Cabot Highlands in Scotland reveals the name and logo for its new Tom Doak-designed layout.
Cabot Highlands in Inverness, Scotland, has chosen a name for its new Tom Doak-designed course that is now scheduled to open for preview play in 2025: Old Petty.
The name is a nod to the Old Petty Church, which was built in 1839 and sits off what will become the 16th green. The now-unused church is believed to sit at the site of an even older church, and the Old Petty Church is reported to have hosted an unusual custom: Mourners in the early 1800s would run to the church’s graveyard during funerals while carrying the coffin.
The logo for the new Old Petty course will be the highland cow, or “Hairy Coo” as the locals call them.
Cabot revealed the logo, based on a highland cow, for Old Petty, the new course being built by Tom Doak in Scotland. (Courtesy of Cabot)
Cabot revealed Doak’s planned routing for Old Petty last summer, with holes passing a 400-year-old castle that provided the previous name for the property, Castle Stuart, before the Canadian-based Cabot bought it and rebranded the northern Scottish resort in 2022.
Old Petty will be on the southwest side of the property’s original Castle Stuart Golf Links built by Mark Parsinen and Gil Hanse, which ranks as the No. 4 modern course in Great Britain and Ireland. Built on land that was previously farmed, Old Petty will wrap down and around an estuary, offering stunning views and a layout that crisscrosses in a huge shared fairway for Nos. 1 and 18.
Cabot also plans to extend the unique white clubhouse to include a new whiskey and cigar bar, a clubhouse grill bar and a chophouse restaurant.
Check out several recent illustrations that provide a glimpse at how Old Petty might look.
Proximity to the ocean and climate change might be too much for this once-proud club to overcome.
Alnmouth Village Golf Club has long entranced visitors with its collection of holes nestling up against the North Sea. The club, which sits about 30 miles north of Newcastle-on-Tyne on the northeastern portion of England, was established in 1869, making it the oldest nine-hole links in England.
Designed by 1874 Open Championship Mungo Park, who was also the club’s first greenskeeper, the course has views of Alnmouth Bay and Coquet Island.
Unfortunately, the proximity to the ocean and climate change might be too much for this once-proud club to overcome.
According to a story by the BBC, large sections of turf have started to fall into the sea, and many of the club’s members are starting to worry this problem might be insurmountable.
Fears as coastal erosion caused sections of a historic golf course to fall into the sea. The 150 year old Alnmouth Village Golf Club was affected by spring tides. More 1830 BBC Look North. pic.twitter.com/T3LoYKklsL
In fact, the club’s secretary, Ian Simpson, told the news station, “We will eventually lose the golf course if nothing is done.”
Here’s more from the story:
Treasurer John Graham, who has been a member of the club for 65 years, said: “We had a big problem in the early 1960s near the boathouse. The sea got in and it destroyed about 15 yards.
“There was more trouble in the 1990s, but we had some pipes buried and we had marram grass planted and that stabilised that area.
“But where the problem is now – what we call link end – we’ve never had an issue there before.”
Councillor Gordon Castle said the situation is “very concerning.”
“I’ve contacted the cabinet member for the environment at Northumberland County Council to see if it is possible that money allocated for coastal erosion could be used to protect this spot,” he said.
“It is worth noting that there has been many changes to the coast over the years, and not all of it can be prevented.”
These photos of the new Tom Doak-designed course at Te Arai Links will leave you dreaming of New Zealand.
Read this story, check out the photos below and then make time to search airfares to New Zealand, because architect Tom Doak’s new North Course at Te Arai Links opened this week.
Doak spent months on the seaside ground about 90 minutes north of Auckland, fashioning a complement to the resort’s highly rated South Course which was designed by Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw and opened in 2022. Doak’s routing features seven holes along the Pacific Ocean, with the others flowing into what had been a pine forest on sand dunes high above the beach.
Doak, famous for layouts such as Pacific Dunes at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort in Oregon and Ballyneal in Colorado among others, also built the ultra-private Tara Iti Golf Club just up the road. By contrast, Te Arai Links offers public-access play as well as private memberships, with private and public play alternating days on the North and South courses.
Doak was hands-on for this project, climbing onto the equipment to shape many of the greens himself during his two-month stay during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2022. Doak worked with shapers Angela Moser, Clyde Johnson and Brian Slawnik.
“I’m still not that great on the dozer, but I do love it,” Doak said in a media release announcing news of the opening. “Some of the results are pretty wild, like the greens at 7 and 4. Maybe too severe at first glance. But in the end, they looked really cool and we all agreed: Let’s keep that.
“To be honest, for this course to be spoken of equally, alongside the South Course, we felt we had to do more with the golf. This is legitimately great inland terrain – pure sand and dunesy, with big undulations. But we couldn’t rely on that. We agreed that if we’re going to produce something different, we should probably be a bit edgier. The overall shaping, greens and fairways, speak to that, I think.”
No. 11 of the North Course at Te Arai Links in New Zealand (Courtesy of Te Arai Links/Ricky Robinson)
The media release pointed out that Doak created several half-par holes on the 6,931-yard layout.
“At one point, we had the potential of five or six par 5s out there,” Doak said. “The course will play to a par of 71, but the routing does affect difficulty. There are some very strong par 4s on this golf course. Good short ones, too – but some real beasts. The reality is, everything on the North Course remains very close to the ocean. On any given day, each of the 18 holes can play completely differently depending on wind direction. That’s what golf by the sea is all about.”
Doak and the construction team also discovered, preserved and showcased a former Māori fort, a defensive fortification known as a pa, between the fifth tee and sixth green. It’s all part of an effort to make the property have as much of a New Zealand feel as possible.
There are further expansions planned for the resort as well. The members-only Bunker Bar, Ocean Restaurant, North Clubhouse and remaining luxury accommodations are on schedule to be completed by October 2024. The Ocean Restaurant at the South Course will open at the same time. Along with the South Course and its clubhouse, the resort’s Ric’s Pizza Barn and the gigantic putting course named The Playground have been open for a year. The property’s luxurious two-bedroom cottages and suites are set well back in the dunes.
International green fees range from $400 to $650 depending on season, as posted on the resort’s website. Second rounds played on the same day have the fee reduced by half. There are discounted fees for New Zealand residents.
“It’s honestly a dream come true, for our entire team to have all 36 holes in play,” Te Arai Links managing partner Jim Rohrstaff said in the media release. “Tom Doak and Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw have each done such incredible jobs designing these two golf courses. Their work has exceeded our expectations. Yet we’re equally proud of the casual, inclusive vibe that prevails here. We wanted Te Arai Links to feel different – to welcome and engage traveling golfers but also non-golfers, spouses and kids. It really does, and that’s rare.”
Check out several photos of the North Course, taken by Ricky Robinson, below.
At least once a round a links golfer is guaranteed to get a bounce he or she doesn’t understand.
On the surface — literally the surface — playing golf in, say, the deserts of the Coachella Valley in California and playing golf on the links courses of The Open Championship couldn’t be more different.
Golf in the desert tends to be strictly target golf, with big lakes and large bunkers protecting large greens surrounded by homes at both private and public golf courses. Even in drought conditions, desert golf courses find enough water to be green while still playing firm and fast.
The links golf courses of The Open Championship, like Royal Liverpool last week, have few if any lakes or water of any kind with the exception of the occasional burn. The courses can be green or brown, depending on what the weather pattern has been in the last few months since there are no irrigation systems. The firm and fast conditions are also dependent on the weather, not the art of course setup.
The large bunkers of the desert give way on a links course to tiny pot bunkers that seem to suck a ball in from 20 yards away. And if greens in the desert are large, they are nothing compared to the typically massive putting surfaces of links courses.
But the two kinds of golf are not mutually exclusive, as the roster of winners at The Open Championship and The American Express prove. Since the tournament now known as The American Express debuted in 1960, seven players have won both a desert title and an Open Championship. Some of those names are obvious, like Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus, Johnny Miller, Phil Mickelson and David Duval. Others, like Justin Leonard and Bill Rogers, might not be as obvious.
It is the unique nature of links golf that causes the Open Championship (yes, you can call it the British Open) to be so compelling for American golf fans.
In a game where the differences in design can make a player chase a tee time on a different course, The Open Championship offers not just different designs, but a different take on the game entirely.
A view of the green on the par-4 1st hole for the 2023 Open Championship (plays as the 17th hole for the club routing) at Royal Liverpool Golf Club in Hoylake, England. (Photo: David Cannon/R&A/R&A via Getty Images)
Links courses fight back
Even in a day of powerful players and souped-up clubs and golf balls, links golf can still encourage a player to play the game along the ground. Links courses have been no more made obsolete than some of the great old courses in this country, still finding a way somehow to defend themselves against technology.
Of course, the greatest defense for a links golf course is the weather. Conditions that would shut down a PGA Tour event or send recreational golfers scurrying to the clubhouse don’t stop play in the United Kingdom. Unfortunately for the golfers at Royal Liverpool, some of those conditions appeared during the 151st Open. Wind worthy of a tropical storm and sideways rain might not be tolerated at Augusta National, but it was often the norm at this year’s Open Championship.
Links golf also requires greater patience than the typical American course. At least once a round a links golfer is guaranteed to get a bounce he or she doesn’t understand, a lie in a bunker that seems unfair or a wayward drive into an area that would take a search team to find the ball. Let that get to you, frustrate you, even anger you and your round will unravel. Accept the unfair or unforeseeable and you can still play well.
Hardcore golf fans were riveted to the television last weekend to watch Royal Liverpool and appreciate a kind of golf that just isn’t available in the United States.
But casual fans who might not understand the links game should watch these events, too.
It might not seem like “real” golf for American golfers, but the links game is actually as real as it gets in the game.
Larry Bohannan is the golf writer for The Desert Sun. You can contact him at (760) 778-4633 or at larry.bohannan@desertsun.com. Follow him on Facebook or on Twitter at @larry_bohannan.
The resort has been dubbed by some to be “a 17-Mile Drive for the southern hemisphere.” These pictures are pretty breathtaking.
Te Arai Links in New Zealand has officially opened its South Course, designed by the team of Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw on a long stretch of beach overlooking the Pacific Ocean.
The resort has been dubbed by some to be “a 17-Mile Drive for the southern hemisphere” in reference to the famed courses on California’s Monterey Peninsula that include Pebble Beach Golf Links and Cypress Point. That’s a huge hurdle of comparison to jump over, but the photos below are certainly eye-catching and any serious fan of golf travel needs to go for themselves to be the judge.
The resort plans to open its second course, the North by Tom Doak, in October. Te Arai Links follows on the well-regarded heels of the private Tara Iti Golf Club, another Doak design just up the road. The resort is less than a 2-hour drive north of Auckland on the eastern shores of New Zealand.
Te Arai Links is a resort that also includes private memberships, and resort guests will have access to the South and North on alternating days, playing one course as the members play the other. The South opened for limited preview play in October, and it is now fully open for resort play.
“We invite the Monterey Peninsula comparison because we believe it’s apt,” Jim Rohrstaff, a partner in Te Arai Links and its managing director, said in a media release announcing the full opening. “Our good friend Mike Keiser (founder of Bandon Dunes Golf Resort in Oregon) believes the South Course has as much ocean frontage as any golf course in the world. It’s that connectivity with the sea that distinguishes the South Course from most links experiences, from the golf experience in Monterey, even from Tara Iti just up the shoreline. On the South Course, the beach is just so close. There’s the visual sensation of actually seeing the waves crashing. But golfers can also hear them crashing — on more than half the holes.”
Te Arai Links includes 48 on-site suites with 19 two-bedroom cottages and six four-bedroom villas slated to be completed in the coming months. The resort also will have a 2.5-acre putting green named The Playground that wraps around a pizza barn near the South’s clubhouse and range and will serve as the resort’s communal gathering spot.
From the Scottish Highlands around to St. Andrews, a series of true links astonish with variety, playability and charm.
Where to begin?
That is not a rhetorical question. When laying out a bucket-list golf trip to Scotland, it’s a very serious query, part of a series of such questions that will follow you around the country. Where to begin? Which course next? Toughest of all: Which courses can I bear to skip?
Headed to St. Andrews? There’s a lot more on tap than the famed Old Course, 30 times the site of the British Open – ahem, Open Championship, thank you very much. Will you play the New Course, which seems a misnomer, seeing how it was built by Old Tom Morris in 1895? How about the Jubilee? The Castle, which having opened outside town in 2008 is the newest of the seven courses managed by the St. Andrews Links Trust? Maybe sample a handful of the other layouts not far from the Home of Golf?
Headed into the Highlands for a dream round at Royal Dornoch? Everyone on other courses, on the way and on social media will tell you that you can’t skip nearby Brora (I didn’t) or Tain or Golspie (I missed both, but I already am planning to return). Scouting a classic links trip to Aberdeen? You can’t miss classic links such as Royal Aberdeen, or Murcar Links or Cruden Bay or a handful of others. The options are lined up along the coast. All the coasts of Scotland, actually.
Cabot Highlands, formerly known as Castle Stuart, in Scotland (Jason Lusk/Golfweek)
Headed east? You’ll be told not to miss the courses to the west. Looking north? Don’t miss those gems to the south. Whichever point of the compass you choose and whatever address you plug into Google Maps, there will be dozens of opportunity costs – all those suggestions are correct, even if they create a totally unmanageable itinerary for a traveling golfer on a weeklong holiday.
Weeks after my recent trip, when playing with a group of Golfweek’s Best course raters in California, I barely could finish a sentence about where I played before the questions poured in: Did you play this one, and what about that one? We all process the world through the lenses of our own experiences, and that’s especially true when judging the courses somebody else is, or is not, playing.
The 18th green of the Old Course at St. Andrews sits close enough to the street and town that the afternoon shadows of old buildings stretch across the putting surface. (Jason Lusk/Golfweek)
Such was the quandary when I started planning this trip to Scotland. I was lucky, because I knew where I would begin. American course designer Tom Doak is building a new course at Castle Stuart near Inverness, which is being rebranded as Cabot Highlands after its recent acquisition by Canadian company Cabot. I would begin there to hear Doak discuss his plans as well as to sample the original course at the resort.
But from there? I had options. Too many options. The names of famous Scottish links courses roll on and on, and it would take months to see even half of what I had in mind. I had only 12 days on the ground, so I enlisted the help of course booking provider Golfbreaks and the local experts at VisitScotland.com to help set up a trip that would venture high into the Highlands before swinging back down the coast, east to Aberdeen and eventually into St. Andrews.
Scotland, of course, is where the game as we know it was invented, and the best of it is all about links golf in particular. Firm, fast and sometimes almost entirely natural – I coveted the links experience. Of the 550 or so total golf courses in Scotland, fewer than 90 might be classified as true links, depending on one’s given definition – there is great debate among academics and clubhouse drunks about what constitutes a proper links. On this trip I was lucky enough to experience 11 examples. Each was distinctive, and don’t dare think of links golf as some uniform game, because it is the definitive opposite of that. The conditions might be similar, but each layout shines on its own, each bouncy shot promising something unexpected.
Street view in St. Andrews (Jason Lusk/Golfweek)
I played courses that are famed worldwide, and several that are less known outside Scotland. I played in sunshine and rain, wind and calm. I played well, and I played poorly. The only constants were the courses, the terrain and coastlines flashing through my exhausted head each night in whatever accommodations I had scheduled. The trip included planes, trains, buses, shuttles and a blue Skoda SUV – “Keep left, keep left, keep left,” I had to remind myself at the start of each drive on skinny, winding roads, because I couldn’t bear the thought of missing my next round of golf due to something so mundane as a car crash.
There were a lot of miles, a lot of different beds, a lot of nerves in the car. So many good courses, too many bad swings. And it was all perfect.
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Eamon Lynch has a few thoughts about where links golf should fit in to the run-up to the British Open, and how players might feel about it.
Isn’t it about time the British Open had a links-golf season?
Eamon Lynch takes a look at the field make-up for the Irish Open and Scottish Open, played the past two weeks on the European Tour and draws some conclusions about using the events as preparation for next week’s 149th British Open at Royal St. George’s.
How much do players really enjoy the kind of links golf they found at this week’s Scottish Open (versus how much viewers enjoy watching them on true links-style courses)? Should there be more on the schedule? Give Lynch’s argument on the subject a listen.
The latest episode of Eamon’s Corner can be watched above.
