Classic Club Blues

Larry Bohannan thinks the desert's much despised Classic Club was validated by the unplayability of Harbour Town.  Thanks to reader Scott for this.

The criticisms ranged from just complaining that the host course of the Hope tournament, Classic Club was built in a wind tunnel to more-whispered talk that Classic Club might have to be dropped from the tournament altogether, even though the Hope tournament owns the golf course on the north side of Interstate 10 near Cook Street.

Of course it would be silly to think that Harbour Town would be dropped as a tour course because a bad year of wind canceled play for a day and had flagsticks whipping at a 45-degree angle.

No one is going to say a bad word about Augusta National. It was just a bad year of wind, the pundits will say.

Yet at the Hope this year, with Classic Club in its second year in the tournament, people were questioning everything. They ignored the solid design of the Classic Course, ignored the fact that it was windy and rainy at the other three Hope courses and ignored the fact that the week before and the week after the Hope this year, conditions at Classic Club were calm and near-ideal.

Wind can impact play anywhere anytime, whether it's the desert of California, the pines of Georgia or the seacoast of South Carolina. But the Hope has taken more than its share of grief over the same weather conditions that hit the Masters and the Heritage.

Uh, but the course still stinks!