11
Cabot Cliffs, Nova Scotia PAR 3, 148 YARDS, HANDICAP 16
We travel up to Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia to play the youngest golf hole ever featured in Kingdom’s collection of fantasy golf courses, the par-three 16th at Cabot Cliffs. This new links course, designed by Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw, opened for ‘preview play’ in 2015, a year ahead of its official opening in June 2016. Already there is no question that a visit to Cabot Cliffs will exhilarate any golfer. Playing 176 yards from the Black tee, on 16 we are cutting off a few yards to the green tee and a yardage of 148, to give all our readers the best chance of finding the putting surface on a hole where calculation of the wind is critical. Golfers tee off with far reaching sea views to their right, where the Northumberland Strait meets the Gulf of St. Lawrence, with the waters lapping in against the bottom of the cliff edge which draws a craggy line between tee and green. There is a far right pin position which looks as if it is right on the cliff edge from the tee, but this is best way to play the hole as the slope of the green from the left feeds down to the right. Be warned though, this is obviously a slicer’s nightmare.
13
12
Oakland Hills (South), Michigan PAR 4, 406 YARDS, HANDICAP 5
Ben Hogan could be counted on for candid course appraisals. After winning the 1951 U.S. Open at Oakland Hills—Hogan’s third straight major title—with a peerless 67, Hogan claimed that if Trent Jones “had to make a living playing the courses he builds, his family would be on the bread line”. And that was from the guy who won. Trent Jones was unrepentant, claiming the world’s best players were in need of “shock treatment” as their game had outgrown so many courses. Trent Jones had bolstered the defences of the Donald Ross-designed South Course at Oakland Hills, outside Detroit, which opened in 1918 and where Walter Hagen was the first pro. Trent Jones converted two par fives into killer par fours and the newspapers branded the course a ‘Monster’. The name stuck. Shot placement is critical at 16, with a sharp dogleg right and pond that encroaches in front of the green from the right. We will play from the back at 406 yards for full flavour. It was here that Arnold Palmer won the inaugural U.S. Senior Open in 1981 to become the first player to win both the U.S. and U.S. Senior Opens. Palmer is now an honorary member of the club that celebrates its centenary this year.
Waterville Golf Links, Co. Kerry, Rep. of Ireland PAR 4, 386 YARDS, HANDICAP 11
Waterville’s American connections run right back to its origins. The original nine was laid out in 1889 for the workforce who established the first trans-Atlantic cable link, and Irish-American owner John Mulcahy brought in Irish designer Eddie Hackett and Claude Harmon—the 1948 Masters champion and head pro at Winged Foot—to establish an 18-hole routing which opened in 1973. Tom Fazio later renovated the course and Payne Stewart accepted club captaincy in 1999. The course occupies a promontory that reaches out into Ballinskelligs Bay, and with Waterville House offering the finest of traditional Irish accommodation and hospitality it is little wonder Waterville is so popular with visitors. Waterville’s 16th occupies the northwesterly tip of the course—Waterville’s ‘land’s end’. Known as ‘Liam’s Ace’, the longest Blue tee yardage is 386 yards and that is what we are playing. There is room off the tee for a long iron or metal-wood, which is the smart play. Golfers should aim for the right side of the fairway to set-up a short iron into a two-tiered green.
76
spring 2016