Huggan On Old Course Vandals: "Never before has that change been provoked by incompetence rather than progress."

John Huggan pens a venomous attack on the R&A over the Old Course Phase 2 vandalism and shreds the primary hooligans involved with the unimaginable molestation of golf's Sistine Chapel, all out of laziness to re-draw the line on distance.

I was not aware of that the modified 11th green--described by one noted architect to me as now a pool table--still did not work during competition because the greenkeeper insists on maintaining the green at too fast of a pace.

Verdicts on the work already in place have inevitably ranged from outrage to point-missing acceptance, the latter’s adherents citing the fact that change has always been part of the Old Course’s long history. Which is true. But never before has that change been provoked by incompetence rather than progress.

Perhaps most laughable has been the alteration to the 11th hole. Slicing the top off the slope towards the back-left portion of the green was designed to provide options beyond the traditional pin-position behind the Strath bunker. Which is fine in theory. But the changes did little to prevent the halting of play during this year’s Ladies British Open. On no more than a moderately windy day, balls were moving on the new, super-duper 11th. And that was the “funny” part. With the slope supposedly eliminated from the equation, the problem was obvious – the speed of the green. Wouldn’t it have been easier to fix that rather than mess with centuries of history? Where does it say in the rulebook that every green must be the same pace (an impossible aim anyway)? Again, just asking.

Then there are the new slopes and humps and bumps left of the 17th green. Ostensibly designed to bring the infamous Road Hole bunker more into play, the more immediate effect has been to eliminate the “long and left” approach. In other words, an option has been eliminated. On the Old Course. On the ultimate strategic links. Amazing.

He goes on to eviscerate the changes to the fourth hole, which averaged 4.25 last time around and which reader Mark made a nice statistical case for leaving alone.

Speaking of the fourth, the one person in St. Andrews who actually is keeping an eye on this crime has posted new photos that show the first attempt to add mounds next to the green was abandoned by architect Martin Hawtree, the sod rolled up, and attempt #2 attempted to create new man-made features that harmonize with the most amazing contours on the planet. Good luck with that!

Graylyn Loomis has added photos and select observations to his initial post so that you can see the crew trying to shape like Mother Nature, only to have their superiors realize the first go-around didn't work.

It would all be funny if it weren't so sad that these are images of the Old Course we are looking at.