Text and photos by Scott Simpson

 

The second part of a review of some of England’s great courses by one of our readers, a lover of the links courses of the British Isles.

 

        Because of the wide variety of golf available in the Merseyside area, we were able to park ourselves for an unusually extended period, 11 restful nights, at the comfortable and welcoming Waterford Hotel in the seaside resort of Southport.  An attractive town of approximately 100,000 permanent residents, Southport is best known for its Victorian architecture, extensive tree plantings and tony shopping, but I'd be remiss if I didn't mention that it is also home to the famed British Lawn Mower Museum.

        Located some 15 miles north of Liverpool, Southport offers some obviously compelling attributes for the traveling golfer, including ease of access (it’s some 90 minutes form Manchester Airport), a wide range of lodging and dining options and, perhaps, the largest cluster of top-tier links course within driving distance of each other (though both the Ayrshire Coast and East Lothian regions of Scotland have compelling cases as well).

        Any discussion of golf in the Southport area starts with the three Royals -- Royal Birkdale, Royal Liverpool (more colloquially referred to as Hoylake) and Royal Lytham & St. Anne.  Each are currently in the British Open rota.  While both Hoylake and Lytham

are no more than 15 to 20 miles from Southport, both require a full 90-minute drive during a typical weekday morning, as the routes are mostly on local roads, a fair portion of which is spent in neutral watching children board school busses.  Hoylake and Lytham are similar in many respects, both built on essentially flat land, with the most interesting holes located at the outer reaches of the courses as they all-too briefly enter the dunes at the nearest point to the Irish Sea.  They remain stern tests of golf due to, principally, the strategic placement of deep pot bunkers and the ever-present wind, but they lack the visual eye candy of the great courses of Scotland and Ireland.  They are both also victims of the encroachment of civilization, as their aesthetics are marred by none-too-attractive red brick housing and other structures close to the field of play.

        Hoylake includes an unusual feature that will surprise and likely annoy the first-time visitor, the existence of internal out-of bounds.  Interestingly, the severity of Hoylake has been significantly tempered over the years as the two most severe, and potentially unfair, conditions have been eliminated.  Hoylake’s 7^th hole, Dowie, one of the most famous one-shotters in the world, is named for the club’s first captain and used to feature out-of-bounds just to the left of the triangular green.  Because a ball pulled even the slightest bit left could readily hop over the cop, a low grass wall demarcating the boundary, most players would inevitably bail out far to the right.  It was decided to consider this area in play for the 1967 Open and has remained so since.

The Royal Liverpool clubhouse looking back from the first fairway.  At left is the cop, a low grass wall demarcating the internal out-of-bounds.

 

        The second hole that has been changed is the 17^th, known as Royal (the Royal Hotel sits right across the road), where the green originally sat at the corner of the property, resulting in many approach shots leaving the yard.  Due to the club’s concerns regarding liability, architect Donald Steel was hired to site a new green some 30 yards from the property line.  Notwithstanding the changes above, there remain several holes affected by the internal out-of bounds.  The most interesting of these may be the 16^th, a potentially reachable par 5 where the most direct line off the tee will require the second shot to be played over the out-of-bounds practice ground.  Hoylake disappeared from the Open rota after the 1967 tournament due to the lack of space for parking and amenities, but it returned in 2006 after the club was able to acquire an adjacent parcel.  Hoylake will again host the Open in 2014.

Top, the author’s dilemma on the short Par 4 9^th (Punch Bowl) at Hoylake (Royal Liverpool), where a great drive has left him with only bad options.  He can either try to hit a soft pitch from the incredibly firm turf, and inevitably skull it, or putt safely to the right and leave himself a 12-15 footer for birdie.  Welcome to links golf!  Below, the beautiful 11th green at Hoylake (the hole is named Alps).  This stretch of holes through the dunes, at the far end of the property closest to the Irish Sea, is quite beautiful but is out of character with the flat terrain of the bulk of the course.

 

        Lytham is the more straightforward of the two, and to our mind the more charming.  But links golf is never without its eccentricities, and Lytham is no exception.  The course starts with an opening par 3, and in its most recent Open in 2001, this eccentricity facilitated Ian Woosnam’s unfortunate two-shot penalty for having a second driver in his bag.  Had the opener been a more traditional driving hole, the oversight would inevitably have been noticed before the penalty was assessed.

The short but treacherous 9th at Royal Lytham, playing only 165 yards from the tips.  With a wedge or 9 iron in hand, the player merely has to hit the ball straight and on the exact number (merely).  The hole offers the classic links dilemma:  Put the ball in the air and challenge the wind, or flight it low with the knowledge that you must carry it the precise distance to stop it on the firm turf.  Unfortunately, most of the structures adjoining the rest of the course are not as attractive as the one behind #9.

 

        The other notable quirk at Lytham is that the clubhouse, which abuts the back of the extremely deep 18^th green, is in play -- i.e. no relief is granted for stance or swing.  In playing to a back pin, the player must be extremely careful not to overclub (or, dare I say out loud, thin it).  Gary Player famously hit his approach shot through the green and played his third backhanded while facing the clubhouse in closing out his Open victory in 1974.  The Open will return to Lytham in 2012.

The author's bride and her caddy approaching her ball just short of the 18^th green at Lytham.  Because of the firm turf, it is very easy to run a ball through the green and have the clubhouse, which is in play, affect your next shot.

 

         Lytham and Hoylake also share a connection to Bobby Jones.  Jones won the first of his three Open Championships at Lytham in 1926 by virtue of a dramatic shot on the 17^th hole in the final round.  Tied for the lead, his tee shot found an unkempt bunker to the left of the fairway some 175 yards from the green.  The shot played into the wind and he was unable to see the green due to large gorse bushes that ran the entire distance.  With his opponent already on the front of the putting surface, Jones gambled and played a remarkable mashie (equivalent to a 3 or 4 iron, but remember they were still in the era of hickory shafts), making the green and rattling his opponent into a three-putt.  The club he used is on display in the Lytham clubhouse and it looks more like something you’d toss on the beach for your dog to fetch.  Jones also won the Open at Hoylake in 1930, the second leg that year of his historic Grand Slam.

Next:  Royal Birkdale and other Southport gems

Editor’s Note:  Golf Community Reviews reader Scott Simpson has made repeated visits to the British Isles to play links golf.  After a recent trip, I asked him to contribute some thoughts about the glories of golf by the sea and to describe his recent rounds in the Isles.  Below are his thoughts about the glories of links golf; we will share his thoughts on some of the best known courses in England, as well as his photos, in coming days.

 

        Since my first trip to Scotland in 1979, I’ve been obsessed with links golf, to the extent that I’ve returned to Scotland five times since in addition to three trips to Ireland.  As the addict would say, I can quit at any time…

         For those only vaguely familiar with the term, “links golf” refers to a very specific variant of the game that is found only on seaside courses in the British Isles and Ireland.  The British Golf Museum defines linksland this way:

        A stretch of land near the coast on which the game is played, characterized by undulating terrain, often associated with dunes, infertile sandy soil, and indigenous grasses such as marram, sea lyme, and the fescues and bents which, when properly managed, produce the fine, textured, tight turf for which links are famed.

        To add some color to this accurate, if somewhat clinical, definition, let me quote from “To the Linksland,” Sports Illustrated columnist Michael Bamberger’s homage to Scotland:

        Do you know what I mean when I say linksland? Linksland is the old Scottish word for the earth at the edge of the sea — tumbling, duney, sandy, covered by beach grasses.  When the light hits it, and the breeze sweeps over it, you get every shade of green and brown, and always, in the distance, is the water.  The land was long considered worthless, except to the shepherds and their sheep and the rabbits, and to the early golfers. You see, the game comes out of the ocean, just like man himself!

        There’s a primal quality to the best of these links, a knowledge that people have been playing them for hundreds of years, and that the land has been largely untouched by human hands.  There’s also a remote feel as you find yourself walking amongst the dunes, often times in spots where you can’t see another golf hole or evidence of mankind’s existence.  Because of the specifics of this unique terrain, the game is played differently.  If you’ve watched a British Open on television, you’ll be familiar with the effects of wind and the importance of avoiding the punitive pot bunkers.  First-time visitors are most surprised by the firmness of the turf and its affect on the game.  There’s an obvious thrill in the ability to play low, boring shots that will run forever, but many an expletive has been uttered at the difficulty of playing a soft pitch off the incredibly tight lies.

 

 

The author tries on a Royal Lytham bunker for size.  Fortunately, his ball was not actually in the bunker; otherwise, he says, he might still be there.

 

        Those of us who have become hooked on links golf appreciate that it offers a range of options to the player, both in terms of the type of shot played and the line to the green, in sharp contrast to the more one-dimensional point-to-point golf inherent in parkland golf.   In addition to the stark physical beauty of the links, the very changeability of the conditions makes it endlessly absorbing.  From day-to-day, sometimes hour-to-hour, the golf course changes its look, its feel and the demands it makes of players.  When possible I try to schedule multiple rounds on a given course, partially as weather insurance (you might have heard that the weather in the British Isles can be, let’s be charitable, memorable) but also because the changed conditions invariably result in a completely altered playing experience.

        While we could happily return to Scotland and Ireland every year, my wife Theresa has extended family, some of whom are quite elderly, in England.  Being a selfless and devoted husband, I insisted that it was long past time for her to pay them a visit.  I assure all that the ability to combine this family time with a visit to the highly-regarded cluster of renowned links courses on the Northwest coast of England, known in the tourist trade as England’s Golf Coast, was the merest of considerations.

        Next:  Royal Liverpool (Hoylake) and Royal Lytham & St. Anne.

 

        Scott Simpson is an avid golfer with a longstanding love of links golf.  In those few hours not spent on a golf course, Scott is an investment banker focusing on middle-market mergers and acquisitions.  A member of Willow Ridge Country Club north of New York City, Scott makes his home in Westchester County with his wife Theresa, a first generation County Mayo girl (as if he needed further motivation to visit Ireland).  The name notwithstanding, Scott has yet to win his first U.S. Open.  He says that, with a handicap of 9, “it is very difficult to make a living.”