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The Irish golf odyssey

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I've spent much of this past week procrastinating, overwhelmed at the prospect of trying to convey the vivid memories of my recent Irish adventure in the various shades of gray of a computer screen. The numbers aren't so elusive -- six courses in four days with three friends. So much harder to capture is the feeling of the trip. It's like writing about a lost first love or a beloved boyhood pet. This afternoon, when I should have been tickling the keyboard, I chose instead to sit on my front steps, throwing the tennis ball to Duke, my beloved German shepherd. Then the mail arrived, with a jolt: Tucked in with bills and the usual miscellanea was a glossy brochure of Irish golf, pictures splashed across the thick pages in almost pornographic detail. Instantly I was transported back to the evocative linksland, the baked turf crunching beneath my feet, the heath giving off an intoxicating, musty scent. Anyone who has had the privilege of playing in Scotland or Ireland or certain parts of England knows that their great courses have an unmistakable, unforgettable look and feel -- a living, breathing landscape of shaggy dunes, serpentine fairways, diabolically perched greens and, always, the sparkling sea just beyond.

MAIL CALL Reflecting on the Misadventure at Bighorn, I have but one question: If they wanted a lefty, why didn't they just invite Phil Mickelson? What the hell is going on? You are not doing Mail Call anymore? One of the best parts of reading your crap is the off chance that you will answer some of our questions or comment on some of our grumbling. Your column is less fun now, and I guess I will soon quit searching for it. Too bad; I used to enjoy it. —Bill Lonsford, Montgomery, Ala. Despite reports to the contrary, Mail Call lives on. As for the grumbling noted above, well, some things never change ... What a snide and mean-spirited article you wrote on Colin Montgomerie. Even the "meaningless" Euro tour got some of your sneering. You are writing about golf and golfers -- try not to dumb it down for easy tabloid reading. —Eric Paisley, Wilmington, N.C. On the same topic, Paul Coffey of San Francisco writes, "The guy just won the Irish Open (a European tour event) three weeks before the Open Championship! Talk of his demise is perhaps a little premature, talk of his retirement is poppycock! (Note: Seve Ballesteros is still playing!)" Seve is still playing ... exactly my point. Monty should get out while he still has a shred of dignity. Watching Seve's weekly requiem is almost too painful for words. Of course, by now I'm used to guys like Paul and Eric venting on me. Far more unsettling are the following e-mails: Hello from Oslo, Norway. Just wanted to show my appreciation for a golf reporter who is able to convey his love for the game through his articles. Reading your articles puts me in a good, life-loving mood. —"Golf enthusiast" Thor Jusnes, Oslo As if that wasn't disturbing enough, this came through the other day: Read your column for the first time recently and loved it. I'm 72, female, widowed and think myself a writer. You remind me of Damon Runyon in your pure enjoyment of sport. I'm sure you had a tortured childhood with that last name, which may have honed your humorous view of "the great ones." Keep up the good work, young man, and keep up the good living as well. And thanks for a most pleasant read. —M. Kreyer, Pratt, Kan. Damon Runyan? Aahhh, Ms. Kreyer, you sure know how to sweet-talk a fella. I just wish I were 82 and not 28 ...

Flipping through this brochure I suddenly remembered the tingly feeling of standing on the first tee at Ballybunion Old, with a graveyard over one shoulder and the ghost of Tom Watson on the other, whispering to me about what he calls the finest course in the world. With a rush, I am once again standing in the vertiginous, valley-like fairway of the famous Klondyke at Lahinch, a par-5 with a green hidden behind a towering sand dune. To rip a 5-iron directly over the aiming rock and then scurry anxiously to the top of the dune like a latter-day Edmund Hillary to get a first, unexpected glimpse of the eagle putt that awaits is, I assure you, the high point of this or any other golfing life.

Of course, more than just the nerve-jangling, golf flickers across the movie screen of my memory. Sitting here at my desk I can once again taste lager so thick it's possible to chip a tooth on the foam and I can feel the enveloping handshakes of the locals, including a fellow we met with the unforgettable name of Paddy O'Looney. I am reminded of the sheer terror of roaring around rough hewn roads no wider than a cart path in a Ferrari-red minivan strewn with discarded PowerBar wrappers, apple cores, dirty socks, an eclectic pile of CDs boasting everything from Dylan to Wyclef, and windows perennially steamed from the aftershocks of those infernal Irish breakfasts.

Yes, it was an epic road trip, and it all came about because of a 30th birthday. My colleague Matt Ginella, an assistant editor in the Sports Illustrated photo department, was hitting the big 3-0 three days before the Open Championship was to commence. Matt looks at every roll of film shot by every SI snapper from every tournament on the calendar. Clearly, the man is accustomed to seeing good golf, and thus a trip to Ireland was hatched to console him in his time of need. (That my wedding anniversary falls the day after his birthday was deemed incidental.) Joining us as wingmen were two old friends -- Todd Curran, whom Matt has known since they attended high school together in the wine country north of San Francisco, and Kevin Price, a best friend of mine since the days when we terrorized Bo Peep Pre-School in Salinas, Calif.

We all rendezvoused at the Shannon airport, the hub of Southwest Ireland, and made the twisty drive to the tiny hamlet of Doonbeg, ideally situated in County Clare half an hour south of Lahinch and a ferry ride to the north of Ballybunion. After a late dinner, we were beckoned by a little bandbox of a pub. Directly across the street from our guesthouse, An Tintean, this joint was jumpin' even though it was well past midnight. It was not a meat market, but rather a place for gray-haired neighbors and friends to meet and greet. In the corner, a couple of fossils were keeping the beat with a banjo and a set of spoons, and the whole pub was singing along to whatever song was offered up by any of the sodden patrons. Among our little group of jet-lagged Yanks, only Matt had the Spaldings to bust out with a tune. But his choice was regrettable, to say the least: The Gambler, popularized by Kenny Rogers, of all people. The whole scene was utterly charming and couldn't have served as a more perfect welcome to the Emerald Isle.

Hitting the links

The next morning we stumbled out of bed and onto the panorama of the elevated first tee at the Doonbeg Golf Club. We had been granted a special sneak preview; the course will actually be inaugurated next spring, a gala opening more than a hundred years in the making. According to local legend, the officers of the Scottish Black Watch Regiment, stationed in Limerick, selected the towering dunesland of Doonbeg in 1892 as the ideal place to build a golf course, but the idea was abandoned owing to its remote location. Instead, the SBWR settled on a site in Lahinch, which was much closer to the rail service of the day. A century later, the good people of Landmark National, in association with Kiawah Resort Associates, rekindled the plans, bringing in Greg Norman to identify, rather that build, 18 holes. The result is destined to become a neo-classic.

What's that shadow on the beach? Our intrepid correspondent, who missed this fairway at Doonbeg by just a tad. All photos by Matt Ginella

Standing on the first tee, you can see a crescent-shaped bay that stretches for nearly two miles. Framed by towering dunes, it calls to mind Scotland's great Machrihanish. What awaits is a rollicking, dramatic, punishing track. Golf in Scotland and Ireland is always a bit spartan, absent the usual comforts of home, like water fountains, bathrooms, yardage markers and beer-cart girls. This was something else altogether -- the holes at Doonbeg don't even have official yardages yet, the tee boxes are still shaggy, the greens still growing in. And yet this natural, primitive state was all the more appropriate for such a wild and wooly links. I'm not sure I've ever trespassed across a course that begins and ends with such memorable holes. Between the knockout punch of 1 and 18 -- a lurch par-5 with a green set amidst an amphitheater of dunes and a long par-4 that doglegs around the bay, respectively -- are three of my favorite holes in Ireland: the short par-4 fifth, playing from an elevated fairway down to a green hard against the sea; the little par-3 14th that channels Pebble's seventh and is, quite simply, the most fun you can have with your spikes on; and the unforgettable 15th, a long, brutal par-4 playing to an elevated green hidden among ever more dunes. Remember Doonbeg. It should be part of your next trip to Ireland.

By the time we putted out on the 18th we were already late for our tee time at Lahinch, and the drive was all the slower for the regional fair we had to cross, the streets crowded with revelers and artisans. It was after 5 o'clock when we pulled up to the Lahinch parking lot, but no matter. There was more than enough daylight for a leisurely 18. Lahinch is where Jim Finegan begins his indispensable Irish travelogue Emerald Fairways and Foam-Flecked Seas, and no wonder -- it is quirky and confounding and just plain magical. Old Tom Morris helped lay out the course in the 1890s, and in 1928 it was improved considerably by Dr. Alister MacKenzie, who would declare, "Lahinch will make the finest and most popular course that I, or I believe anyone else, ever constructed." Who am I to argue?

Shipnuck seemed to spend more time on sand at Doonbeg than on grass.

The fourth through the 12th at Lahinch is as good and varied and challenging -- as fun -- a nine holes as exist anywhere in the world. After playing the confounding Klondyke, the fifth, you then step to the tee of the Dell, a blind par-3. Again, there is only an aiming rock and the suspense of the unknown. These holes are not for everyone -- Kevin, the purist among us, was less than impressed. I, however, love these kind of quirks and shall defer in my praise to the preeminent golf historian, Herbert Warren Wind, who has written, "These may be defective holes in this day and age but at Lahinch they are absolutely right: two living museum pieces, two perfect Irish holes." And yet, the course is really just beginning. We putted out on 18 under a Technicolor sunset, exhausted and exhilarated from the 36-hole bender. There would be no pub on this night.

The next morning we began working our way south to Ballybunion. I may have enjoyed Lahinch more but Ballybunion is undoubtedly a sterner test. In addition to vertiginous dunesland, it has the toughest greens I've ever seen on a links course -- some turtlebacked, some with false edges, a couple tilting away from the fairway, and all so steeply pitched that if you were playing in slippers you might slide right off the green.

Birthday gifts

Fortuitously, our trip to Ballybunion came on Matt's birthday, and he got a couple of presents. In all the excitement we had forgotten to request caddies in advance, so the starter rustled up one experienced looper to carry double and ... drum roll ... a couple of 14-year-old girls, both well into the pre-heartbreaker stage. The two were shy and awkward and totally endearing, and they spent most of the round picking wildflowers and gossiping about the local boys. With Todd, Kevin, Matt and I having regressed into some sort of prehistoric lad culture, theirs was a presence that was sorely needed. Thus inspired, Ginella birdied the first hole, present No. 2.

Like Pebble Beach, Ballybunion begins with a series of playable holes and then really turns all-world at No. 6. From here on it's nothing less than a series of perfect holes and outrageous shots. Thirty years earlier Wind marauded across Ireland and wrote a hugely influential article for The New Yorker basically introducing Irish golf to the masses. "Ballybunion," he declared, "revealed itself to be nothing less than the finest seaside course I have ever seen."

Driving in Ireland presented its own unique set of challenges.

How do you follow up a place like that? With the wildest day of the trip, that's how. It began early in the morning -- OK, it was like 10:30 -- at the Tralee Golf Club. We knew we were in trouble when, by way of hello, the starter told us, "Ay, she wun't designed for wind like this." Built in 1984 by a couple of Americans, Arnold Palmer and Ed Seay, the front nine at Tralee is a headlands stroll, perched on cliffs high above a beach pretty enough to have been the backdrop for much of Ryan's Daughter. The back nine at Tralee is the source of much conversation, but the front gets off to a wondrous start -- the second hole was one of best par-5s of the trip, a big dogleg right skirting a cove and framed, on its left edge, by a centuries-old rock wall; and the par-3 third is a jewel, its rolling green backed by a centuries-old Tudor gun turret.

Things take a darker turn once you plunge into the Warren, the rugged dunesland that is home to holes 11-17. With the exception of a couple of desert courses in the U.S., this is the most extreme golfing terrain I've seen, so feral we spent parts of the home nine following the progress of a red fox out searching for a late lunch. On a nice day the backside of Tralee would probably be a fun, if maddening, test. We caught it in 40- to 50-mph winds, and it was all but unplayable. On the par-3 13th, which is all of 150 yards, Todd hit a driver, god bless him. The only goal the rest of the way was to keep the ball on the planet.

After a perfunctory anniversary call to my better half from the clubhouse, we piled back into the van to road-trip to Waterville, along the jaw-dropping Ring of Kerry, which is basically the Highway 1 of Ireland. Tralee to Waterville is a three-hour drive, but we did it in two, screeching into the Waterville parking lot just after 6 p.m. In the pro shop we were asked if we still wanted to play. Before I had the chance to answer, the boys had already planted their pegs on the first tee.

Waterville is at the tip of the remote Inveragh Peninsula, which dangles off the palm of Ireland like a dislocated finger. In part because of its isolation, Waterville is Tiger Woods' favorite place to tune up for the Open Championship. Having now played it, I can further understand his love of the course. Waterville is Big Golf, long, unrelenting and less capricious than what you get at a classic links. There are dunes aplenty, but they are not so much in play as incredibly scenic backdrops.

In Ireland you find a lot of shortish, easy par-5s, but not so at Waterville. The 550-yard 18th, running along the beach, is one of the great finishing holes in golf, but that is just one brute among many. By the time we holed out, in the dark, we were all near delirium. Leaving Tralee, soggy from the rain and dispirited by the late hour, there had been talk of abandoning the long journey to Waterville, but now we were grateful for having followed through on the longest, hairiest day of golf any of us had ever experienced. Every road trip needs a motto, and ours was, "That's good for the game of golf." (The lyrics from Wyclef's Gentleman's Club also got a lot of play.) If someone golfed their ball with particular panache, the chorus would begin, three Yanks croaking, "That's good for the game of golf," all in bad Irish brogues. Anyway, pulling away from Waterville we all agreed that this epic day had been good for the game of golf.

The fearsome foursome (from left to right) at Old Head: Shipnuck, Curran, Price, Ginella

Scarcely 12 hours later, after another fingernails-in-the-dashboard drive, we pulled onto the wondrous promontory that is home to Old Head Golf Links, surely the most audacious development in the recent annals of golf course construction. The whole layout is basically built on the edge of a cliff, hundreds of feet above the sea. There can be no doubt that Old Head is the most visually spectacular course in the world, even more so than my beloved Pebble Beach. The 564-yard 12th hole, in particular, must be seen to be believed. It sweeps left around a rocky cove, taunting golfers with a sheer rock wall that easily drops 300 feet to a churning azure sea. It looks like one of those Bud Chapman paintings -- you know, where the tee is on one side of the Grand Canyon, the green on the other. Funny thing is, the 12th is not even a very good hole. When we arrived at the tee the caddies grumbled that the markers should have been moved up another 100 yards, and we soon found out why -- playing into a hurricane, none of us could even reach the landing area, though Matt's heroic drive stuck in the grassy hillside just below the fairway (he went on to make an impossible par, the best hole any of us played all trip). Of course, we're not the only displaced Yanks to struggle at Old Head. A couple of days earlier Phil Mickelson had played the course in an even stronger wind and, according to one of the caddies, hung up a sporty 89. Mark Calcavecchia was also on site and is reputed to have spent most of the day tossing clubs.

Old Head will do that to you. Despite the unparalleled setting I counted only two truly great holes -- the fourth and the second, both plunging par-4s hugging the cliffs. Then there is this: Old Head is the only course we visited with a beer-cart girl. Enough said.

Reviewing the favorites

So there it is, the Cliffs Notes on an outrageous journey. Those who have the moral courage to follow would be wise to contact South West Ireland Golf Limited (SWING), a group of absurdly helpful folks who arranged the details of our trip and will be glad to do the same for you. The thing about a journey like this is that it haunts you forevermore. I am (or perhaps I should say, my wife is) constantly having to interrupt little reveries, like, say, a recent internal debate about where the best view in Southwest Ireland is -- from the sixth tee at Doonbeg or the ninth tee at Lahinch, the 17th tee at Ballybunion, the 16th tee at Tralee, the 18th tee at Waterville or the 12th tee at Old Head? There are no definitive answers, only golden memories. For those who have gone before us, and those that will dare to follow, below is a personal list of favorite holes, with input from Kevin, Todd, and Matt. Let the great debate begin ...

Par-5s

No. 5 Lahinch
No. 16 Ballybunion
No. 18 Waterville
No. 2 Trale
No. 1 Doonbeg
No. 11 Waterville
No. 17 Old Head

Par-4s

No. 15 Doonbeg
No. 7 Lahinch
No. 11 Ballybunion
No. 12 Lahinch
No. 4 Old Head
No. 5 Doonbeg
No. 10 Tralee
No. 2 Old Head
No. 18 Doonbeg
No. 18 Ballybunion
No. 13 Lahinch
No. 2 Waterville
No. 4 Lahinch
No. 14 Tralee

Par-3s

No. 14 Doonbeg
No. 6 Lahinch
No. 8 Ballybunion
No. 3 Tralee
No. 17 Waterville
No. 15 Ballybunion

And now, my highly subjective ranking of the six courses we played on the trip. Keep in mind that this is akin to trying to choose between Miss April and Miss May. So ...

1. Lahinch
2. Ballybunion (Old)
3. Doonbeg
4. Waterville
5. Tralee
6. Old Head
7. Heaven

Sports Illustrated senior writer Alan Shipnuck periodically waxes about life On Tour for CNNSI.com. Click here to send him a question or a nice, friendly comment.

 

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