Links Or Parkland?

[allin]

I have played several, once in Oregon and a couple times in Nebraska, not Sandhills though. I hit the ball fairly low and below average distances, I am not a great iron player but hit my fairway woods well and putt decently. I lack distance so parkland courses which reward high spin and maximum carry play more difficult for me. FWIW I think a lot of the links courses in Europe irrigate a lot more than in the past so maybe don't play as firm as they used to.

[James_Black]

Originally Posted by allin

I have played several, once in Oregon and a couple times in Nebraska, not Sandhills though. I hit the ball fairly low and below average distances, I am not a great iron player but hit my fairway woods well and putt decently. I lack distance so parkland courses which reward high spin and maximum carry play more difficult for me. FWIW I think a lot of the links courses in Europe irrigate a lot more than in the past so maybe don't play as firm as they used to.

The course I posted a picture of is a proper links course.
Rock hard fairways and greens.

American courses maybe play a little softer though

[VOX]

Originally Posted by SQ Bimmer

Yea, rated 2nd best course for under $50, has to be a little more pretty to keep up with that. I guarantee you though, the fairways and greens are hard as rocks! I never drive the ball 300+!

There seems to be some confusion about links fairways. They are not "hard" as in hardpan or concrete. They are "firm" (like hitting off berber carpeting). The soil is very sandy and so it drains exceptionally well.

Links, by definition, are seaside. Not all seaside courses are links, but all links are seaside.

[SQ Bimmer]

Originally Posted by VOX

There seems to be some confusion about links fairways. They are not "hard" as in hardpan or concrete. They are "firm" (like hitting off berber carpeting). The soil is very sandy and so it drains exceptionally well.

Links, by definition, are seaside. Not all seaside courses are links, but all links are seaside.

Sorry for using a different adjective than you, but based off of your description, I would say we are talking about similar turf conditions and that I am not confused at all.

And I don't think all links courses have to be seaside. We have a lot of sand and a lot of wind in select parts of this state.

[VOX]

Sorry if I offended you, I was put off by the expression "hard as rocks!".

If links don't have to be seaside, then why are they called "links". As I understand it the term allies to a strip of non-aerable sandy soil that "links" pasture land to the sea. Some also insist that all true links are a single loop of 9 holes out and 9 holes back.

[tjy355]

I think the "hard as rocks" perception grows from the unfortunate tendency for most American courses to be soft and over-watered. In an attempt to maintain the wall-to-wall green everybody thinks a golf course should look like (some call it the Augusta Syndrome), American golf has evolved into a one dimensional game involving a strict aerial assault. Bomb and gouge. When today's golfer encounters a firm and fast golf course, it is so unfamiliar and uncomfortable that that a negative image is conjured, thus the metaphoric description "hard as a rock."

I consider the term "links" to be one of the more misapplied descriptions in golf. True links land is only found only next to the sea and there are very few such golf courses to be found in the USA. That said, golf courses can be built and maintained with what I call "links sensibilities."

While I have never played a true links course, I'm growing to like more and more, the links style golf. Firm turf conditions that allow shot options primarily. Open spaces that allow the wind to be a factor. Less reliance on water hazards and trees to dictate the play.

A mention of Rustic Canyon was made in an earlier post. No way a true links, Rustic does present the links aesthetic. It is so different from the typical American golf course but a total BLAST to play and I highly recommend anyone with the chance to play it get out there and experience it.

Links or parkland? I think both have their place. I just wish more courses were maintained with a little more "links sensibility."

[ctyankee]

Originally Posted by tjy355

I think the "hard as rocks" perception grows from the unfortunate tendency for most American courses to be soft and over-watered. In an attempt to maintain the wall-to-wall green everybody thinks a golf course should look like (some call it the Augusta Syndrome), American golf has evolved into a one dimensional game involving a strict aerial assault. Bomb and gouge. When today's golfer encounters a firm and fast golf course, it is so unfamiliar and uncomfortable that that a negative image is conjured, thus the metaphoric description "hard as a rock."

I consider the term "links" to be one of the more misapplied descriptions in golf. True links land is only found only next to the sea and there are very few such golf courses to be found in the USA. That said, golf courses can be built and maintained with what I call "links sensibilities."

While I have never played a true links course, I'm growing to like more and more, the links style golf. Firm turf conditions that allow shot options primarily. Open spaces that allow the wind to be a factor. Less reliance on water hazards and trees to dictate the play.

A mention of Rustic Canyon was made in an earlier post. No way a true links, Rustic does present the links aesthetic. It is so different from the typical American golf course but a total BLAST to play and I highly recommend anyone with the chance to play it get out there and experience it.

Links or parkland? I think both have their place. I just wish more courses were maintained with a little more "links sensibility."

Well said. I sometimes use the phrase link-styled course as I don't want to get hung up on some lofty standard that misses the forest for the trees. That said I don't buy into the "hard as a rock" attribute. If someone were to say harder than soft American fairways ... no problem. But, most link-styled courses have sandy soil and most get a lot a rain, hardly conducive to rock hard fairways or greens.

[Prairie Golfer]

I've never played a links course, but I like both options far more than the "TPC of Housing Development" style courses.

[sabram]

As has been indicated by a few previous posters, unless they've been to the UK or Ireland, most Americans have never played a links course and many of them don't know what a links is. There are only approx 200 true links in the world and the vast majority are in the UK and Ireland. Most US courses that people think are links, don't even approximate a links. Even courses that look like a links (such as Whistling Straits) don't play like a links. This will be a long post, but every golf fan should have a better idea of what constitutes a links.

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

The following is excerpted from an article by George Peper:
This [links] soil wasn’t rich enough to sustain crops, but it was ideal for grazing. At the same time, the animals burrowed and scraped into the leeward sides of the dunes, creating blowouts that the wind enlarged into sand pits—bunkers. Starting six hundred years ago, in and around the towns of Scotland’s east coast—from Dornoch in the far north down through St. Andrews to Leith and Musselburgh in the south—people began to play golf in this dunescape, developing and evolving holes over the centuries. Thus the first links were born. In the words of Sir Guy Campbell, author of A History of Golf in Britain (1952), “nature was their architect, beast and man her contractors.”
Now, there are those who feel the current definition is too broad, that a true links should meet more stringent criteria, like:

1. It should be alongside a river estuary.

2. It should offer at least partial or occasional views of the sea.

3. It should have few if any trees.

4. It should have numerous bunkers.

5. Its two nines should be routed out and back, the front heading to a far point and the back returning to the clubhouse, in the general manner of the Old Course.

These are all fair points. Under such standards, however, numerous venerable [links] courses fall off the list. Turnberry has no neighborhood estuary; Royal Birkdale is near, but has zero views of the sea; Carnoustie has numerous tall trees; Royal Portrush has few bunkers; and Muirfield’s 9th hole returns smack to the clubhouse.
Indeed, an argument can be made for relaxing rather than tightening the definition of a links, based on how it plays. And links, to be sure, play differently from all other courses.

Qualities of linksSince the original links just unfolded on the terrain—they weren’t sculpted like today’s courses—there’s little in the way of definition. Bunkers frame few fairways and greens, and dogleg holes are uncommon. The terrain is raw and erose, full of blind shots, hilly lies, deep pits of sand and steep slopes clogged with snagging shrubs.

Because linksland is sand based, it has a wonderfully pliant quality. Somehow soft and firm at the same time, it’s easy on the legs and yields just the right amount to the blade of a well-struck iron. As five-time Open champion Peter Thomson has said, “The thrill of squeezing a ball against the firm turf, trying to keep it low into a buffeting wind, is something that lingers in the mind forever.”

The firm ground also allows for long drives, especially downwind. But accuracy quickly becomes an issue—a powerful poke that bounds through the fairway into thick grass or sand brings no advantage. Even from an ideal lie in the fairway, approaching the firm greens is a challenge. Said Bernard Darwin, “In its most charitable mood, the ground never helps the player, and that is an immense virtue. When the ground is hard, it is not merely unhelpful but ‘aye fechtin’ against ye.’”

The firmness of the fairways and greens is the legendary links’ last defense against today’s power players. Tiger Woods recognized the challenge last year at sun-baked Hoylake, where he staged a clinic in intelligent golf, using irons off most tees to avoid the bunkers and rough, and accepting long birdie putts rather than firing at pins he knew he had little chance of approximating. Precision, not power, prevails on a links.

For us mortals, it’s about establishing our ground game—running the ball in with a mid-iron or utility club from 60 yards or so rather than wedging it, and putting from well off the green.


Choices abound
Fundamentally, links golf is about options. In contrast with parkland golf, where a poor shot into water or trees takes you out of the hole, on links courses there is almost always a way—sometimes three or four. As Henry Longhurst wrote of the Old Course, “On every shot, whether a short pitch or a full drive, you must step back and say, ‘Wait a minute, what exactly do I want to do here.’”

Options, choices, decisions. Bobby Jones, one of the first Americans to sing the praises of links golf, said, “There is always some little favor of wind or terrain waiting for the man who has judgment enough to use it, and there is a little feeling of triumph, a thrill that comes with the knowledge of having done a thing well, when a puzzling hole has been conquered by something other than mechanical skill.”

There is no truer test of one’s game—or oneself [than playing golf on a links course].

The following is excerpted from an article called "Recipe for a Links" by golf course architect Gil Hanse who, among other thinhgs, designed one of the few recent links courses in Scotland at Crail.

WindWind is the greatest variable in the design of a links, and it is certainly not lacking at our site. The dreaded “prevailing wind” is a term we have grown to both love and hate. This wind’s direction refuses to be ignored; The truth is that the wind changes constantly. Such is the importance of wind that we must construct holes that will work in a three-club tailwind, headwind and crosswind.
One such hole is our 18th, a downhill par 5 that plays into the prevailing wind (left). Taking into account the angles of play for the second shot, as well as the contours, the green can accommodate a wide variety of wind conditions.
I have attempted to provide for this by offering width off of the tee corresponding with preferred angles of attack for any wind condition. The green approaches have also been prepared with varied wind conditions in mind and are generally free of any required carries. This should allow run-up shots to be played through and over a set of contours that will provide challenges under a variety of conditions.

SandAt the base of all true links courses is the one constant, the free-draining nature of sand. One of the fundamental needs of the site selection was sandy soil,

TurfThere is nothing like true, tight links turf. Since links golf does not truly begin until the ball hits the ground, a tight sward of velvety fescue turf is our conduit for those skittering, careening and bounding shots you can only find on a true links. The fine blades of fescue can knit more closely and provide less friction to the ball on the ground. Fescue also offers tight lies that exaggerate the differences between well and perfectly struck shots, with the results quite apparent to the golfer. Links turf also promotes a wide variety of shots that we would never attempt at home on our lush courses. The joyful bump and run, Texas wedge, even 80-yard putts are best sampled on the backs of fescue-covered fairways, approaches and greens.

ContoursI would be lying if I did not say that as an architect I find the contour of the ground the most fascinating aspect of links golf. Every preceding ingredient is necessary to highlight the contours, but within these elevations the magic of links golf emerges. On a links, the best path between the ball and the hole is rarely a straight, high one, even to a flag clearly within view. A shot that lands away from the target and is propelled the rest of the way along the ground like a pinball by the heaving land is the essence of links golf.