr. Nicklaus' fault that players were taking a short cut thanks to modern equipment, so he liberally sprinkled bunkers to maintain relevancy for the finishing hole at the Memorial. A lot of bunkers.

And now he acknowledges in this Rusty Miller note, too many.

"Every time I look on television, I look down and see all those bunkers along 18 and I don't think it's a pretty look," Nicklaus said, referring to right side of the landing area beyond a walnut tree. "It looks like something I had to do to protect the hole. All the other holes on the golf course are basically played the way they were designed. Eighteen is the only hole where they are able to circumvent the design. They take it over the corner and get it out there.

"To me, the finishing hole needs to be stronger."

Monday after the Memorial, Nicklaus will meet with superintendent Paul Latshaw to evaluate the tourament and the club will proceed accordingly. Nicklaus told the press Wednesday that a new tee could extend the hole by 30 yards to return the driver to relevancy on the finishing hole.

Though Latshaw did tell me the timing could be anywhere from ASAP to a few years from now depending on what Mr. Nicklaus says. With the Presidents Cup looming this fall, I won't be surprised if the new 18th tee is built sooner than later. The added bunkers?  That may take a bit longer to deal with.