Compulsion brings success

Course Development: Edmondstown and The South County Golf Club: Philip Reid pays a visit to Edmondstown in the Dublin foothills, where the club transformed a crisis over a new motorway into an opportunity to create a special new challenge

In a golfing context, at least as far as Peter McEvoy, the former Walker Cup captain, is concerned, Irish golf clubs are far less conservative than their counterparts in England, Scotland or Wales.

"They're more reticent (in Britain), I think the willingness of Irish clubs to have a go is very admirable," he remarked.

The topic, not for the first time, is the forward-thinking nature of clubs in Ireland to undergo redevelopment work and, in particular, the work that has just been completed at Edmondstown Golf Club, in the foothills of the Dublin mountains.

No one could dispute that the location of the Edmondstown course is a fine one. Adjacent to the Southern Cross motorway - the Compulsory Purchase Order (CPO) placed on the club to take away some of its land was partly responsible for encouraging the club to upgrade the course - and so close to the mountains that the notorious Hell Fire Club, a ruined hunting lodge reputedly used for occult activities, is clearly visible from many fairways, the course is something of an oasis in the sprawling suburbs of the south county.

When the redeveloped course is unveiled to one and all in late May, it is sure to captivate. If anyone had doubts as to the wisdom of proceeding with a project that disrupted play on the course for over a year, when the members were reduced to playing a Par 65 - with a number of par fours shortened so much that they were driveable for many players - and forced into using temporary greens, then the end product provides the answer.

The course has been transformed and, although it has always enjoyed a reputation for being immaculately maintained, Edmondstown - should the need arise - now has the capacity to bare its teeth as a real test of golf.

Neville Kutner, chairman of the club's development committee, was to the fore in pushing for the course's upgrading; but even he admitted to some apprehension when the bulldozers moved in.

"It was quite painful watching a course that had matured for over 50 years being torn asunder by bulldozers," he accepted.

Now, however, the comparisons to a building site, or a ploughed field, are non-existent: the redevelopment work has been an unqualified success, keeping the special ambience of Edmondstown but also giving the members, and visitors, a course that examines every aspect of a player's game.

The catalyst for change came when the council placed a CPO on a portion of the club's land, effectively taking away the 13th hole. "That triggered the whole thing," admitted Kutner.

The search for new land reaped rewards, however, when local landowner Pat Leonard made some available and two new holes - the 10th and 11th - were constructed. The quality of the holes prompted the club to go all-out and upgrade the rest of the course to the same USGA specifications, and a development committee, chaired by Kutner, was put in place.

The high-powered five-man committee comprised Kutner; his brother, Peter Kutner, and Denis O'Callaghan, both former club captains; Andrew O'Riordain, a past treasurer of the club; and Donal Casey, this year's vice-captain. The options facing them included phasing in the reconstruction of the course over three years - completing six greens a year - or completing the job in one go.

"It was a major job, and, after doing a lot of research and talking with different designers, we took the view that we should take the pain and complete the job in one year. We didn't want a mishmash situation where we had different types of greens," said Kutner, a reference to the fact that a number of years ago the club had actually started to integrate a type of sand-based greens, with sods brought in to form the putting surface, on some holes.

That policy was discarded after McEvoy and Cooke redeveloped the ninth green as a prototype of what could be done - and the club's feeling was that such a uniformed approach should be taken with all the greens and tee-boxes thereafter; that they should all have the same quality and consistency.

For my visit to the redeveloped course, Stephen Alkin, whose tones can be heard on many a soccer commentary on RTÉ television, is an enthusiastic guide. He has played this course all his life, and has seen saplings mature into the fully-fledged trees which nowadays give definition and sylvan character to the course.

Much of the redevelopment work concerned the greens and tee-boxes, all of which now boast the same USGA sand-based designs. The first hole is what used to be the old 10th, with the ditch that traversed the fairway gone. From the second to the ninth, it is much the same lay-out as it always was, apart from additional fairway bunkers and extra yardage as a result of moving back some tee-boxes.

The 10th and 11th holes are brand new, and have been fully in play for over a year, and were built on land acquired from the Leonard family. What is now the 12th, though, is a hole that combines the old first and 11th holes. It is a tough hole, playing uphill into the prevailing wind - and, in all likelihood, could become the new index one.

There is great character on the holes on the homeward run; the motorway, which was primarily responsible for the upgrading, skirts the 13th green and 14th tee but, in the main, is barely noticeable.

There is great diversity on this homeward stretch. The 14th, a long par four, followed by the 15th, a short par four, and on to the 17th, a par three of over 200 yards that demands an accurate uphill tee-shot and, finally, the 18th that runs downhill back towards the fine clubhouse that was rebuilt in 1991.

And, yet, it is probably the approach shots over the Whitechurch river to the fourth and sixth greens which will remain as the really memorable holes.

McEvoy's brief, he recalls, was "to create a playable course on which members were not to be too heavily tested but which still had the ability to challenge."

It can be said that he has achieved this mix, and the greens - which are not nearly as undulating as those on other McEvoy-designed courses but which still manage to use the nuances of the surrounding Dublin mountains to good effect - are indeed of an exceptionally high quality.

"I didn't change the lay-out of the course but there was a knock-on effect from the motorway which required some shunting," said McEvoy. "It was a case of trying to make the best with the acreage, and we nudged and changed some things in the upgrading and, in the end, we're very pleased with how it has turned out."

Edmondstown's progressive approach is symptomatic of that adopted by many other Irish clubs, which, in McEvoy's view, is quite at variance with the approach of clubs in Britain.

"I think one of the reasons for the difference is that Ireland is very much a tourist golf market and there is a requirement for excellence. For some reason, very few golfing tourists think of England as a location for a golfing holiday - instead, they are more inclined to go to Ireland or to Scotland," said McEvoy.

While Edmondstown's reasons for upgrading may have been forced upon them to some extent, and they would certainly welcome visiting golfers (there is an open week planned for the last week in May) and societies and corporate days, the main reason for the redeveloping the course was to give the members a course of which to be proud. It can be said that such is the case.

As Kutner remarked, "I'm absolutely delighted."

And why wouldn't he be?