{"id":1084,"date":"2013-08-25T12:53:38","date_gmt":"2013-08-25T17:53:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/theaposition.com\/johnstrawn\/?p=1084"},"modified":"2013-08-25T12:53:38","modified_gmt":"2013-08-25T17:53:38","slug":"carne-golf-links-new-nine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/johnstrawn\/golf\/personalities\/1084\/carne-golf-links-new-nine","title":{"rendered":"Carne Golf Links\u2019 New Nine"},"content":{"rendered":"

Carne Golf Links<\/a> in County Mayo, by general acclaim an exhilarating and formidable addition to the world\u2019s roster of great links courses since its opening in 1995, recently debuted a third nine to complement its original Eddie Hackett-designed 18,.\u00a0 There are good reasons, especially on a course with heavy play, to build 27 holes. You can perform maintenance tasks, for example, without closing the course. But one potential cost of operating 27 holes is the risk of confusion about which 18 is the \u201creal\u201d course. Carne\u2019s decision to create the new 9, which it calls \u201cKilmore,\u201d seems to have been driven more by the spirit animating the original course\u2019s creation than by demand.\u00a0 John Garrity <\/a>explained the attitude guiding Carne\u2019s gestation in Ancestral Links<\/i><\/a>: there\u2019s a great piece of ground for golf here in Belmullet, said the founders of Erris Tourism, the company established to develop, own and operate Carne Golf Links, so let\u2019s create the best course our budget will allow.\u00a0 That same determination underwrote the building of the Kilmore nine.<\/span><\/p>\n

An 18-hole course may be good, bad, or indifferent, but there is no ambiguity about what it is.\u00a0 Twenty-seven-hole courses, however, always struggle to establish their identity. While the nines at a 27-hole course can combine into three alternative 18-hole course routings\u20141+2, 1+3, or 2+3\u2014they are always seen as a hybrid or blend rather than a \u201ctrue\u201d course.\u00a0\u00a0 The architect may try to design three balanced nines, but it\u2019s a hard goal to achieve, due to restraints in the site, the difficulty of getting three comparable loops to return to the clubhouse, and so on. History and tradition at a 36-hole club will establish one of its courses as the championship test, as the East Course is at Oak Hill or the Lake Course is at The Olympic Club. At a twenty-seven-hole complex, however, it\u2019s a challenge to determine the optimal course.\u00a0 Even if two nines are combined into an eighteen-hole setup that\u2019s always used for tournament play, guests may rarely play that specific layout.\u00a0 That\u2019s part of the challenge Carne faced when it decided to add another nine.\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

In addition to the prospect of playing the three nines in their various combinations\u2014the Kilmore with the Hackett front, or the Kilmore with the Hackett back\u2014Carne\u2019s management team discovered a Composite Course, combining all nine holes from Hackett\u2019s back nine with the new Kilmore holes, but in a sequence that combines seven holes from the original nine with two new holes as the Composite\u2019s front, and then the remaining seven new holes plus Hackett\u2019s original finishing holes, 17 and 18, as the back.<\/span><\/p>\n

A group of golf writers <\/a>gathered at Carne in late July, 2013, for the soft opening of the new nine-hole loop whittled through the land Hackett had disregarded when he laid out Carne\u2019s original back nine.\u00a0 Playing the Composite Course invited comparison between the new and old holes, and between Hackett\u2019s course and the Kilmore.\u00a0 While Hackett\u2019s front nine used roughly fifty-five acres of relatively flat land on the eastern portion of the site, all eighteen holes of the Composite Course are on Carne\u2019s western and southern portions, where the land is most severe.\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The rule of thumb in golf design is that a steep site requires more land than a flat site, especially when the holes have to be benched into the slopes using heavy equipment.\u00a0 Carne\u2019s original eighteen was built, however, with minimal grading, which meant finding the relatively flat portions where holes could most readily be created was the principal challenge of the original design.\u00a0 This was a task at which Hackett excelled, working much in the manner of his esteemed precursors, the venerated early designers possessed of an instinctive understanding of what makes a good golf hole, such as Old Tom Morris.\u00a0 Carne\u2019s eastern portion, with the gentlest terrain, was the obvious place for Hackett to start.\u00a0 He laid out a series of mostly excellent but not terribly difficult holes there.\u00a0 Then he moved west into the irregular, brawny dunescape that gives Carne its identity, and created a course that can only be described by echoing Ben Hogan\u2019s assessment of Oakland Hills after the 1951 US Open: it\u2019s a monster. And I mean that in a good way.<\/span><\/p>\n

Grades of more than 10%, especially on ground where the turf can get hard and fast, means there is no chance of stopping the ball from running out, and an errant shot at Carne, given the depths of the canyons and the thickness of the marram grass menacing every fairway edge, spells doom.\u00a0 Creating fairways which used the native ground but were still capable of holding a shot was Hackett\u2019s greatest challenge, and one which was even more acute for the architect of the Kilmore 9, Ally McIntosh, whose canvas, after all, was the land Hackett had already judged daunting.<\/span><\/p>\n

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\"Ally<\/a>

Ally McIntosh, Designer of Kilmore<\/p><\/div>\n

McIntosh is a 39 year old Scotsman who lives with his Irish wife in Dublin.\u00a0 Trained as an engineer, McIntosh decided seven years ago to enroll in the European Institute of Golf Course Architect’s education program. \u00a0The EIGCA\u2019s website is candid about its students\u2019 prospects: \u00a0\u201cA career in golf course architecture,\u201d it notes \u201cis not easily obtainable.\u201d \u00a0That\u2019s putting it mildly. \u00a0The market for the services of golf course architects has been worse over the last six years than at any time since the Great Depression and WWII.\u00a0 As McIntosh notes, his \u201ctiming was not good.\u201d \u00a0Kilmore is his first project as lead designer, even though he was adapting a conceptual routing plan by Jim Engh, a prominent US designer who is also an overseas member of Carne.<\/span><\/p>\n

After laying out the front nine, Hackett had an area of roughly 160 acres still available for the back nine, most of it characterized by irregularly shaped dunes rising as much as fifty feet above the base grades. \u00a0He abandoned most of the southwestern third of this portion of the site, both because the terrain was difficult and because he had found a way to create a nine-hole circuit returning to the clubhouse without using it.\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

McIntosh\u2019s first challenge was the getaway hole, which he placed parallel to Hackett\u2019s 10<\/span>th<\/span><\/sup>.\u00a0 Both are par fives playing to the northwest which start with an uphill tee shot to a landing area that rises thirty feet are so above the tee.\u00a0 The fairways, in John Garrity\u2019s words, \u201cdisappear over the crest of the hill.\u201d\u00a0 Kilmore\u2019s new green is tucked against a dune, with a deep swale between it and the second shot landing area.\u00a0 <\/span>Playing as the 13<\/span>th<\/span><\/sup> hole in the Composite Course, the first of the Kilmore holes very much resembles Hackett\u2019s work, both in the character of the fairways and the location and shape of the green.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The second hole in the Kilmore nine, like the second in Hackett\u2019s front, is a par 3.\u00a0 As a general rule, architects like to avoid par 3 second holes because they slow down play, but on a course like Carne, such considerations are irrelevant, for several reasons.\u00a0 First, members at Carne (the Belmullet Golf Club) play fast and don\u2019t obsess over stroke scores. \u00a0They\u2019re not going to grind out a triple bogey after a poor tee shot. Second, because Carne\u2019s layout was driven above all by the inherent limitations of the site, which meant starting by identifying a series of linkable green locations, putting a hole where it fit best had priority over other elements, such as proximity of greens to the following tee.\u00a0 And finally, the whole point of links golf is to defy any strict principles of design to create a course that is challenging, fits the site and does as it pleases.\u00a0 So a par three second is not only acceptable, it\u2019s welcome.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Kilmore second has an elevated tee with a panoramic view providing an excellent portrait of the scale of Carne\u2019s dunes.\u00a0 The size of its very large green is disguised by the heft of the dunes surrounding it, and by the green\u2019s relative flatness, which compresses perspective.\u00a0 Depending on where the cup is cut, the green offers at least a four-club flexibility on this 165 meter hole, and that doesn\u2019t account for the effect of wind.\u00a0 I can imagine hitting anything from a wedge to a driver on this hole, making it the epitome of a links par three.\u00a0\u00a0 Just over a relatively subtle hillock on the front right of the green is a large, deep, totally terrifying bunker hidden from the tee.\u00a0\u00a0 The hole reminds me of the second at Oregon\u2019s Bandon Trails, which has a large partially hidden bunker on the right side of the green.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The Kilmore third is a short par four, similar in length to the 11<\/span>th<\/span><\/sup> on the Hackett, but with a clearer path to the hole.\u00a0 <\/span>If the second at the Kilmore calls to mind Bandon Trails, the Hackett 11<\/span>th<\/span><\/sup> is reminiscent of the 8<\/span>th<\/span><\/sup> at Cypress Point, a short hole wrapped around a steep and imposing nose with a small shelved green hidden behind it.\u00a0 <\/span>As the crow flies, the distance from tee to green is about 320 meters, but the risks of taking the direct route are huge\u2014if you miss short, you\u2019re dead; if you miss long left, you\u2019re mortally wounded; if you miss right, you\u2019re lost.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The Kilmore third resembles the Hackett twelfth in character, and is the least definitive of the new holes and the most likely to evolve. Kilmore\u2019s fourth is the second and shortest of its three par 3s, playing at only 146 meters.\u00a0 It has a postage stamp green, with bunkers right and left.\u00a0 In the Composite Course, it\u2019s the preamble to the arduous finishing holes on the Hackett, the 17<\/span>th<\/span><\/sup>, Garrity\u2019s Moby Dick, and the 18<\/span>th<\/span><\/sup>, a tight double dogleg par 5 which descends like an angry snake back to the clubhouse.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Kilmore\u2019s fifth plays as number eight in the Composite Course, and is the sole hole of the new design that I felt was not quite in keeping with the overall character of Carne.\u00a0 The tee shot is excellent, with an accommodating fairway that swings left around an imposing dune.\u00a0 McIntosh decided to create a landing area from about the mid-point of the back side of this dune to invite players to take on the risk of a shot over the dune, rather than the prudent play out to the left and around the dune.\u00a0 The landing area created is steep unless the shot carries down onto the confluence of the left routing fairway with this alternative route.\u00a0 The risk of the heroic route is muted by this design.\u00a0 Good players will figure out quickly that they can cut off the dog leg with a great shot over the dune, but most players will only increase the probability of disaster assaying this route.\u00a0 I don\u2019t see anything wrong with a par 5 (and this is the second of the par 5s on the Kilmore, to balance the three par 3s) that requires a layup second.<\/span><\/p>\n

McIntosh explained the thinking behind this hole. \u201cI really want to see how it plays out over the next year or so,\u201d Ally explained in an email. \u201cMost of the hole was inherited but we left it in the routing and did some work on the mid-dune to make it more playable.\u00a0 The low road to the left would be ideal if a little wider but you work with what you’ve got. The bad-side to just leaving the left route is that the better player may just have a drive, 8-iron, 8-iron which is never ideal.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

A mid to high handicapper would be better served hitting a shot of 160 meters or so down the left side, leaving a third of perhaps 120 to the green.\u00a0 \u201cWe cleared the right route as much as possible,\u201d McIntosh explained, \u201cbecause in my experience there is nothing more frustrating than hitting what you think is a perfect blind shot to find out that you’ve lost your ball.\u201d But that\u2019s my point\u2014it should be an heroic shot, but it\u2019s made less so if the risk is largely removed.\u00a0 It\u2019s then just a quirky hole without the appeal of, for example, Hackett\u2019s 17, which requires perfection for par.<\/span><\/p>\n

McIntosh is open to modifying this hole, depending on how it\u2019s perceived and its effect on pace of play.\u00a0 \u201cThere is the option to grow this back in as semi-rough in future,\u201d he pointed out, \u201cif we find it is the default option. If it ends up 50\/50 then that is perfect in my book.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

He also noted that \u201ca bell will go in for people to ring prior to arriving on the green (as the hole isn’t really reachable in 2),\u201d which frankly gives me a chill.\u00a0\u00a0 A bell was recently installed on the par 5 fourth of the Hackett course, as the Chairman of Ennis Tourism, the affable Gerry Maguire, pointed out to me when we played the Hackett front nine.\u00a0 He was not fond of it.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Kilmore sixth is a short par 4 running parallel to the long par 5 13<\/span>th<\/span><\/sup> of the Hackett course.\u00a0 It runs almost directly up hill, and has an exquisitely placed pot bunker in the landing area.\u00a0 <\/span>The 7<\/span>th<\/span><\/sup> is the long par 3, playing at 209 meters.\u00a0 Playing almost level, 7 is a great single shot hole.\u00a0 8 and 9 on the Kilmore make the turn back toward home.\u00a0\u00a0 Both require precise tee shots, and are good, demanding holes, but not as difficult as Hackett\u2019s original 17 and 18.\u00a0 <\/span>The composite course makes good use of them as the 11<\/span>th<\/span><\/sup> and 12<\/span>th<\/span><\/sup> holes\u2014they fit well with the rhythm and pace of the Hackett holes.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Most of the tees and greens on the Kilmore were grassed with sod harvested on site rather than seeded.\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cWe were worried we’d lose the greens through wind and erosion if seeded,\u201d McIntosh said.\u00a0 \u201cHowever they are currently getting overseeded with fescue as per the original 18.\u201d\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Where the fairway surfaces were not modified, \u201cthey were mown out,\u201d McIntosh said, but they\u2019re now \u201cbeing topdressed and overseeded with fescue.\u201d\u00a0 The areas disturbed during construction were first stripped of the rough sod, which was laid back down after the grading was complete. \u201cThis was to initially stabilize the soil,\u201d McIntosh noted, and they are \u201cnow over-seeding with fescue and using the odd bit of Rescue to get rid of any rye grass.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Perhaps the most astonishing fact of the Kilmore\u2019s creation was its cost.\u00a0 The \u201cofficial budget,\u201d \u00a0according to McIntosh, was $200,000. \u00a0To put this in some perspective, $200,000 would have been less than the amount budgeted to build a single hole on a typical 18 hole course in the USA during the boom years.\u00a0 Kilmore\u2019s expenses were mostly for irrigation heads for the greens and tees and \u201csome small amounts of labor.\u201d\u00a0 Kilmore will continue to evolve, as all courses do, but its basic structure is sound, and the likelihood seems high to me that the Composite Course will establish itself as the most challenging for championship play, while the Hackett 18 will always command the loyalty and affection of the original members of the Belmullet Club and Erris Tourism, the custodians of the strapping, merciless, and beguiling Carne Golf Links.<\/span><\/p>\n

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