Best Course / Worse Course

HughJars said:
Best Course: Boat of Garten. The setting, simply stunning in the heart of the Cairngorms, you can be playing on a hot summer's day and still look up at snow. Course always in fabulous condition, and only one weak hole on the course, the rather ludicrous 15th (I may give the first a meh as well), all at a decent price.

Worst Course: Westhill. Everything about it. The course, the appalling state of it, doesn't have a single good hole, half of them on the side of a hill. The cavernous barn of a clubhouse in totally the wrong location, and the complete lack of practice facilities.
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I take it that isn't WestHill in Surrey?
 
Even though I've only played it once in very stormy conditions, my vote for top course is Muirfield. Despite the weather the class shone through. I'd love to go back in better weather.

"Worst" is harder to pick as for example some of the remote 9 hole courses are in dodgy condition (as the greens staff are literally a few sheep and a dog), but they are huge fun nonetheless. If I have to pick one I need never play again it would be Redhill and Reigate, dull, poor condition and slow. At least it was in the early 90s when I lived there - hopefully it is much improved.
 
Best - haven't played a vast amount of courses but my favourites have probably been Richings Park, Grims Dyke and Aldenham.

Worst - we lot a lot of cheap courses. None so bad that we wouldn't return. Ruislip I find very boring, and flat, and a couple of times the greens were not in the best nick. But as I say, I'm happy to hack my way round anywhere that's local and cheap really. :lol:
 
Best Royal County Down, very closely followed by Turnberry.

Haven't really got a worse course, but not a fan of The Duchess at Woburn. Too many trees for me.:mad: I do like the Marquess though.
 
Best course is hard to pick as so many I like and enjoyed or thought of as good quality.

Worst is also pretty hard as I have had few awful experiences multiple times.

I have played some courses that one time have been in the best category and the next in the worst.
 
Best course either RCD or Turnberry or The Old course (I cant separate them)

But the most enjoyable course North Berwick by a mile

The worst for me is Laughterton middle course but it was one that I learnt to play on, its a field with 18 flags on it but it did the job well.
 
Best is difficult, but probably Ganton.

Worst is probably Sawdon, a field with five greens in it, with fairways marked out with Pine trees
Can't say it's a bad course, but I was disappointed by North Manchester GC, it just didn't feel like a fair test to me.

sawdon.jpg
 
Best - too many to mention

Worst - how do you define it? Location, condition, layout or it could be something else. I played a course in Wales 2 weeks ago (Llanwern) and some of the holes were just unfair because of the slopes across some of the fairways. One hole for instance, downhill, dog-leg right par 4, and the fairway sloped from right to left. I hit a good tee shot with fade that bounced in the right semi rough. I found my ball in the rough behind a tree on the left side of the hole and was blocked out from seeing the green. That just should not happen, good shots should not be penalised, but this course has a few holes like that. One of the par 3's was just ridiculous, very short and uphill and two other holes had priority before you could play your ball from the tee. The 16th and 17th holes had cross overs so it was like bomb alley and could be dangerous if you are not alert. Add to that the trains going past every 5 or 10 minutes just the other side of the fence made it not very enjoyable at all.
 
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Orikoru said:
Best - haven't played a vast amount of courses but my favourites have probably been Richings Park, Grims Dyke and Aldenham.

Worst - we lot a lot of cheap courses. None so bad that we wouldn't return. Ruislip I find very boring, and flat, and a couple of times the greens were not in the best nick. But as I say, I'm happy to hack my way round anywhere that's local and cheap really. :lol:
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Your favourites are on my worst list! Amongst many others though.
 
Best was a course called the Legacy in Port St Lucie in Florida. It's a private members club that I was allowed to play as I was staying at the Sheraton nearby. I now know what proper Millionaires golf is really like and I only paid $30 !!!.

The course was stunningly prepared. Fairways and greens were immaculate. And I had the whole course to myself, didn't see another player the whole time. And to top all that my game was on song that day, shot really low if I remember correctly.

Worse, I can't remember the name of the course but it was in Scottsdale, Arizona. It was a muni and was in awful condition and was covered in goose crap.

Had a right laugh though as I was paired up with what I can only describe as a couple of rednecks. It was a bit odd at first as they didn't know what to make of me but after a few holes the banter started going and we basically took the p*ss out of each other all the way round. It was just fall down hilarious at times. Ironically was probably one of the most fun rounds I think I've ever played despite the course.
 
srixon 1 said:
Worst - how do you define it? Location, condition, layout or it could be something else.
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For me it's layout, then condition, and everything else is way behind.

Very few clubs can overcome a weak course.

Hmm, though, a good course in awful condition would also be one I wouldn't go back to. But, you can cure bad conditioning, you rarely have the land and money to cure a bad layout.
 
HughJars said:
Hmm, though, a good course in awful condition would also be one I wouldn't go back to. But, you can cure bad conditioning, you rarely have the land and money to cure a bad layout.
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Raven Hall in Ravenscar is one of those for me, absolutely beautiful. potentially brilliant short 9 hole on the cliffs. Just poorly maintained and presented
 
HughJars said:
For me it's layout, then condition, and everything else is way behind.

Very few clubs can overcome a weak course.

Hmm, though, a good course in awful condition would also be one I wouldn't go back to. But, you can cure bad conditioning, you rarely have the land and money to cure a bad layout.
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I think flow of a course is very important.

Another I would put on my bad list is Dougalston in Milngavie, north of Glasgow.

Absolutely loads of trees, which make the course extremely tight and in many cases it's a lost ball if you hit into them due to the leaves. Ok, so that's just the type of course it is... albeit likely the trees were much less of a factor when the designer layed out the course originally.

But that layout is pretty bad with massive walks from green to the next tee, and a few holes on the back 9 where you exit the woodland path and still have a 50m walk up the side of the fairway to the tee.

Not a pleasure to play at all. Many of the holes are enjoyable and the condition is great, but not one I would wish to play every week.
 
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