Nick Schaan works side by side with architect David McLay Kidd out of their offices in Bend, Ore. Kidd is one of the most esteemed and decorated designers in the business over the last 25 years, and since 2006 Schaan has been instrumental in bringing to life acclaimed courses like Tributary, Mammoth Dunes and the new GrayBull course in the Sand Hills of Nebraska.

Schaan joins Golf Digest architecture editor Derek Duncan to discuss GrayBull, making the new course at Gamble Sands different than the first, flying with Kidd as he pilots his private plane, the mastery of Pete Dye, the challenge of building Huntsman Springs (now Tributary), advancing their concept of “playability,” how they routed GrayBull and his thoughts on what the next generation of architects need to do to inherit the torch from Kidd and his peers.

Photos: Above, Gamble Sands’ 17th (Brian Oar); Main page, GrayBull’s 11th.

Outro song: “Wishlist,” Pearl Jam.

Watch Derek Duncan break down The Postage Stamp at Royal Troon.

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Mike Cocking is the “C” in the Australian golf design firm OCM. His partners are former tour player and 2006 U.S. Open champion Geoff Ogilvy and Ashley Mead. The trio have built courses in Australia and Asia and consult with some of the top historic clubs Down Under including Victoria and Kingston Heath. Over the last five years they’ve gained a foothold in the U.S. as well, beginning with the renovation of Shady Oaks in Fort Worth and more recently executed the radical reconception of the famous #3 course at Medinah outside Chicago. They have new projects, too, including the Fall Line in central Georgia, Tepetonka in Minnesota and a course near Austin.

Cocking joins the Feed the Ball podcast to discuss how OCM broke ground in the states, the influence of Alister MacKenzie in Sand Belt golf, caddie culture, the insurmountable cost of building affordable public golf, the DNA of Sand Belt golf, the rare privilege of routing courses, the role of aesthetics in perceptions of greatness and the concept behind the revamping of Medinah.

Photos: Main Page, Victoria Golf Club (Gary Lisbon); Above, Medinah #3 (Medinah C.C.)

Outro song: Modest Mouse, Sunspots in the House of the Late Scapegoat

Watch Derek Duncan break down The Postage Stamp at Royal Troon.

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Golf course builder Allan MacCurrach began working on crews for Pete Dye in the late 1970s and opened his own golf course contracting company in 1987. He’s been involved in building or remodeling over 20 courses for Dye, who passed away in early 2020, as well as architects like Tom Fazio, Bobby Weed and Rees Jones. MacCurrach is also responsible for constructing–and designing, through interpretation of the numerous conversations and planning sessions he had with Dye —The Dye Course at White Oak, Golf Digest’s Best New Private Course of 2022. White Oak, located near Jacksonville on the Florida/Georgia border, is extremely private and is played only occasionally by its billionaire owner, his few guests and select Golf Digest panelists.

MacCurrach joins the Feed the Ball podcast to talk about his involvement in the White Oak project, creating something distinctive on a non-distinctive site, the opportunity and challenge of attempting to carry out Dye’s design directives after Dye could no longer participate in the construction, the evolution of Dye’s green contours as a reaction to higher green speeds, how the golf course building business has changed to a renovation business and the artistic and engineering genius of the original TPC Sawgrass design.

Photos: Cover page–The 16th hole at The Dye Course at White Oak (Brian Oar); Above–White Oak’s par 3 17th (Brian Oar).

See more White Oak photos and flyovers here.

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Peter Kessler was the face and voice of the Golf Channel when the station first went live in 1995. Over the next seven years he commanded the show, mastering ceremonies and interviewing virtually every important figure in golf and instruction. In the course of that time period, and for years following hosting his show on Sirius XM’s PGA TOUR channel, Kessler has intersected with virtually everyone in the game of golf, old and new.

In part 1, he joins the podcast for an entertaining discussion leading into the Masters about how to project a winner, what happened during the infamous interview with Arnold Palmer over the non-conforming Callaway ERC II driver, trying to understand the bewildering argument behind the resistance to bifurcation, how ad dollars influence the way the media addresses the distance and technology debate, and a question about why golf can’t limit the ball flight the way tennis slowed its ball. [Note: this talk took place the Friday prior to Masters week.]

(photo: Stephen Szurlej)

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Listen here to Derek Duncan discuss Tom Coyne’s “A Course Called Ireland” with hosts Rod Morri and Adrian Logue of the iSeekGolf Podcast.

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Brad Klein has been one of the media’s foremost authorities on golf course architecture since he began writing for Golfweek Magazine in 1988. He created that publication’s highly influential ranking of America’s 100 greatest modern and classic courses, and he recently, after 30 years, moved on to a new position with Golf Advisor and the Golf Channel.

Klein joined Derek Duncan on the podcast to share his thoughts on the sadness of sitting in airports on Saturday nights, life as a college activist in the ’70’s, life as a part-time caddie on the PGA Tour, having an outsider’s view on the calamitous overbuilding of the 1990’s and the insidious nature of the game of golf being run as a business, the absence of frank commentary in the media, loop golf courses, the honor of being threatened by Donald Trump, the short and ugly lives of Golden Age courses and what the next decade or so realistically looks like for golf design.

Listen here to Derek Duncan discuss Tom Coyne’s “A Course Called Ireland” with hosts Rod Morri and Adrian Logue of the iSeekGolf Podcast.

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Keith Cutten is an integral player in golf design’s next generation who has worked alongside a variety of architects including Bill Coore, Jeff Mingay, Doug Carrick and, most importantly, his mentor Rod Whitman shaping features, drafting plans, developing budgets and running job sites. He’s also one of the leading young historians on golf course design and expects to publish a book, “The Evolution of Golf Course Architecture” later this year.

He joins Derek Duncan to talk about the kinds of things Bill Coore might like as a gift, Canadian architects, the Dark Ages of architecture, why design styles changed after World War II and how architecture moved from the field into the office, the continual effort to combat technology with design, the effect of television on the increased presence of water hazards, the deleterious effect of advanced irrigation, Horace Hutchinson and the influence of the British Arts & Craft movement on Golden Age architecture and the possibility of Mammoth Dunes being the apotheosis (and final chapter) in the width/minimalist movement as we know it.

Listen here to Derek Duncan discuss Tom Coyne’s “A Course Called Ireland” with hosts Rod Morri and Adrian Logue of the iSeekGolf Podcast.

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Ian Andrew is one of golf’s most respected restoration and preservation specialists, working principally on Golden Age courses in Canada. He has few peers when it comes to observation and the analysis of golf course architecture, and he rarely shies from expressing candid opinions on the state of the game. His writings can be found in numerous magazines as well as online (ianandrewsgolfdesignblog.blogspot.com and thecaddyshack.blogspot.com) and a book on five of Stanley Thompson’s greatest courses is expected later this year.

Andrew joins the Feed the Ball podcast to talk about whether we’re taking the correct view of the “Second Golden Age” of architecture, how it’s difficult to find surprises in modern design, the trap of the “Prairie Dunes” aesthetic, the need for complete conviction in art, his idea for a third course at Sand Valley, the chase to design a sub-par-70 course, whether we’ve reached the end of the age of restoration, who he would choose to grass a golf course over anybody else in the business and who his Spidey-sense tells him might be the next great architect.

Listen here to Derek Duncan discuss Tom Coyne’s “A Course Called Ireland” with hosts Rod Morri and Adrian Logue of the iSeekGolf Podcast.

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Mike DeVries belongs to an elite class of golf architects working today who have been fortunate to work on properties that qualify as some of the best sites golf has seen since the 1920’s. His jaw-dropping design at Cape Wichkam Links on Kings Island in Tasmania, with wide holes rolling along the rocky ocean shore, stretching along high headlands and rumbling through interior sand dunes has rocketed into the world top 100 since opening in 2015.

DeVries sits down with Feed the Ball to discuss the wonderful provocations of Pete Dye, the devastating effect of higher green speeds, working long summer days at Crystal Downs, the “billion” holes that existed on the Cape Wickham property, which hole at Wickham he thinks is one of the coolest in the world, working with a young Tom Doak, the skills of Tom Fazio, not being a member of the ASGCA, owning one of the rare original Sand Hills t-shirts, and the person to whom he’s passing the crown of “most underrated architect.”

Listen here to Derek Duncan discuss Tom Coyne’s “A Course Called Ireland” with hosts Rod Morri and Adrian Logue of the iSeekGolf Podcast.

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Dr. Michael Hurdzan was on golf’s center stage the summer of 2017 during the U.S. Open, contested at Erin Hills, the giant, rambling meadow course he designed with then partner Dana Fry and Ron Whitten. It was a well-deserved moment for the architect known as much for building some of the most artistically voluptuous courses in the U.S. as for his nearly bottomless knowledge of golf, its history, equipment, construction methods and turf science.

Hurdzan joins the Feed the Ball podcast for a discussion that touches on his career, the future of golf design in China (Chinese architects?), the surprising sophistication of building courses with horses, how military tanks influenced golf design, serving in the chemical corps during the Vietnam War, how an architect can game the rating systems, how Erin Hills was intended to be a $50 “poor man’s Whistling Straits,” growing up in Columbus in the time of Jack Nicklaus, having Jack as a collaborator at Scioto and the virtues of being a golf course “plumber.”

(Photo, Shelter Harbor by Larry Lambrecht)

Listen here to Derek Duncan discuss Tom Coyne’s “A Course Called Ireland” with hosts Rod Morri and Adrian Logue of the iSeekGolf Podcast.

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Do you love Donald Ross and the idea of experiencing accurate expressions of his designs? Then this podcast is for you. Architect Kris Spence made the jump from golf superintendent to the design and build world when a club in North Carolina hired him to help restore the lost features of its Donald Ross course. 20 years later he’s become one of the country’s most passionate and dedicated practitioners of golf course restoration and an authority on Ross designs in particular.

Spence spends some time with Feed the Ball to talk about sand greens, following Ross’s career path from greenkeeper to architect, how his first restoration project came about because other architects turned down the job, his revelation at Pinehurst No. 2, pure restoration vs. “intent” restoration, the frustration of dealing with the PGA TOUR‘s tendency toward timid and destructive course set-ups, Ross’s philosophy of angles, restoring Ellis Maples, occasionally getting out of the Ross “box” and who Tom Fazio’s wife thinks is the one of the game’s greatest architects. Plus: a breakdown of Streamsong’s Red and Blue courses!

(photo: Roaring Gap Club, NC, by krisspence.com)

Listen here to Derek Duncan discuss Tom Coyne’s “A Course Called Ireland” with hosts Rod Morri and Adrian Logue of the iSeekGolf Podcast.

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Nobody’s roots stretch deeper into the field of golf architecture than Robert Trent Jones II’s. Oldest son of Robert Trent Jones and now in his sixth decade of design, he’s been literally almost everywhere, seen everything and been a prominent voice the industry his entire life.

After some light banter about fatalism and nuclear bombs, Jones joins the Feed the Ball podcast and discusses his new course on the west coast of Ireland (Hogs Head), the concept of the “High Art” of architecture, his early pioneering spirit of exploring far flung golf markets (including ’80’s-era Soviet Union), why Chambers Bay needs no defense or excuses, the competing ideologies of Dick Wilson (dogleg) and his father (straight), the similarities of Spanish Bay (v.1) and Chambers Bay (v.2), the romanticism of — and problem with — pure restoration, “fresco” architecture and a little known course in Colorado that has some important fans. Plus: Bob reads a poem!

Listen here to Derek Duncan discuss Tom Coyne’s “A Course Called Ireland” with hosts Rod Morri and Adrian Logue of the iSeekGolf Podcast.

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Rod Whitman has been one of golf’s masters of construction for nearly 40 years and has designed a number of courses on his own. In 2010 he got the call every architect dreams of — an offer to design and build a course on one of the world’s great new seaside properties, in this case at Cabot Links, a golf dreamscape of humps, hollows and bunkers overlooking an endless expanse of the St. Lawrence River in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia.

Rod visits the Feed the Ball podcast to talk about Cabot Links and how he finally landed this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, gaining Mike Keiser’s trust, learning the craft from Pete Dye and Bill Coore, the difficulty of getting design jobs, the art of turning potato fields into top 100 courses, and who would be on his dream team of golf course shapers.

Listen here to Derek Duncan discuss Tom Coyne’s “A Course Called Ireland” with hosts Rod Morri and Adrian Logue of the iSeekGolf Podcast.

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Following the economic crash of 2008, Love Golf Design, founded by brothers Mark Love and Davis Love III, decided to step back. Now, after a hiatus, the company has resumed business with several new renovations in the works following last year’s  completion of Atlantic Dunes, a total remodel of one of the Lowcountry’s original golf courses at Sea Pines Resort on Hilton Head Island.

Mark Love recently visited Feed the Ball for a round-the-world discussion about geeking out on golf architecture, how he and Davis got into the business, their “old world” inspirations and favorite courses, the “lost” course designed by his father Davis Love, Jr., jumping holes at Pinehurst courses No.’s 1-4 as a kid, building at one of the world’s best coastal golf sites, why we don’t want to see Vijay Singh get into golf design and what makes Winged Foot so good.

Listen here to Derek Duncan discuss Tom Coyne’s “A Course Called Ireland” with hosts Rod Morri and Adrian Logue of the iSeekGolf Podcast.

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Designer and historian Josh Pettit began collecting the writings of Alister MacKenzie for his new compendium of essays, “The MacKenzie Reader,” years ago, and was ready to publish in 2020 when the pandemic postponed printing until the summer of 2022. The wait was worth it–the Reader is a gorgeous volume of Pettit’s selections of the architect’s best and most important writings, presented with sketches, prints and routing maps. The volume will soon be in its third edition.

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Pettit visits the Salon to speak with hosts Derek Duncan and golf course builder Jim Urbina about a variety of topics, from his research into the archives at The Valley Club of Montecito that helped inform Urbina and Tom Doak’s greens renovation, the horse-trading that goes on with memberships when attempting to recreate what was originally designed, the romanticism of early-internet archival research and what’s still undiscovered, MacKenzie’s process for identifying local talent to construct his courses, the necessary discrepancy between the green elevations MacKenzie drew and what was originally built (and the problem that presents to preservationists), and why there isn’t a contemporary voice advocating for design ideals comparable to MacKenzie.

Get “The MacKenzie Reader” here.

Photos: Above, The Valley Club of Montecito (LC Lambrecht); Opening page, “Thirteenth at Cypress Point” (J.P. Graham Photos)

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Few living architects are better than Steve Smyers at combining an understanding of golf shots and strategy with holes that possess immense visual flourish. Based in Florida, he’s designed courses and played in top-level amateur tournaments all over the globe. He joins Derek Duncan on the Feed the Ball podcast to discuss how he’s always evolving as a designer, being the king of bad sites, what piece of equipment he’d change for TOUR players (it’s not the ball), the contrast between Dallas’s two newest golf clubs (Maridoe and Trinity Forest), how player fitness and athleticism has changed the game, what the increase in average shoe size of TOUR pros tells us and what fellow designer he’d pick as his partner in an architectural two-ball match.

Listen here to Derek Duncan discuss Tom Coyne’s “A Course Called Ireland” with hosts Rod Morri and Adrian Logue of the iSeekGolf Podcast.

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Keith Rhebb is one of the leaders of a new generation of golf course architects who have learned the trade shaping courses for design-build luminaries like Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw, Tom Doak, and Gil Hanse. He’s worked for Coore and Crenshaw at places like Lost Farm at Barnbougle Dunes, Cabot Cliffs and Streamsong Red, and last year, along with another young shaper and artist, Riley Johns, he remodeled the old Winter Park Golf Course, his first independent design. In this episode Rhebb visits Derek Duncan to discuss Winter Park and the importance of community golf, pickin’ rocks with a 5-gallon bucket, the fury of Bill Coore, who he thinks is the world’s greatest shaper, how he’s not a fan of the “Shark Experience,” and building golf courses with Daft Punk.

Listen here to Derek Duncan discuss Tom Coyne’s “A Course Called Ireland” with hosts Rod Morri and Adrian Logue of the iSeekGolf Podcast.

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To renovate or restore. That is the question many historic clubs must decide when their courses are in need of repair. Just as many would view it a tragedy to deface a pristine Colonial- or antebellum-era house with modern accoutrements, prominent golf voices believe the features of classic era courses, and the architectural intent behind them, should be preserved and returned to original form.

For over 30 years, Ron Prichard has been one of the most respected advocates and practitioners of golf course restoration and has worked with some of the country’s finest clubs to help restore their courses to lost Golden Age glory, often using sketches and plans from the founding architects as guidance.

In this episode, Prichard takes host Derek Duncan into the world of restorations and shares his thoughts on, among other things:

— architects who wear ascots,

–mingling with Robert Frost and Norman Rockwell as a young student,

–the athletic prowess that once flowed through Middlebury College,

–constructing a hole that Dustin Johnson annihilated,

–his recent work at Charlotte Country Club and Portland Country Club in Maine,

— how USGA setups  = #sad!,

–the boring greens of contemporary architects and the misguided ubiquity of MacKenzie-style bunkers,

–what he thinks is one of the 5 best sets of Ross greens in the country (or maybe not),

–and the destructive legacy of Geoffrey Cornish.

Listen here to Derek Duncan discuss Tom Coyne’s “A Course Called Ireland” with hosts Rod Morri and Adrian Logue of the iSeekGolf Podcast.

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In this episode, architect Bill Bergin and Derek Duncan catch up and discuss a wide array of subjects including Bill’s recent and upcoming re-workings of several historic clubs, WWSRD (what would Seth Raynor do?), keeping pace with Bob Tway and the northwest Atlanta high school golf scene, going low at St. Andrews, Bill’s top 3 Atlanta area courses, hitting it longer today than he did in his TOUR-playing prime, the Allen Doyle intimidation factor and who the best (and worst) sticks are in the American Society of Golf Course Architects.

Listen here to Derek Duncan discuss Tom Coyne’s “A Course Called Ireland” with hosts Rod Morri and Adrian Logue of the iSeekGolf Podcast.

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In this episode of Feed the Ball, Derek Duncan speaks to Bill Coore, who along with design partner Ben Crenshaw and their team of shapers has built a collection of what are considered to be some of the greatest golf courses of the last 60 or 70 years. Bill shares his thoughts on life and death situations in the field, working on some of the most spectacular golf settings to come online since the 1920 or ’30’s, the pressure he feels to maximize the potential of landscapes like Sand Hills and Sand Valley, dogsitting for Pete and Alice Dye, the gift of a mother’s encouragement, a spectacular new opportunity in the linksland of Scotland and what you can offer him if you happen to encounter him poolside at a resort.

Listen here to Derek Duncan discuss Tom Coyne’s “A Course Called Ireland” with hosts Rod Morri and Adrian Logue of the iSeekGolf Podcast.

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Bobby Weed joins Derek Duncan on the latest edition of the Feed the Ball podcast. Join us as Bobby talks about how he learned from Pete Dye that all good golf courses are built in the field, the joy of getting back on the bulldozer, his recent work at The Medalist Club in South Florida (home of Tiger Woods, Dustin Johnson, Rickie Fowler and others), how he’s continually imagining ways to challenge the TOUR players who practice and play there and elsewhere, designing on less than spectacular sites and the key ingredient to a successful golf design project.

And please stay tuned to the end to listen to Bobby share a personal matter that’s had a profound effect on him and his family, and a special foundation he’s set up to help.

Listen here to Derek Duncan discuss Tom Coyne’s “A Course Called Ireland” with hosts Rod Morri and Adrian Logue of the iSeekGolf Podcast.

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Noted golf course architect and past winner of Golf Digest’s Architect of the Year Award Jim Engh calls in to talk to Derek Duncan about the concept of image creation, pushing the envelop in his designs, the eureka moment that led him to pursue his bold style of golf holes, chasing an endorphine rush on the golf course and why it pays to be patient when playing his courses…or listening to music.

Listen here to Derek Duncan discuss Tom Coyne’s “A Course Called Ireland” with hosts Rod Morri and Adrian Logue of the iSeekGolf Podcast.

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Landmand Golf Club in northeast Nebraska, just across the Missouri River from Sioux City, is one of the largest and most expansive golf courses ever built, with the largest total square footage of greens of any course in the U.S. That it was designed by Rob Collins and Tad King, creators or the equally audacious though much smaller Sweetens Cove outside Chattanooga, should come as no surprise–both courses (Landmand is their first 18-hole course) are courageous pieces of architecture that push the boundaries of the genre.

Collins comes back to the Feed the Ball podcast to talk about Landmand and his design outlook with Derek Duncan and golf course builder Jim Urbina. Topics include the new King-Collins short course at Palmetto Bluff, seeing the Landmand property for the first time, whether he doubted if he and King could pull of such a major build, if Landmand is a “maximalist” course, routing a course on 550 acres but only coming up with 16 holes, the reasoning behind the size and extremity of the greens, the thought behind the Sitwell green and figuring out the blank slate that was Red Feather in Lubbock.

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Photos: Cover photo–Landmand’s 12th hole; Above–Ground level view of Landmand’s 17 green.

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Jim Nagle began working with golf course renovation and historical restoration legend Ron Forse in 1998, in what might be considered the field’s pioneering days. Golf course restoration is an attempt to reestablish a course’s first principles–placing it back in a specific point in time, usually in accordance with the way the original architect designed it–using documentation and photography as resources. In the last few decades Nagle and Forse have helped dozens of clubs reconnect with their past, from Lancaster Country Club (PA) to Country Club of Buffalo, to Kirtland in Cleveland to Lawsonia Links to Broadmoor East. If there was a Hall of Fame for restoration and consulting work, Nagle and Forse would be first ballot admissions.

Nagle joins the Feed the Ball podcast to discuss how the desire to host top tournaments can skew a club’s architecture, the fine line of following the a previous architect’s design “intent,” how fast green speeds kill interesting contour, the early days of restoration, dealing with a new type of historical ignorance (or at least agnosticism) and the unending revolving door of the renovation profession.

View Derek’s latest narration in the Golf Digest Every Hole at series with “Every Hole at The Country Club“

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Derek Duncan discusses the breakdown of Golf Digest America’s 100 Greatest Courses list with Aaron Abrahms and Jimmie James on the Golf Nuts Podcast, Episode 15.

Photos: Above, Country Club of Orlando (Vaughn Halyard/StoryLounge Films); Title page, Philadelphia Country Club (Vaughn Halyard/StoryLounge Filmss).

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Jason Straka has been a principle in Fry/Straka Global Golf Design since joining with partner Dana Fry in 2012. Previously he was the senior architect for Hurdzan-Fry Golf Design, helping that company build landmark courses like Calusa Pines, Erin Hills and Shelter Harbor. Fry/Straka is one of the hottest design firms in the world right now, coming off major new builds including the South Course at Arcadia Bluffs and Union League National in south New Jersey. They will soon begin redeveloping the four different courses at Boca West Country Club in Florida, and are currently restoring 36 Donald Ross-designed holes at Belleair Country Club in Clearwater.

Staka visits the Salon to talk with Derek Duncan and golf designer Jim Urbina about the first time he met Urbina as a landscape architecture student, his goals at current president of the ASGCA, the influence classical has on architecture today, the advise he received from Bill Coore, the social and emotional importance of community golf courses, the role of criticism in golf course architecture and much more.

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Photos: Opening page, Union League National, 4th hole, Meade 9 (Derek Duncan); above, restoration work at Belleair Country Club in Clearwater, Fla. (Connor Lewis).

View Derek’s latest narration in the Golf Digest Every Hole at series with “Every Hole at The Country Club“

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Derek Duncan discusses the breakdown of Golf Digest America’s 100 Greatest Courses list with Aaron Abrahms and Jimmie James on the Golf Nuts Podcast, Episode 15.

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Andy Staples positioned himself as one of the profession’s most creative architects with his throwback renovation of Meadowbrook Country Club near Detroit with its Willie Park, Jr. inspired early-1900s shaping. He moved into the 1920s with his green designs and shot strategies at The Match Course at PGA National Resort, opened in 2021, that pull from Macdonald/Raynor templates. He’s currently remodeling the South Course at Olympia Fields and consulting for numerous clubs in the U.S. and Canada.

Andy steps into the Salon to talk with Golf Digest architecture editor Derek Duncan and designer Jim Urbina about the economic tailwinds behind renovation work, whether the same amount of investment that’s been pouring into the private and high-end markets will find its way into public golf, the massive effect of television and the PGA Tour on golf design and the way golfers perceive the game, giving golfers the opportunity to experience different forms of the sport, the mundane instinctiveness toward par 72 courses, an emerging cultural taste for old style architecture and pre- and post-war green design.

Photos: Above, San Vicente Resort (sanvicenteresort.com); Title page, The Match at PGA Resort (pgaresort.com, )

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View Derek’s latest narration in the Golf Digest Every Hole at series with “Every Hole at The Country Club“

Subscribe to Feed the Ball on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher Radio and Google Play

Twitter: @feedtheball

Instagram: @feedtheball

Derek Duncan discusses the breakdown of Golf Digest America’s 100 Greatest Courses list with Aaron Abrahms and Jimmie James on the Golf Nuts Podcast, Episode 15.

The post Feed the Ball Salon Vol. 22, ft. Andy Staples appeared first on Feed The Ball.

Chris Cochran began his career building golf courses for Jack Nicklaus in the mid-1980s. With over 100 international projects completed, he is Nicklaus Design’s longest tenured senior design associate, and since the early 90s has arguably been the most significant mover behind Nicklaus Design’s global operation.

Cochran sits down with Golf Digest architecture editor Derek Duncan and golf course builder Jim Urbina to discuss his career working side by side with the Golden Bear. Specifically the conversation veers to Cochran’s love for hands on field work, the dynamics of interacting in the design process with Nicklaus, how Nicklaus valued a high “player’s IQ” in his design team, the early Nicklaus way of designing holes tactically through the lens of shot values, the shift into more artistic design and an intriguing new project in south Florida called Panther National that will allow for a rare degree of originality.

PHOTOS: Homepage–The par 4 5th at Quivira in Cabo San Lucas (nicklaus.com); above–Dismal River’s White course in Mullen, Nebraska (nicklaus.com).

View Derek’s latest narration in the Golf Digest Every Hole at series with “Every Hole at The Country Club“

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Derek Duncan discusses the breakdown of Golf Digest America’s 100 Greatest Courses list with Aaron Abrahms and Jimmie James on the Golf Nuts Podcast, Episode 15.

The post Feed the Ball Salon Volume 21, ft. Chris Cochran appeared first on Feed The Ball.

Joe Jemsek grew up with Dick Wilson. At least figuratively. In the early 1960s, Wilson, one of golf architecture’s most interesting and possibly misunderstood figures, designed the former America’s 100 Greatest Course Cog Hill No. 4 in Chicago, known as Dubsdread, for Jemsek’s grandfather. Few people knew Wilson or his former partner Joe Lee as well as the Jemseks, and the family remained close with Lee until his death in 2003. The younger Jemsek’s experience growing up on Dubsdread inspired him to dig deeper into the work of Wilson. Now an architect in his own right (the Jemsek family stills operates Cog Hill, along with several other facilities), Jemsek has poured through the Wilson/Lee archives and studied Wilson’s courses as closely as anyone in the profession.

Jemsek joins the Feed the Ball podcast to discuss how Wilson’s legacy has aged, the orchestrated prescription of shots he built into his designs, how Wilson’s courses helped revolutionize resort golf, the special shaping crew known as the All-Stars he used on his courses, the appeal of the “championship course” to golfers of the 1960s (and beyond), the role Lee played in the Wilson operation and how his approach to design differed, and the past, present and potential future of Dubsdread.

Photos: Above, Cog Hill No. 4, Hole 8 (courtesy coghillgolf.com); Cover page and below, Pine Tree GC, 1961

View the latest in the Golf Digest Every Hole at series with “Every Hole at Oakmont“

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Derek Duncan discusses the breakdown of Golf Digest America’s 100 Greatest Courses list with Aaron Abrahms and Jimmie James on the Golf Nuts Podcast, Episode 15.

The post Episode 80: Joe Jemsek on Dick Wilson appeared first on Feed The Ball.

Tim Liddy and Dave Axland have worked together on a number of projects including, most recently, Harrison Lake in Indiana, a remodel that included the addition of several new holes and a re-routing of the course. Liddy, the primary designer, was a longtime collaborator with the late Pete Dye and knows his mentor’s work and beliefs as well as anyone. Axland is the longtime associate of Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw and has been the “muscle” behind most of their best work since the early 90s. He’s also recently joined forces with Rod Whitman and Keith Cutten to create a new power firm, Whitman, Axland and Cutten, who have new builds under construction in Bend, Oregon and British Columbia.

Liddy and Axland join golf architect Jim Urbina and Golf Digest architecture editor Derek Duncan for an entertaining and wisdom-filled talk about the nature of collaboration, the pitfalls of ego, the humility required to do the work and the most important lessons they’ve learned over the course of their long careers.

View some photos of Harrison Lake, and other lovely golf holes, at Tim Liddy’s website.

Photos: Cover, Harrison Lake Club, Tim Liddy. Above, Colorado Golf Club.

View the latest in the Golf Digest Every Hole at series with “Every Hole at Oakmont“

Subscribe to Feed the Ball on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher Radio and Google Play

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Derek Duncan discusses the breakdown of Golf Digest America’s 100 Greatest Courses list with Aaron Abrahms and Jimmie James on the Golf Nuts Podcast, Episode 15.

The post Feed the Ball Salon Vol. 20, ft. Dave Axland and Tim Liddy appeared first on Feed The Ball.

In just the last several years, designer Andrew Green has played a prominent role in guiding back to their founding architectural spirit a number of prominent major championship courses, including America’s 100 Greatest Courses fixtures Inverness Club, Oak Hill East and Congressional Blue. He’s also brought back to life the most interesting features that had faded from over a dozen other clubs in the U.S. and Caribbean. His current work includes restorations of another 100 Greatest course with major championship heritage, Scioto Country Club in Ohio, and Second 100 Greatest ranked courses Wannamoisett in Rhode Island and East Lake in Atlanta, home of the Tour Championship.

Green joins the Feed the Ball podcast to talk to Derek Duncan about these projects, how he got his break as a solo designer, the line between renovation and restoration, projecting bold design and restoration visions to clubs, the excitement and the personal connection he feels when working with clubs with older architecture, and what we can learn about the game from the great writer-architects of the past.

Photos: Above, the par-4 8th at Congressional’s Blue Course (Derek Duncan); title page, the par-4 6th at Oak Hill’s East Course (Evan Schiller).

View the latest in the Golf Digest Every Hole at series with “Every Hole at Oakmont“

Subscribe to Feed the Ball on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher Radio and Google Play

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Derek Duncan discusses the breakdown of Golf Digest America’s 100 Greatest Courses list with Aaron Abrahms and Jimmie James on the Golf Nuts Podcast, Episode 15.

The post Episode 79: Andrew Green appeared first on Feed The Ball.

Lee Schmidt’s lengthy golf architecture career began in the early 1970s working for Pete Dye and took many different detours through the decades. He worked closely with Landmark Land Company on numerous Dye projects in the 70s and 80s before taking a job with Jack Nicklaus’ design firm. In the late 1990s he created his own firm with Brian Curley, and the two built courses across the U.S. and also made deep inroads into the Asian market, becoming the most influential American architects in the region. Today Schmidt is semi-retired, though as is always true in golf architecture, there’s always work that keeps pulling him back.

Schmidt joins Golf Digest’s Derek Duncan and golf course builder Jim Urbina to share stories about Pete and P.B. Dye, learning about golf design from Bill Diddel, the different construction approaches of Dye and Nicklaus, building the Alcatraz Bunker at PGA West’s 16th hole, Dye’s love of building courses that were challenging to professionals, the decision to leave Nicklaus, how he formed his partnership with Curley and opened over 60 courses in China and rooming with Bill Coore in the early 70s.

Photos: Cover page, The Wilderness Club (wildernessclubmontana.com); Above, the Alcatraz Bunker at PGA West.

Watch Golf Digest’s drone video of Pinehurst No. 2 here.

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The post Feed the Ball Salon 28, ft. Lee Schmidt appeared first on Feed The Ball.

The topic is bunkers: should they be placed scientifically or randomly? Should there be more or less, or any at all? Has the naturalistic look become ubiquitous and overused? What about proper bunker depth? Are liners a waste of money? And are bunker still the hazards they once were, have they lost their importance, and have they become too expensive to maintain?

To discuss all of this, as well as answer questions about bunkers from listeners, is Golf Digest architecture editor Derek Duncan and golf course builder Jim Urbina. They’re joined by Ron Whitten, Golf Digest architecture editor from 1985 to 2020, a historian who is also a practicing designer with current projects going on in several states, including the new North Course at Corica Park in Alameda, California, with lead architect and builder Marc Logan.

More pertinent thoughts from Urbina about bunker myths can be found here: Urbina on Bunkers

Listen to Ron Whitten on The Green Awning golf podcast: Whitten

View my narration of Golf Digest’s “Every Hole at Whistling Straits”

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Derek Duncan discusses the breakdown of Golf Digest America’s 100 Greatest Courses list with Aaron Abrahms and Jimmie James on the Golf Nuts Podcast, Episode 15.

Photos: Opening page, Claremont Country Club (courtesy Jim Urbina); Top, The Valley Club of Montecito (Urbina); Below, Corica Park South Course (Urbina); Bottom, Corica Park North Course (courtesy of Derek Duncan).

The post Feed the Ball Salon Vol. 19: Bunkers ft. Ron Whitten appeared first on Feed The Ball.

Like most architects, Steve Smyers has a deep reverence for the classical era and the strategic brilliance of Harry Colt, Alister MacKenzie, George Thomas and others. However, as an elite player as well as a veteran designer, he realized the basic strategic precepts that have existed since the early 1900s and have guided much of his own work might no longer apply to golf at the highest levels. Smyers joins Golf Digest architecture editor Derek Duncan to discuss the a-ha moment that led to his evolving views on strategy and course design for the game’s best players, and whether or not a changing understanding of strategy symbolizes the end of strategic play as we’ve always known it.

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[Photos–above, Old Memorial, courtesy oldmemorialgolfclub.com; cover page–Pine Valley, Derek Duncan]

View my narration of Golf Digest’s “Every Hole at Whistling Straits”

Subscribe to Feed the Ball on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher Radio and Google Play

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Derek Duncan discusses the breakdown of Golf Digest America’s 100 Greatest Courses list with Aaron Abrahms and Jimmie James on the Golf Nuts Podcast, Episode 15.

The post Episode 78: Steve Smyers and Rethinking Strategy appeared first on Feed The Ball.

In this Feed the Ball podcast, we get deep into some Wisconsin golf talk with golf course architect Craig Haltom. Haltom joins Golf Digest architecture editor Derek Duncan to discuss recreating C.B. Macdonald’s The Lido at Sand Valley, how GPS technology has the potential to change the way courses are preserved and finished, how he located the Sand Valley property over a decade ago and brought it to the attention of Mike Keiser, renovating a municipal course in Madison with a crew of talented designers, the power potential of adventurous practice putting greens, and his new 18-hole course, The Club at Lac La Belle outside Milwaukee.

Photo, above: The par-4 5th, “Cape” at The Lido in Wisconsin. Cover photo: the wild par-3 4th at The Club at Lac La Belle.

View my narration of Golf Digest’s “Every Hole at Whistling Straits”

Subscribe to Feed the Ball on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher Radio and Google Play

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Derek Duncan discusses the breakdown of Golf Digest America’s 100 Greatest Courses list with Aaron Abrahms and Jimmie James on the Golf Nuts Podcast, Episode 15.

The post Episode 77: Craig Haltom appeared first on Feed The Ball.

Is it possible we take Whistling Straits for granted? Of all the spectacular builds in the history of golf, from The Lido to Calusa Pines, very little is spoken about how Pete Dye and Herb Kohler transformed flat farmland and an abandoned Army airfield into the wild, multilayered Irish-looking golf course gouged into the bluffs of Lake Michigan that is the 23rd ranked course on Golf Digest America’s 100 Greatest Courses ranking. How did Dye do it?

Mike O’Connor can tell us. While Dye is known for beginning the careers of many current designers and course builders, very few knew him like O’Connor did, who worked as Dye’s construction manager at a multitude of courses for over 25 years, including running the job at Whistling Straits. He essentially lived on site for several years, and in this podcast he shares his insight and recollections of what it was like to build the course, and what it took to pull off one of golf’s most dramatic land transformations. He also shares stories about working side-by-side with Dye, meeting and developing a friendship with Kohler, what the virgin property was like, discovering live rounds of aerial ammunition on site, how the course evolved from conception, the origins of the out-of-character par-5 5th, and one very strange but discarded idea for the famous par-3 17th.

View my narration of Golf Digest’s “Every Hole at Whistling Straits”

Subscribe to Feed the Ball on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher Radio and Google Play

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Derek Duncan discusses the breakdown of Golf Digest America’s 100 Greatest Courses list with Aaron Abrahms and Jimmie James on the Golf Nuts Podcast, Episode 15.

Photo: Early days at Whistling Straits (all construction photos courtesy of Mike O’Connor).

The post Episode 76: Making Whistling Straits appeared first on Feed The Ball.

Davis Love III needs no introduction. But just in case, he’s a member of the World Golf Hall of Fame, has logged over 20 PGA Tour victories, won the 1997 PGA Championship, was twice victorious at The Players Championship and is a two-time Ryder Cup captain. He’s also a tournament founder (the PGA Tour’s RSM Classic at Sea Island), philanthropist and golf course designer. Love Golf Design, which he operates with brother Mark Love, is a craft-oriented and highly creative design firm that has produced courses like Diamante Dunes in Cabo San Lucas, The Plantation Course at Sea Island, Atlantic Dunes at Sea Pines, and Kinderlou Forest in Georgia. They’ve recently completed projects at Birdwood Golf Club at Boar’s Head at the University of Virginia, and Belmont in Richmond in conjunction with The First Tee of Greater Richmond, consisting of the restoration of 12 original A.W. Tillinghast holes plus the conversion of six others into a dynamic short course, expanded practice area and Himalayas putting green.

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Love joins Golf Digest architecture editor Derek Duncan and golf course builder Jim Urbina to discuss:

–The Ryder Cup and setting up Whistling Straits;

–What makes a great match-play course;

–Preserving and fighting for the integrity of old courses;

–Working with talented creatives like Forrest Fezler, Paul Cowley and Scot Sherman;

–How to balance the needs of the skilled with the desires of the everyday player;

–How Pete Dye defined a golf course architect;

–And what types of courses attract him personally.

Subscribe to Feed the Ball on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher Radio and Google Play

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Derek Duncan discusses the breakdown of Golf Digest America’s 100 Greatest Courses list with Aaron Abrahms and Jimmie James on the Golf Nuts Podcast, Episode 15.

Photos–Cover Page: The Plantation Course at Sea Island (photo: seaisland.com). Above: Dormant grass at Ricefields at Hampton Island Preserve; Below: more scenes from the abandoned Ricefields.

The post Feed the Ball Salon Vol. 18, ft. Davis Love III appeared first on Feed The Ball.

James Duncan came to the U.S. from his native Denmark in the early 1990s to learn the craft of building golf courses. He learned from the best, working first with Tom Doak and Renaissance Golf Design, then joining with Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw to help construct courses like East Hampton, Old Sandwich, Bandon Trails, Clear Creek Tahoe, Shanquin Bay in China and many others. He has his own firm now, and he’s currently fulfilling a lifelong goal of founding and designing a new course, Brambles, in Northern California, along with Coore, Crenshaw and his own team of creative shapers.

Duncan joins the podcast to talk to Golf Digest architecture editor Derek Duncan and golf course designer Jim Urbina about the Brambles site, meeting Jim and Tom Doak and Gil Hanse almost immediately upon arriving in the U.S., the value of traveling to see great architecture, architects as “editors in chief,” his attempts to have Brambles reflect the simplicity and essence of golf as he knows it, what a course would be if you had once chance in life to build it, using ground as a means of connecting to a community and beauty of keeping it simple.

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Photos: Above–copses at Brambles’ soon-to-be 10th hole; Main Page–the green at the par-4 4th at Brambles, looking back.

The post Feed the Ball Salon Vol. 17, ft. James Duncan appeared first on Feed The Ball.

Designer Troy Miller worked for Landmark Land Co. for a decade, building golf courses around North America, before leaving the company to settle down in his hometown of Charleston, SC. The move put him in a unique position to do something he’d first envisioned years before: help the city rebuild the popular but dated municipal golf course he grew up playing, that happened to be in the same neighborhood where he lived. With help from an organization called “Friends of the Muni,” Miller got the Charleston Municipal project off the ground and reimagined the design as the third installment in a trilogy of Seth Raynor courses, the architect who built two other clubs in the city in the years before Muni first opened in 1929, the esteemed but private Yeamans Hall and Country Club of Charleston. Miller pulled many of the famous Raynor and C.B. Macdonald template hole concepts into the Muni design, giving public players at last a taste of what private club members had long experienced.

Miller joins the Feed the Ball podcast to discuss the how the Muni came into being, how smartly done municipal golf projects can be financially prosperous, Raynor’s presence and influence in Charleston golf, the advantage of keeping green-speeds lower, watching The Ocean Course at Kiawah Island get built and then being present years later when Pete Dye renovated it, The Ocean Course as a “golf safari” and a potential redevelopment of the Patriot’s Point course overlooking Charleston Harbor.

Photo: the par-4 13th, “Road,” at Muni. Cover photo: the “Maiden” green at the par-5 15th.

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The post Episode 75: Troy Miller appeared first on Feed The Ball.

PGA Tour and current PGA Champions tour player Tom Lehman, winner of the 1996 Open Championship at Royal Lytham & St. Anne’s, has seamlessly managed to maintain an elite game while developing a golf course design outlook that almost entirely eschews consideration of elite players. Lehman stops by the Salon to speak with Golf Digest architecture editor Derek Duncan and golf course builder Jim Urbina about:

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–The importance of hitting your line when playing links golf;

–how golf is too consumed with “championship golf;”

–the overuse of multiple tees;

–the similarities of old-school U.S. Open setups and links golf;

–the curse of construction technology;

–anchoring a routing on several special natural features;

–and how some players just “get it” and “see it” when it comes to architecture (and others don’t).

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Photos: The Prairie Club, courtesy lehmandesigngroup.com

The post Feed the Ball Salon Vol. 16, ft. Tom Lehman appeared first on Feed The Ball.

In a limited amount of original work, David Kahn has proven to be one of the most creative, courageous and expressionistic golf course architects working today. Along with partner Tim Jackson, the other half of Jackson Kahn Design, he’s reimagined the shaping and visage of the historic Dunes Course at Monterey Peninsula Country Club, built an artistic and technical tour de force with The Other Course at Scottsdale National, as well as the world’s most outlandish (and fun) short nine-hole course at the same facility (The Bad Little Nine). What consumes him most, however, is the rapidly declining health of his twin daughters, Amelia and Makenzie, who each suffer from a fatal neurological disease known as CNL3 juvenile Batten Disease.

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David joins Derek to talk about the emotional toll of caring for his daughters as they lose the ability to speak, walk and see, the shock of their diagnosis four years ago, and how he and his wife, Karen, have created the Fore Batten Foundation to raise awareness and money to fight the disease through one of golf’s largest and most prestigious online auctions, with bidding available for rounds of golf at America’s greatest and most exclusive courses.

He also discusses the grueling curriculum of a landscape architecture degree, modifying Robert Trent Jones’ work at Eugene Country Club, his interest (or lack of) in historical restoration, hiding cart paths, finding a golf course owner with means (Bob Parsons at Scottsdale National) but also knowing what to do with the gifts of land and money, and the extreme luxury of complete creative freedom.

Read more about the Kahns and the Fore Batten auction in my recent Golf Digest story here, and in Alan Shipnuck’s original story on the family from 2018, here.

Listen to Derek Duncan discuss the book “The Match” by Mark Frost in the Good-Good Golf Podcast Book Club edition.

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Photos: Cover page: the par-3 3rd at Scottsdale National; above: the sensational 18,000 square foot 17th green at Scottsdale National.

The post Episode 74: David Kahn appeared first on Feed The Ball.

Canadian designer Ian Andrew, Feed the Ball guest from Episode 14, is back to visit with Derek Duncan and Jim Urbina. The conversation turns to topics of:

–Choose Your Own Adventure golf architecture;

–The satisfactions of playing “unknown” courses;

–Golf as an emotional experience;

–The importance of “compression and release” in design;

–Creativity beginning with saying “I don’t know”;

–How the best architects “fight” for contours;

–and the genius of Stanley Thompson.

Listen to Derek Duncan discuss the book “The Match” by Mark Frost in the Good-Good Golf Podcast Book Club edition.

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Photos: Cover page, St. Georges Golf & Country Club, 1st hole, Clive Barber; above, Knollwood Country Club, 16th hole, Evan Schiller

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The post Feed the Ball Salon Vol. 15, ft. Ian Andrew appeared first on Feed The Ball.

If might seem like golf course architect Scott Hoffman came out of nowhere with his design at Lost Rail, opened in 2022 outside of Omaha. However, he’d previously worked for over a decade with Tom Fazio, designing courses in the western U.S. He then worked with Tim Jackson and David Kahn for a number of years. Hoffman wasn’t pursuing new work when he was approached about looking at land for a club near Omaha, where he’s from, and those interests turned into Lost Rail, Golf Digest’s runner up for Best New Private Course for 2023. He’s now busy constructing Mapleton, another new stand-alone club near Sioux Falls, Idaho.

Hoffman joins Golf Digest architecture editor Derek Duncan on the Feed the Ball podcast to discuss finding the land for Lost Rail, his instinct for routing golf courses, the insomnia-inducing puzzle of routing Lost Rail, the freedom of working for Fazio versus being his own business, how to water a 20,000 square-foot green, whether classical architecture influences his designs, the futility of properly evaluating a course after just one round and how he compares and contrasts Shinnecock Hills with National Golf Links of America.

Photos: Cover page, Lost Rail (Lost Rail Golf Club); Above, the par-3 11th at Scottsdale National.

Watch and listen to Bill Coore narrate the latest Golf Digest Every Hole at Cabot Saint Lucia (script by Derek Duncan).

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The post Episode 87: Scott Hoffman appeared first on Feed The Ball.

Larry Lambrecht has been one of golf’s most prolific and talented photographers for over 30 years. He’s shot golf courses and tournaments, as well as Super Bowls, World Series and other major sporting events, for virtually ever major publication. He’s also published a number of books and club histories along with his course photography, including, in 2004, “Emerald Gems”, a lusciously photographed book dedicated to the links courses of Ireland.

Lambrecht joined Derek on the podcast to discuss what initially drew him to photography, shooting courses like Augusta National, being in the NFL Hall of Fame, transitioning from film development to computer editing, how the iPhone revolutionized the field of photography, how cart paths ruin photography, the natural photographic composition of Tom Fazio holes, the unique light of Ireland, meeting Eddie Hackett and his most harrowing visits abroad.

Listen to Derek Duncan discuss the book “The Match” by Mark Frost in the Good-Good Golf Podcast Book Club edition.

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Photos: Ballybunion by Larry Lambrecht (above); Cape Wickham by Larry Lambrecht (title page).

The post Episode 73: Larry Lambrecht appeared first on Feed The Ball.

Golf course architect Forrest Richardson was elected in 2020 to be the 75th president of the American Society of Golf Course Architects, a chair that’s been held by such notable designers as Stanley Thompson, Robert Trent Jones, William Langford (twice), Rees Jones, Robert Trent Jones, Jr., Alice Dye, Jeff Brauer and Steve Smyers. He joins Derek Duncan and golf course builder Jim Urbina in the Salon to discuss his plans for the society as well as:

–Authoring a golf course design newsletter as a teenager;

–making the ASGCA younger and more inclusive;

–His long relationship with Desmond Muirhead;

–His idea for the “Lighthouse Hole”;

–Whether golf needs to develop more different “expressions” of the game;

–The feasibility of stand-alone short courses and par-3 courses in towns and cities;

–And whether golf needs to innovate to continue to exist.

Click here to watch Forrest Richardson mission statement video for the American Society of Golf Course Architects.

Listen to Derek Duncan discuss the book “The Match” by Mark Frost in the Good-Good Golf Podcast Book Club edition.

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The post Feed the Ball Salon Vol. 14, ft. Forrest Richardson appeared first on Feed The Ball.

Architect Kyle Phillips began his illustrious career as an associate working for Robert Trent Jones II in California. He gained unique design and planning expertise working on a slate of international courses for Jones, which later helped him garner major overseas jobs once he opened his own firm in the late 90s. Those include Kingsbarns in St. Andrews, Yas Links in Dubai, South Cape in South Korea, Bernardus in the Netherlands, and numerous others. He continues to be one of the major figures in golf course architecture both domestically and worldwide.

(Photo above: the 14th at Cal Club, from calclub.org.)

Phillips joined Derek Duncan and golf course builder Jim Urbina from his home in northern California to talk about:

–The prevailing modes of golf design when he started with Jones;

–His major rebuilding of the Cal Club in San Francisco;

–How golf architecture lost its soul in the 70s, 80s and 90s;

–The importance of outside voices to a club’s self-perception;

–Creating naturalistic holes (Kingsbarns) out of unnaturalistic golf sites;

–How constructions and design moves from spans of acres to feet to inches;

–The concept of “turning back geologic time” in golf design;

–And the difference between the European concept of healthy turf and the American impulse to always “grow grass.”

Listen to Derek Duncan discuss “The World Atlas of Golf” on the Good-Good Golf Podcast.

Listen to Derek Duncan discuss the book “The Match” by Mark Frost in the Good-Good Golf Podcast Book Club edition.

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The post Feed the Ball Salon Vol. 13, ft. Kyle Phillips appeared first on Feed The Ball.

Few people in golf have had as rich or wide-ranging life in golf as Donald Steel. He began his career as the golf reporter for London’s Sunday Telegraph in 1961, memorably covering, as a rookie writer, Arnold Palmer’s back-to-back Open Championship wins at Birkdale and Troon. A few years later, while continuing his reporting duties, he joined the architectural firm of Cotton, Pennink and Lawrie, assisting in dozens of new designs and remodels throughout the U.K.

After opening his own firm in 1987, his design business flourished and he built a string of prominent new courses like the Carnegie Club at Skibo Castle in northern Scotland, the Abaco Club in the Bahamas, and Cherokee Plantation, The Vineyards on Martha’s Vineyard and the Highland Course at Primland Resort in the U.S. At 83, Steel has largely retired from golf architecture but he continues to be one of the profession’s wisest, most knowledgeable and most gentlemanly figures.

Steel joined Derek Duncan via Skype from London to discuss growing up during the London Blitz, what era he thinks had the greatest balance between equipment technology and skill, playing in the President’s Putter, his recollections of Bernard Darwin, the quality of golf writing in the 60s and 70s vs golf writing today and the unique challenges of building golf in various countries and climates around the world.

A video of Steel’s unique Le Tecina course at La Gomera on the Canary Islands.

Listen to Derek Duncan discuss “The World Atlas of Golf” and Donald Steel’s contribution on the Good-Good Golf Podcast.

Listen to Derek discuss the book “The Match” by Mark Frost in the Good-Good Golf Podcast Book Club edition.

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The post Episode 72: Donald Steel appeared first on Feed The Ball.

Golf architect Chris Wilczynski has bridged two distinct eras–that of the course-a-day, turn and burn construction frenzy of the 1990s and 2000s, and now the current period of “slow” golf with its focus on boutique operations and club restoration. He began his career as an associate with Arthur Hills, one of the busiest designers of golf and real estate development. Since 2010 he’s operated his own Michigan-based business and conducted prominent renovations of courses like Warwick Hills in Michigan and Chautauqua Golf Club in New York, as well as several new designs including Esplanade at Azario near Sarasota, Florida, opened in 2020.

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Wilczynski joins the Feed the Ball podcast to talk about:

–Teaching his class at Michigan State about golf construction and renovation during the time of Covid-19;

–The most important factors in getting hired by clubs and clients;

–Restoration vs. Renovation;

–How golf course construction in the 1920s and construction today are both similar and different;

–The “unifying vision” of Arthur Hills courses; and

–The consequences of building small greens.

Listen to Derek discuss the book “The Match” by Mark Frost in the Good-Good Golf Podcast Book Club edition.

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The post Episode 71: Chris Wilczynski appeared first on Feed The Ball.

After working for over a decade for Tom Fazio, Tim Jackson opened his own West Coast design firm with David Kahn, another Fazio alum. Jackson Kahn Design is known for their creative, ambitious ideas about design–as exhibited at, Monterey Peninsula Country Club’s Shore Course and The Other Course and The Bad Little Nine at Scottsdale National–and also for their decidedly artistic approach to client presentation and development with state-of-the-art graphics, renderings and animations.

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Tim joins golf builder Jim Urbina and Derek Duncan to talk about:

–Tom Fazio’s mandate to “make it playable and make it beautiful”;

–The design motivation: “rich guys suck at golf”;

–The advantage of being able to show clients realistic photo-renderings of proposed holes and renovations;

–The odd discomfort of working with a client without the normal constraints of a budget;

–Sand Hills vs. Shadow Creek;

–And creating one of golf’s most outlandish courses, The Bad Little Nine at Scottsdale National.

Listen to Derek discuss the book “The Match” by Mark Frost in the Good-Good Golf Podcast Book Club edition.

Subscribe to Feed the Ball on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher Radio and Google Play

Twitter: @feedtheball

Instagram: @feedtheball

The post Feed the Ball Salon Vol. 12, ft. Tim Jackson appeared first on Feed The Ball.

Lester George was an artillery officer in the U.S. Army who rose to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. In the late 1980s, already into his 30s, he made a career switch to golf design, setting up a business in his native state of Virginia. In the mid-1990s he was introduced to a magnificent property outside Richmond that he would eventually develop, along with legendary Virginia amateur player Vinny Giles, into Kinloch Golf Club, now one of Golf Digest’s 100 Greatest Courses and the state’s number one ranked course. George has restored numerous Golden Age designs in the mid-Atlantic states and has also worked in locations from Florida to Texas to Connecticut and Japan. He later followed up the success of Kinloch with the brawny, exuberant, rough-and-tumble Ballyhack near Roanoke.

George joins the podcast to talk about:

–Getting jobs he was told he had no chance of getting;

–Sequencing pars in a routing;

–The importance of being able to read terrain;

–The development of Kinloch and Ballyhack;

–The forensic work used to recreate the Seth Raynor features at the Greenbrier’s Old White Course;

–Potential upcoming projects on a sand mine in Chicago, river bluffs in Virginia and a new 22-hole Raynor template-hole design.

Listen to Derek discuss the book “The Match” by Mark Frost in the Good-Good Golf Podcast Book Club edition.

Subscribe to Feed the Ball on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher Radio and Google Play

Twitter: @feedtheball

Instagram: @feedtheball

The post Episode 70: Lester George appeared first on Feed The Ball.

Golf designer Dana Fry began his career learning the business as an associate for Tom Fazio, and later forged a prominent partnership with Dr. Michael Hurdzan. With Hurdzan he created such top U.S. courses as Erin Hills, site of the 2017 U.S. Open, and Calusa Pines in Florida. Today he runs his business with partner Jason Straka. He joins the Salon to talk to Derek Duncan and Jim Urbina about:

–When it’s appropriate to lengthen golf holes;

–The extremities of Calusa Pines;

–The need to change up design looks and approaches;

–Being consumed by certain jobs (Arcadia Bluffs), and

–The radical site swings between south Florida, coastal New Jersey, northern Michigan and central Wisconsin.

Listen to Derek discuss the book “The Match” by Mark Frost in the Good-Good Golf Podcast Book Club edition.

Subscribe to Feed the Ball on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher Radio and Google Play

Twitter: @feedtheball

Instagram: @feedtheball

The post Feed the Ball Salon Vol. 11, ft. Dana Fry appeared first on Feed The Ball.

It’s not unreasonable to suggest the path of golf architecture in the second half of the 20th century can be traced through Ron Kirby. His career has been a remarkable Zelig-like whirlwind placing him in the immediate proximity of Dick Wilson, Robert Trent Jones, Gary Player, Jack Nicklaus and many others. His name is on the design of over 70 golf courses on four continents, including Old Head in Ireland on one of golf’s most spectacular sites, and, most recently, the remodel of Apes Hill in Barbados.

Ron generously lends his time to discuss his remarkable career, including the terror and talent that lived inside Dick Wilson, Trent Jones’ strength as a designer, Trent Jones’ limitations as a designer, Gary Player’s role in their design partnership, what was wrong with architecture in the 1970s, Jack Nicklaus as a master strategist, pounding and grinding Old Head into shape, and his late conversion from bunkers to grass hollows.

Listen to Derek discuss the book “The Match” by Mark Frost in the Good-Good Golf Podcast Book Club edition.

Subscribe to Feed the Ball on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher Radio and Google Play

Twitter: @feedtheball

Instagram: @feedtheball

“GOLF’S BATTLING ARCHITECTS”, Sports Illustrated, August 2 1962

The post Episode 69: Ron Kirby appeared first on Feed The Ball.