Surviving Golf’s Toughest Test – The Carnoustie Preview

Nish: 0:00

Every story has an ending. Does our quest to play the top 100 courses in 10 years have a good ending? I’m Nish. I’m Chris. I’m Jim. And we’re here to guide you through this golfing journey. This is the top 100 in 10 golf podcast. But we’ve got to get a picture of us with our shoes off in the bird, right? Hopefully people who’ve played this course, Chris. You’ve played this before. I’ve played this before, yeah. Or like the toughest mile in golf. I’ve been decent recently with our bunkers. But you know, yeah, any last wishes before. Episode 49. Surviving Golf’s toughest test. The Carnoustie preview. Carnousti is the only place on earth where you can hit four perfect shots and still end up in a burn, a bunker, and a mild existential crisis. It’s Golf’s version of a black comedy. Just ask Jean Van der Velder, who went from champion in waiting to part-time fisherman on the 18th hole. It’s psychological warfare in tartan trousers. This is the course where Par feels like victory, bogey feels like mercy, and Jean van der Velde felt the full range of human motion in six short minutes. Carnoustie doesn’t host championships, it eats egos for breakfast and reputations for lunch. Now that’s good job we’ve got neither of those things now.

Chris: 1:17

Oh yeah, ego. Sorry, I forgot about Nish.

Nish: 1:21

Now before we get into the teeth of what is a very fearsome golf course. Car nasty, I think. Locally known as Car Nasty. Please can I ask you just to hit subscribe on YouTube or wherever you’re listening to this podcast so we can get a little bit of extra clout with the clubs. And it just helps us do things like expand our production. I really, really would like to get some new mics to improve the uh the sound quality so you can hear us that much better. Uh, but if you could do that, that would be absolutely wonderful. Thank you so much. Now back to the episode discussing what is a proper big boy Carnoustie, car nasty. We sent you sent me a message, Chris, just this week saying, Holy fuck, we’re at Carnoustie in two weeks. And then we’ve obviously been watching it on Alfred Dunhill Links Championship. It’s a regular on the open rotor. Yeah, it’s hosted the open eight times, I believe. It’s actually one of the most ever. Yeah, we and adding to all of that, I’ll tell you how the book came about. So there is a gentleman called Paul who is an avid listener of the podcast, and we were chatting, I think it started off chatting about Gleneagles. He just messaged me saying, Oh, you know, I’ve heard it and wanted to share some thoughts. And we started kind of just generally chatting anyway, and then his friend Barry was messaging me at the same time. Now they both had have similar things that they’re trying to do. They’re both trying to play every single golf course in Scotland, and they’re doing it for charity.

Chris: 2:54

Yeah. I mean, we thought what we were doing was pretty mental, but that is just that’s fine, isn’t it? How many do you know how many golf courses there are in Scotland?

Nish: 3:02

I don’t know, but I think roughly what? There’s got to be six, seven hundred golf courses in Scotland. Yeah. And I think Paul’s past 500 now. Wow. So unbelievable effort. Now Paul does it as it happened, so they’re both doing it for charity, and I’ll run through the charities in a second. But as I was chatting to both of them, I kind of got an idea that they were they might have known each other, but you don’t want to say anything really because you don’t know, and you think, oh, it could be like are they like rivals or what’s that?

Chris: 3:33

But like so much of that, they’re just like ringing up golf clubs, like cancelling the tea times before they play. That’s very similar handles on Instagram.

Nish: 3:41

So so uh uh Barry is doing his challenge for uh kidney research. That’s a cause that’s dear to my heart because my mum had a renal transplant and she got amazing care. So I remember speaking to Barry and I was like, I’m gonna I’m gonna donate to to your to your charity because uh it’s it’s a cause close to my heart. And then I was talking to Paul, and Paul was is uh fundraising for Parkinson’s, and that’s another cause that’s close to my heart because my dad, my dad had Parkinson, unfortunately passed away because of it. So you know I kind of felt and I said to them, I feel like I’ve got a something kind of in common, not really, but like you know, there’s something there, like uh uh, but I want to support you in your journey, and yeah, and we just kind of chatted, yeah. And I think it was uh another few months down the line, and and Paul would just message a little bit every now and again, and he said, Do you fancy coming and playing Carnoustie? And I was like, Yeah, actually, I really do, and I you say it, but it was one of those things where he just I mean, I didn’t know who was a member Carnoustie at all until he mentioned that, and it’s like, Yeah, actually, we’d we’d really love to. And you know what? He’s been brilliant organizing it because he’s kind of he was like, I’ll set 15 alarms to sit remind me I can make sure I book the tea time and giving us loads of tips and like you know, you can look to stay here and all that kind of thing. So uh, Paul, I know you listen, so you know, from the bottom of our hearts, thank you. We’re we probably won’t be this effusive in our praise when we see you. Effusive or abusive. Yeah, it wouldn’t be a bit of gentle ribbon when we see you because you know we’ve got to add a little bit of spice to it, but no, thank you, Paul. Honestly, it it it really does mean the world to us. Um, and we actually can’t wait to meet him. I mean, yeah, very excited about this. Yeah, first and the course, yeah, you know, so it’s ranked 12 on our list.

Chris: 5:23

I mean, it’s the first open rota course we played, and it’s yeah, it’s it’s it’s one of the big boys as well, isn’t it, right? Oh, yeah.

Jim: 5:30

You just think back to Van De Velde.

Nish: 5:32

Yeah, everybody knows that. It’s an iconic.

Jim: 5:34

We talked about it earlier on this year, didn’t we?

Nish: 5:36

We did, yeah.

Chris: 5:37

But I think that’s got to be the most iconic golf shot of all time. Yeah, that that’s that’s that’s that’s an image of golf shots.

Nish: 5:45

You know, there’s there’s a few things that are open related that really are burning to your memory, and that’s that melted. Ian Baker Finch’s pink shirt at Birkdale. Like that’s that’s burned on your memory, isn’t it? Like, what else really are we thinking?

Chris: 5:57

A couple of couple of shots Tiger Wood shots at the Masters, that putt and chip.

Nish: 6:02

Everybody knows that moment and also the legendary Peter Aliss’s commentary when it was happening, you just could not believe what was happening. You know, just you felt like I mean Peter Aliss had that kind of almost wicked style to his commentary as well, where it was like it’s he was laughing at him as well. Yeah, yeah. We almost sort of felt he was like, Oh god, I’ve had my fun now. Kind of feel like we should just put our arm around him, yeah, and just yeah, I don’t know. It was yeah, it was an interesting, interesting development that wasn’t it. I mean, and I I’ve actually have got a bit of chat sorry, John, I’ve got a bit of chapter and verse about your your meltdown. But I mean, if anybody doesn’t know about this, what you do and listen to a golf podcast, but this chat switch off now, please.

Chris: 6:47

He was French, wasn’t he?

Nish: 6:48

Jean Van de velde was French, wasn’t he? Or was he Belgian? Not sure. I think he was French. Good question, and he had a three-shot lead walking down the 18th. Yeah, the first t-shot went into the rough. Yeah, yeah. His second t-shot went into the grandstand and then bounced back into the rough. So lucky at that point, yeah, yeah. He then topped his next one into the burn. He then goes, did he take a drop out of the burn? He must have had to take a drop out of the burn. They went into a bunker. I thought he took his golf shoes off and he went into the bottom.

Chris: 7:27

Because he placed them up on the side and then he was climbing down.

Nish: 7:29

Yeah, yeah. And then so he ended up triple bogeying, that’s his lead’s gone. Yeah, ends up in a playoff with Paul Lawrie.

Chris: 7:35

Who we’ve also met on this on this uh tour, haven’t we?

Nish: 7:37

Yeah, and who by the way, poor Laurie was 10 shots back at one point. On the final day. On the final day, yeah. And so it’s the biggest unbeknownst to one and in the undercurrent of all of this, that’s the biggest final round comeback in major history, 10 shots back. Wow. Which is bonkers. That’s lost in this triple bogey nightmare. I mean, I didn’t know that.

Chris: 8:00

Oh, yeah, I knew I thought it was probably one of my earliest golfing memories, that maybe not earliest, but it’s certainly one of the ones that’s most ingrained on there. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Nish: 8:08

It’s like in in like perfect like woods territory, wasn’t it? That time, yeah. So, yeah, it was a perfect like it was this tragic event playing out in front of your eyes, and you did feel like just give him a hug. Somebody I have to say, what’s his caddy during the during during this whole thing? Like, you should just be like, put your fucking shoes back on and I’ll take a drop.

Jim: 8:29

Yeah, yeah, yeah. My 10% is not looking quite so good anymore.

Nish: 8:33

But they asked him, they said that in hindsight now. Nobody go business class love. They asked him in hindsight, like, would you have taken uh this is years later, would you have taken a like just a two iron off the off that team? He said, the way that that hole went that day and the way that my round was going that day, I probably still would have put that two iron in a in a bunker or a bird. I don’t think I think it’s which is a wonderful way of reacting to something like that, which I think only a golfer could do. Only a golfer could look at it and go, Yeah, I probably still would have done that, would have been that equally bad. So yeah, yeah. Now, talking to people who’ve played this course, Chris, you’ve played this before.

Chris: 9:11

I have played this before, yeah.

Nish: 9:12

Go on then, tell us a little bit about it. In fact, we’ll just let Chris talk now for the next one. Yeah, yeah. So I mean, yeah, I can’t remember what I played.

Chris: 9:20

I played it in wasn’t competitive, it wasn’t competitive golf, it was I don’t know, it must it was my dad, so I don’t know why we were there, it must have been some sort of charity day or something. Um but yeah, I mean, I all I remember is there’s a lot of water in places where you don’t want the water to be. Okay, so like it’s quite intimidating, so it can be quite intimidating off the T, I’d say, probably most of the way around. There’s quite a lot of out of bounds as well, which is a bit sneaky. Yeah, yeah. Um and then the bunkers are challenging, and that’s that’s a nice way of putting it. Some of those bunkers are like we’ve not really played any of the the brutally bunkered courses yet.

Nish: 10:00

This is I think the Paul’s own words. Stay out of the fucking bunkers they’re a fucking nightmare. Yeah, yeah.

Chris: 10:07

I mean, there’s yeah, there’s there’s three, maybe four evils at Carnoustie there’s the bunkers, yeah, the Barry Burn. Yeah, the Barry Burn, the out of bounds, and then just the wind, right? So I mean if the wind’s up, we’ve had it. Yeah, yeah.

Nish: 10:21

It’s yeah, I mean Tiger Woods are to wolf around there as well, and open, so but it’s incredibly, incredibly beautiful.

Chris: 10:29

Not the not the scenery, but the actual course itself is stunning. Like it’s it’s so it’s also a history fest, right?

Nish: 10:36

You know, eight opens that that we’ve had there, that the winner’s list is unbelievable. Like it’s Podrick Harrington’s one there, yeah, yeah. Paul Lawrie’s one there, yeah, Tom Watson’s one there.

Chris: 10:48

Padraig Harrison was the first Irishman to win the open at that point, wasn’t he? Which is pretty wild. Was he? I’m pretty sure he was, yeah. Wow, that might need fact checking, but I’m pretty sure when he won that open, he was the first Irishman to win the open. Let’s not, because somebody on social media will tell us. Someone will tell us.

Nish: 11:03

Wow, that’s phenomenal. It’s pretty mad, that isn’t it?

Chris: 11:05

Yeah, it’s pretty mad.

Nish: 11:07

Gary Player, previous winner. I mean, Tom Watson’s won five opens, so like Gary Player, unbelievable legend of the game. Ben Hogan. Full odd legend of the game.

Chris: 11:16

Well, I mean, there’s Hogan’s Alley, of course. Hogan’s Alley. Yeah, yeah.

Jim: 11:20

Hogan’s Bridge?

Nish: 11:22

That’s is that not somewhere else? I’m sure it’s Hogan’s Hogan’s Alley is satisfied. Hogan’s Alley is the yeah, yeah. It’s the it’s the fair with six. So so we mentioned it, so might as well just bring that up actually. So the sixth hole is yeah, it’s one of the famous holes at Carnegie, amongst the many famous holes. But yeah, yeah. It’s a it’s a par five, it’s got a very narrow fairway, it’s got bunkers left, right, there’s uh outer bound on the left. Yeah, yeah. There’s bunkers on the right, so you’ve got to thread the eye of the needle to get there. And Hogan, it’s named Hogan’s Alley because when he won his only open in 53, I think it was, yeah, he hit four consecutive drives right down the middle on that. So it’s called Hogan’s Alley as a result. Now, I watched a video and they sort of said, you know, you look at it, and you do look at the course map, and you think it’s alright, was that there’s plenty of room on the left between over? And so the guy went, walked down the bit where it’s at its narrowest, it’s 25 yards. That is narrow, yeah.

Chris: 12:20

Very, very narrow. You have to like you just have to be insanely accurate around there to keep it out of trouble. And if you don’t keep it out of trouble, you get punished.

Nish: 12:28

That feels like it’s built for my game, Chris.

Chris: 12:30

That yeah, watching the the Dunhill Links this weekend, it’s obviously been prepared for the amateurs going around there, and actually, the a lot of the rough’s been cut down, so there’s not a huge amount of rough, and it’s not really got growing time by the time we go to the room. No, yeah, it should be, it should be in reasonably fair, fair game at that point.

Nish: 12:48

So, what you’re saying then?

Chris: 12:48

We’re still gonna be first record.

Nish: 12:50

Yeah, we’re still gonna be shit. We’re gonna get this. Every time we’ve thought we’ve got it, we’ve got a course easy and we’re gonna do alright, we’ve just been absolutely dog shit, you know, just full on dog shit.

Chris: 12:59

Yeah, so have we messed with your flow then?

Nish: 13:02

No, no, you haven’t, no, no, not at all. But you said about the wind as well, and like so this this is great. So because the wind changes direction, no two rounds are the same, which is natural. Uh they say that locals say that the the wind is fair but brutal, which does that make it can it be fair and brutal at the same time? Exactly, yeah, absolutely.

Chris: 13:23

No say it’s I mean I guess if it’s consistently windy, then I guess it’s it’s it’s fair because it’s the same every day.

Nish: 13:28

They also say that the the wind has moods, locals claim. Again, this is the romance of Scottish golf, right? The wind has moods.

Chris: 13:35

It’s obviously in a very bad, bad mood this weekend when it must be cancel one of the days of the tournament.

Nish: 13:39

They say it’s uh uh the the wind is friendlier on a Monday and we’re playing it on Sunday. Okay, so it’s preparing to get in a friendlier mood, right? I think I think we get we’ll get the full car nasty experience, won’t we? But you know, I think you feel like it feels like you’re doing it down a little bit only by calling it car newstims, it’s brutal or whatever. But I mean, like it is described as the toughest course on the open rotor. Yeah, yeah. It’s described as the hardest nine holes, back nine anywhere in the world. And the last 16, 17, 18, which is called like the toughest mile in golf. Yeah, everything is telling you like you’ve got to have your A game. Yeah, and I think Paul said that as well. He’s like, be prepared, it’s you gotta have your absolute A game to score well. Yeah, luckily, that’s not really a consideration for us, you know. We’re not I think also actually it is interesting. We we’re not we talked about it in the uh the review we did of Trump where you said loads of people want to play from the tips and things like that. We don’t want to do that, we’re gonna go and enjoy ourselves and give ourselves a chance.

Chris: 14:42

So yeah, we’ll play from the junior tees then.

Nish: 14:45

We’ll I know just have Paul chirping away in our ear the whole time about doing that. Uh so architects-wise, well no, we’re gonna we’ll go even further back. There is a mention of a game called Golf. Don’t know what I’m doing. Golf, G-O-W-W-F. Played how are you spelling that? G-O-W-F-O-Wolf played in that area, okay, that land around the 1560s. Okay. Okay. So that’s like kind of mentioned in history of the town and all that kind of stuff. Yeah. But the formal course was actually laid out in 1842. Tom Morris Sr. Yeah had his hands all over that. Alan Roberts was the architect, and then James Braid in 20s, 1926, did a redesign. And we’ve liked all the James Braid ones, haven’t we? Yeah, yeah. They’ve been they’ve been cracking golf courses. Yeah. Uh, and then 1931 it got its first open and it’s hosted eight since then.

Chris: 15:43

Yeah, which also it’s the first course that we’ve played where you just like a lot of those holes are just instantly recognizable, right? And we’ve never we’ve not played any of those yet. So I think that’s that’s quite an exciting little uh yeah, like it’s been on teddy so much, yeah, like you know what those holes are, absolutely.

Nish: 16:01

So we talked about the sixth already, and that’s Hogan’s alliance. Very that’s very famous, of course. Uh 25 yards wide, hit four straight drives, uh, and then so the th I think about Hogan of the locals. Obviously, everyone loved Ben Hogan anyway, because that’s the kind of guy he was, but apparently he left an aura of surgical genius. Again, I don’t know what that means. Yeah, what does that mean?

Jim: 16:27

I mean, I hang around with you quite a lot, but fucking hell, I’ve never read it. Surgical genius.

Nish: 16:32

Don’t listen to the I don’t even know what that means, and what’s going on with it?

Jim: 16:37

And then so it well it shows how accurate he was, obviously.

Nish: 16:40

Yeah, to talk about course highlights. The the the the four holes that came out were six for Hogan’s Alley and then 16, 17, 18. Yeah, so 16 is a brutal par three, yeah, no bailout, long, long, got to hit the green. Yeah, there’s literally no bailout, and it plays into the wind quite often. Yeah, so brilliant. 17 is called Ireland, which is so the Barry Byrne horseshoes around the fairway, and this planet just appears where you don’t expect it to. So even when you’re like, oh, I’ve hit one straight, you can run into it.

Chris: 17:09

It just creeps up down the left, there’s a little loop that kind of comes back around. You’re like, where did that come from? Amazing.

Jim: 17:14

So well, so that there was a comment on on somebody’s review here, which was talking about how difficult it was, and that was fiendishly difficult bunkers and unforgiving fairways. Nothing is hidden. You just have to get him a good shot every time. But you’re obviously arguing argument is against that that it just kind of appears.

Chris: 17:31

Uh yeah, I mean it’s I guess it’s not hidden, but it’s also not that visible. So I guess it’s kind of it’s far enough away that you wouldn’t really be expecting it, but if you hit a bad shot, all of a sudden it’s there. Yeah, do you know what I mean? It’s not in your eyeliner, you think oh, it’s not really kind of part of the whole, but it’s gonna be nice playing with a member, isn’t it? Yeah.

Nish: 17:50

Yeah, yeah. To find out where stuff is and I’m I’m beginning to, now that we’ve had a few places that we have played with members, I’m beginning to understand the uh value in your round of a caddy.

Chris: 18:05

Yeah. I was thinking about it the other day, we should we should do a caddy soon. Maybe we should maybe we should do a caddy.

Nish: 18:12

I think people listening would love to know what that experience is like as well. Like, you know, even if it’s a four caddy, we do our own bags and whatever, and they just you know go ahead and let us know what’s going on and stuff on the tea. I mean, yeah, it’s gotta be done, hasn’t it? Um we don’t need it, we’ve got Paul who’s gonna guide us through it all. Fantastic. Not carrying your bags though, is it? No, no, I there is a bit of me that is still a bit uncomfortable with the the concepts of somebody carrying my bag, talking the clubs out and stuff like that. I mean, I’m sure once I get into it, it’ll be like great. But I’d but you’re happy for someone to valet park your car.

Chris: 18:43

Oh, yeah, 100%.

Nish: 18:45

I don’t understand where you can do it. I mean you’re paying for the pro for the experience. I mean, it’s it’s a battle driving my car as well, to be fair. So, yeah, fair enough. And then 18. So part of this that golves hardest mile, it’s iconic because of a certain Frenchman, uh, and everybody knows that.

Chris: 19:04

View up to the hotel behind it. The hotel behind burn in front of the green. Like it’s yeah, it’s it’s it’s pretty pretty iconic.

Nish: 19:10

Yeah, that’s that hotel as well. That hotel is the only hotel that has a view of the first T and 18th hole on an open on a on a op is it open course, or was it actually a major venue? I think even it might be open, it might be open or major, I’m not sure. But it’s the only hotel in the world that that has that. So that’s pretty cool. No, no, we’ve got to get back, we’ve got to get back, haven’t we? Of course. Yeah, and then after Dumbarnie, we do do fancy having a few whiskies afterwards in the in the clubhouse, so we’re not making our way over there. But yeah, precision overpower. Apparently, even modern bombers struggle, but you were saying that you’re right, Alfred Dunhill, they were they were chewing it up a bit, weren’t they?

Chris: 19:50

They were, yeah, six, seven, eight on us were were coming in. Yeah. But I mean if they’ve if they’re playing off shorter T’s and they’ve cut the rough back and it’s too soft, right? It’s been raining, so it’s not it’s not particularly hard. Receptive greens, they’re always they’re always gonna scroll well in those conditions. Firing a little bit there, yeah.

Nish: 20:05

Okay.

Chris: 20:06

I mean it was it’s still the the highest scoring of the three courses, right? They were I mean St Andrews, they were absolutely annihilating. There’s people who would like St. Andrews just looks like one guy got 11 or 12 birdies in a row. It was the highest the highest ever consecutive birdie count on the European tour.

Nish: 20:30

Possibly. I don’t I didn’t see that, but yeah, yeah.

Chris: 20:33

Yeah, I mean there were there there were lots of like eights, nines, tens under pars.

Nish: 20:36

Yeah. Wowser. Wowser. Oh, it’s easy easy street then. What are we on about? There’s a halfway hook, which is quite rare for a Lynx course. The welcome is supposed to be absolutely on point because it is on this rotor of Americans playing. It’s one of the big boys, right? Modern clubhouse, which is interesting. Yeah. For such a historic golf club to have a modern clubhouse. And again, that’s supposed to be incredible inside.

Jim: 21:01

And then an Instagram’s dream, something.

Nish: 21:03

Instagram’s dream, is that right? A couple of other whole notable things on the whole I’ve got here, on the holes I’ve got here is that uh the 15th is the most exciting par four in the course. Apparently. The 17th, oh no, sorry, the 16th, so that’s the one that’s the long par three. Uh in 1975, Tom Watson had five attempts at trying to get a par on that par three and failed on each one. So that’s good, isn’t it? Looking forward to that one. That’s really gonna test your par three prowess out, Chris. I think on that one.

Chris: 21:36

Yeah, it’s a it’s a tough golf hole.

Nish: 21:38

Uh and then the town, obviously, like a lot of these Scottish towns where they’ve got these big boy courses there, it’s just it’s all about the golf. And I think that’s gonna be an incredible experience as well. So I’d like to have a little wander through the town because there’s the tree that’s on the crest, yeah, it’s a Dibble tree or something like that. They’re called it, I don’t know what it is, but it’s apparently there’s a tree in the town that it’s it’s modelled on and whatever. So it’d be nice to get a picture of that and sort of see what that’s about. There’s there’s a shop, somebody said there’s a shop, I saw a video, Simpsons, it’s called, I think, which is just overlooks it’s off the back behind the hotel, I think. It’s basically the first sort of shop you come to as you walk out away from the course. But they’ve got uh bag tags from like two and a half thousand courses around the world or something that like hung up, so it’s it’s worth dropping in to see stuff like that. Stick a reddish veil on there, also stick a red veil on it. Do we do we even have the reddish veil? Yeah, but uh I I love that like it’s the whole like the whole thing at Gullen like villager golf, yeah. You know, you’ve just got this whole thing that’s built around a golf golf course, all of that kind of stuff. Yeah, um in terms of the actual course, wait a second, it’s ranked 12th on our on our list of comfortably the highest ranked course now, yeah. Um handicap wise, uh mine goes from 17.3 up to 24.

unknown: 23:01

Shh.

Nish: 23:02

So that’s quite a lot of extra shots. Decent, isn’t it? Yeah, so I get two shots on holes two, six, nine, ten, fourteen, and seventeen. So if I play to map a handicap, that’s that’s a 96. Anything sub 100 I’ve got to be absolutely delighted with around there. Uh and then this is the interesting thing. We sort of spoke about this before we came on, but there isn’t a range. Yeah. You warm up on a state of the art simulator, it’s interesting, which I find very interesting. Yeah. And I’d like to do that.

Chris: 23:36

Is it like a series of simulators? Simulators, is it like is it just one there must be loads in there?

Nish: 23:42

Yeah, you’ve got loads of people there, so there must be a some kind of system, but I don’t know what to make of that. Yeah, I really don’t. It’s a it’s an odd one, isn’t it? That I mean, because you you sort of if if it went, oh we haven’t got a range, but we’ve got a hitting net or a row of hitting nets. Alright, okay. Not ideal, but okay.

Chris: 23:59

Yeah, yeah.

Nish: 24:00

But like a simulator is I don’t I don’t know how I feel about that, and I don’t know how what I’ll feel about that until we get there, I think. That’s gonna be a bit of a problem on that, isn’t it? Just wasn’t expecting that to come out because when Paul said it, I was like, alright, fine. I mean, okay, it doesn’t really massively impound me because you never want to almost arrange your time taking anyway. Yeah, it’s totally irrelevant to me. But yeah, I didn’t yeah, I don’t know. We watch this space, and actually, if you listen to this and you have experienced the warm-up facilities and the simulator, let us know what actually happened, what was it like? Um so we ought to talk about the signature hole challenge, Jim.

Jim: 24:42

What the signature hole is?

Nish: 24:44

I don’t know, do you? Yeah, I do. Oh, you do, right? I don’t know what’s no, I don’t. What is it? 18th. She’s got the 18th, yeah. It’s always the 18th, Jim, isn’t it?

Chris: 24:53

It’s always always this time. I can yeah, I can actually verify that it probably is the 18th.

Jim: 24:59

Like, I know there’s plenty of par three to eights and nines that we’ve had on the on this journey so far. So it’s a I mean it’s iconic, isn’t it?

Nish: 25:06

It’s like the post is stamp at treatments.

Jim: 25:08

It’s like you know, you just know it’s up there, you know, top ten most iconic holes in and the whole course. I mean, the the thing is every hole is named as well.

Nish: 25:16

They are, yeah. Yeah, quite quite bad. Are there any unusual ones there? Any that you’ve seen it, you’ve got holding it.

Jim: 25:21

No, no, it’s like the first is it’s cup, the eighteenth is called home.

Nish: 25:26

But they don’t have like uh Scottish names, do they?

Jim: 25:29

It’s just English names, which is Barry Byrne, Lucky Slap, 15th spectacles, wins.

Chris: 25:38

Oh, spectacles is the one that’s got the two bunkers on the front, which look like glasses. That’s a good that’s a good hole. Do you want a top hole?

Nish: 25:45

So the 18th, so that’s signature hole, right? Okay, so we’re gonna be brutalized by this golf course, and then we’re gonna hit 18, and we’ve got to try and find ourselves some motivation to well minded. We did that uh um Hollingwell, didn’t we? That was 18th hole. So keeps setting us 18th hole, then he only went to the city.

Jim: 26:02

So yeah, watch out the outer bounds fence, obviously, on the left. And I mean, you’ve you you you recalled the John Van der Velder and his uh his problems on that course. So the grandstand at least is not gonna be in the way for you to uh get a happy Gilmore kind esque right um shot from there. Um but yeah, and it’s only it’s only a par four. Actually, there aren’t there there weren’t that many. There’s only two par fives on the oh is that right. Actually, for you, I think there’s only one because you’re not playing the Ts that we’re playing interesting, only one par five.

Nish: 26:35

I’m pretty sure, yeah. That’s difficult, isn’t it? That means they’re all tough par fours. Yeah, yeah.

Jim: 26:39

There’s some pretty long par fours, and particularly towards the back end, as you know, we’ve discussed the yeah, yeah, the difficult five par fours are over well, well over four hundred, not quite five hundred, but I like the website as well. You haven’t mentioned that.

Nish: 26:55

I haven’t actually I did like it, very thorough. Yes, there’s a lot of information. The history bit is unbelievable. I’ve got an amazing timeline, actually, and I would urge people to go on that. I assume there’ll be a new entry for when we when we play it. Yeah, exactly. Record high score. Most swears on a course. Uh now, what’s the side bet, Jim?

Jim: 27:18

The side bet is there are three par threes, including one which is about 230 yards, I think. Yeah. Um, so yeah, par three challenge for those three.

Nish: 27:29

Oh man, getting a par three challenge at Carnoustie.

Jim: 27:33

Yeah.

Nish: 27:34

I thought you’re gonna say you’ve got to do Hogan’s Alley or whatever.

Jim: 27:37

Well, I did think that when we started talking about it, is um, but no, you’re gonna achieve challenge on it. So we hit hitting a fairway in Hogan’s Alley, that’s well, it’s not gonna happen.

Nish: 27:50

Yeah, we’ll be getting into all sorts of like technicalities of that, won’t we? Of it in the oh we’ve got a par three. Yeah, yeah.

Jim: 27:56

I just keep it easy so I can remember what the uh so we don’t get challenged. Is it four four par threes?

Nish: 28:02

I mean, is it it’s not an unusual amount of three par threes? Right, okay. Interesting job.

Jim: 28:08

Um you know, looking at the course guide and the flyover as well of each other’s they looked stunning, so I just thought, yeah, you know, add a new little bit of spice to them as well.

Nish: 28:16

Yeah, I mean, I think the bunkers are gonna be pretty tough, aren’t they? I’ve been pr I’ve been decent recently with out of bunkers, actually, but I think it’s gonna get tested to its limits. Yeah, yeah.

Chris: 28:26

To the point where it’s like, shit, I can’t even I can’t even reach the top of the bunker, never mind get my ball out of it. This is gonna be a yeah, this is this feels like it’s what a golf proper links.

Nish: 28:36

This one’s proper links. What a golf. Yeah. If we can, you know, we’re looking at things here where like obviously we talked about John. We keep mentioning him, but we talked about John, we’ve talked about Tom Watson needing five attempts to par to par three. Uh Johnny Miller took two out of bunk out of a bunker in 75. You know, just Tiger Woods has had a nightmare, had a nightmare around it, it’s just like a list of people who’ve had meltdowns there.

Chris: 28:59

You when we played Hollinwell the other day, and I think it was the 18th, I was in the bunker, and I just I just got out, and you were just like, you’re not even like phased by bunkers at all, are you?

Jim: 29:06

And I was like, no, not really, but this one you are used to as a little bit of like so it’s gonna be much more of a challenge than Woodall Spar, do you think?

Chris: 29:14

Yeah, I mean it’s a Wood hall Spa, there’s a lot of sand at Woodhall Spa, but there are not those really deep faced bunkers, so where you kind of get in and you’re like you know, you literally pitching out sideways, it’s a it’s a proper penalty. You can’t advance it anywhere. Um they’re not all like that, it’s a bit of a it’s a bit of a range, but but when the the the deeper ones are pretty pretty penal.

Nish: 29:40

Yeah, I think so. Well, I think we should uh leave it with asking if anybody has anything else they wish to commit to the ether before we wrap this up and then we start. Golf related or just just anything really, but before you know, yeah, any last wishes before Carnoustie. He takes another victim, but you know, more importantly, just anything we want to say before we next time reconvene when we’ll be talking about how we ended up playing F carnes. Is there anything else you want to do?

Chris: 30:11

I think we can pretty much guarantee that we’re gonna have played shit, we’re gonna have been absolutely annihilated. I don’t think we need to worry about that.

Nish: 30:20

I will bring a wider point actually. We I I hadn’t taken this into account at any stage until last time, and it was only because we did Hollinwell, and Hollinwell was obviously we were doing it as a society and checking on handicaps and all that kind of stuff. So obviously, in in Squabit, who are our sponsors, uh, we’ve been tracking all of our rounds, and in there, there is a there is a little tab, it’s got your gross score, it’s got your stables for stableford, and generally I’ve been looking at those two. There’s also a net score tab. So your net score is handicap adjusted, how have you done on the round? And I sort of looked at that and I just thought it it added a new dimension to how I thought about my rounds, some of these courses that I played. So so far, handicap adjusted, I’ve been level par three times out of 16 courses. And I’ve been under par once, that was at Aberdovey, I was six under handicap. And when you start looking at that net score, and actually, if people are amateur golfers and they are tracking their scores and things like that, and it is easy to get stuck in the I haven’t broken 80 or I haven’t broken 85 or I’m stuck in the 90 or whatever, and I’m I’m shooting 25 over par. Like, look at it when it should be for your ability, and how did you play against that? And like to Trump. Like, I don’t I played well at Trump, actually, admittedly, I played well and I came off and I was like, I played this course really well. Yeah, yeah. But you know, you go back and go, I was level par at Trump with my handicap. Like, I can’t really ask to play any do anything better than that, really. Anything after that is a bonus. Yeah, I was like, oh, and I did feel good about that. So I think it’s an it’s an interesting thing to to have a little. I’m only like 110 over, over 16 of 16 very tough courses.

Jim: 32:05

Oh, yeah, yeah. No, I’ve liked that. It’s it’s it’s it is quite interesting. I think you know, particularly with someone of my ability when I go around and I do get a little bit demoralised sometimes when you’re shooting in the hundreds. And yeah, yeah, um, but yeah, you’re absolutely right that it is playing to your ability. Obviously, you should be happy with what you’re doing, but obviously, you never want to improve that handicap and make it so you you are improving overall as well.

Nish: 32:29

The way we a lot obviously we’re in a fortunate position. We want to experience the golf courses, and that’s it. The mag the magic of the golf course, and that’s fine. But yeah, we are still you have to have something else to keep you motivated in that. Of course, it’s wonderful to play a golf course and all that kind of thing, but there is that little bit where you just go, actually, like my ability, and that’s the wonderful thing about golf and the handicap system that you’re supposed to be able to play anybody and give them a game. Yeah, that’s the whole point of it. So when you go, right, well, my challenge isn’t against like Chris, it’s not it’s not like that’s what I’m trying to beat you, it’s like it’s against that course. That course, and now this is a new WHS system, it is that, isn’t it? Each course has its own rating, and the course is setting you the handicap now like that’s where you should be at. Can I beat that? Can I play well to that?

Jim: 33:17

Yeah, it’s fascinating. It is, I think it’s it’s quite a unique sport in that regard, and uh you know, having grown up playing many other sports, including the odd round of golf when I was when I was a teenager, but you play football, you play rugby, you play tennis, squash, badminton, whatever it would be. Um it’s like competitive.

Chris: 33:36

Yeah, it’s literally it’s always against the team or it’s against the manner, yeah.

Jim: 33:40

So I think trying to change that psychology, then go in to to have a round of golf, and then you I I am competing against whoever I’m around, even though I’m not, even though I shouldn’t be. So even though I could take probably three extra shots, then you can’t in every hole. Yeah, I I think that’s whilst that may be good for me in terms of my ability of golf at that particular time, I’m still not happy with it because I no, and I think that’s I think that’ll make it just having a 28 handicap and going around and going, Oh, I played two under my handicap today and just playing up a 28 handicap forever.

Chris: 34:10

Like, what’s what’s the point in that? Yeah, you have to do that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean that’s ridiculous, right? You’re not doing that. Yeah, yeah.

Nish: 34:15

Absolutely. Yeah, but that that’s foolish as well, you know, because then that’s that’s almost settling, isn’t it? Yeah, you know, you want to improve. But it is interesting to go, you know, and it was only because I was starting getting into the lingo, didn’t I, Chris? I was like, Oh, is that I started getting into the lingo, didn’t I? I’m reading Hollywood, and I was like, Oh yeah, yeah, four for two, three for whatever, you know, whatever it was, or like kind of the line.

Chris: 34:34

This is learning stableford, basically.

Nish: 34:36

Yeah, on the never done it before, and I was like, Oh, I think I understand what people have been talking about. Like, I’m just thinking it’s that it’s the alchemy people do with a change, don’t they? Two’s your threes, your fours, your eight, you’re ten, twenty. There you go. I was like, what are you on about? But it it suddenly made sense, and it was like your two shots, whatever. And and I used that quite quite well at Hollingwell, where I knew I had two shots on a hole, and you it does change the way you approach it. You were a pussy. There were a few occasions where I was just a pussy at Hollingwell.

Chris: 35:05

I forgot to mention that to you afterwards. He’d be like, Oh, I’m just getting my seven-iron out now. I was like, fuck up, Nish.

Nish: 35:11

That’s don’t let the truth get in the way of a terrible story. It’s a terrible story, isn’t it? He’s just he’s just he’s just jealous that I clean I clean swept the the signature hole, the side bet, the score in general, everything, mate. Everything. What a crackerjack of a driver, wasn’t it Hollingwell? Oh yes. On the 18th as well, Jim. Thank you. Thanks. Thanks for always saying 18.

Jim: 35:39

I don’t always say 18. You do say 18 quite a lot. I get now why you’re you are slightly bitter on that. It’s always 18, Jim. It’s always fucking 18. Just because it was at Hollingwell. I’m essentially forget everything else in the previous 15 courses.

Chris: 35:52

The only good driver here all day as well, Jim.

Nish: 35:54

Oh well, it it was the only good driver. Yeah, I was I was not agreeing with my driver that day. But uh yeah, it it was something I’d picked up on and hadn’t noticed up to now that we were doing, and if there is anybody playing just golf with emmates, whatever, for your own mental approach to it, you know, just have a look at your net score. I don’t think it does you do you do like I feel like my my handicap’s normalized now, it’s probably gonna always hover around that 16 to 18 mark. I think the lowest it got down to was 16.3, highest to went 18.3, and that’s during this whole this whole journey. So I’m I’m there or thereabouts.

Jim: 36:32

I think you’ve also got to consider that you know the the type of courses that you are playing. I mean, these are the top 100 courses in the British and Irish Isles.

Nish: 36:38

Yeah, and not I hazard a guess if we had another crack at some of these, we’d we’d go better because there probably are places where we’ve played a bit of a foolish shot and we’d score better, yeah. Not necessarily have a better experience, yeah, yeah, but we’d perhaps uh would score better, yeah, and you’re a bit more aware of what’s going on. And actually, like now I would probably not be as hung over playing Ganton. That would help. Uh having slept outside on that. Yeah, I would not in the doghouse. And you know, some courses where it’s taken me seven or eight holes to suddenly click into gear and just go, what are you doing? Why are you trying to overpower the course? Just let the score come to you. Just you know, play let the score come to you, play a three hybrid up the middle. There you go. Stable for times, yeah.

Chris: 37:28

Let the score come to you. You’re becoming a sports psychologist, Nish. Is that what you’re going into now? A few more questions to be.

Jim: 37:35

Have you got a sports psychologist? Have I got a sport psychologist?

Nish: 37:38

Yeah, I’m just wondering if you if you if you No, but I’m gonna get a sports psychologist on the on the podcast though, so I think that’ll be very interesting. And I bet he brings up about next cause. Let the sports psychologist come to you. Bingo cause as well. Right, okay. So I’m gonna leave you with another couple of couple of quotes, if I may, if I’m allowed to. As long as they’re not your quotes. Do we guess who it’s who it’s from? Yeah, Confucius said that famous golfer. Apparently, the locals say that Barry Byrne remembers names. Again, there’s a lot of whiskey in the case. As long as your name is Barry, it will remember it every time. But one thing that Barry Byrne does say is that you don’t beat Carnusti, you survive it. Yeah, that feels apt, doesn’t it? And then Tom Watson. So Tom Watson is probably somebody that everybody’s heard the name of, but don’t know too much about as a golf player. But Tom Watson. Phenomenal golfer. I think everyone knows Tom Watson, right? He’s a pretty famous golfer. I don’t know. I bet there’d be a lot. If you asked a lot of people how many opens did he win, they wouldn’t know. He won five. That’s believable. That’s max, but anyways, Tom Watson, obviously highly respected. He called this the finest test the finest test of championship golf in the world. That’s what he called it. That sort of covers it. I think. Is there anything else anybody wanted to say?

Jim: 38:59

I thought you we’d be we’d be here for three hours. You going along hanging on about the history?

Nish: 39:04

I think it all centred around poor Jean. It didn’t. Have we got to get a picture of us with our shoes off in the burn, right?

Chris: 39:12

I mean, I’m pretty sure that everyone does that, right? But yeah, we’ve got to do it. I’ve got to do that. Which it’s a good question, actually, Nish. Which shoes are you gonna A wear and B, take off at Carnoustie? Maybe you should bring like a spare pair of shoes for just that that shot. Just that eventuality, that shoe. For that shot. You need to think about that, don’t you? You’ve added a whole new dimension to my preparation for the round. Nish now needs to bring nine pairs of shoes for that round rather than just. Do you know what I’m gonna do?

Jim: 39:38

And you need to be at the course five hours only.

Nish: 39:40

Yeah, I’m gonna can all of my work in the week leading up to playing Carnoustie.

Jim: 39:44

So, how about your experience of the book? Oh, well, Paul sorted out Carnoustie, so you’re you’re obviously you have you contacted the club.

Nish: 39:51

We did contact the club. Oh, but I didn’t expect anything back from Carnoustie because of it’s Carnoustie, it’s so big, you know. They don’t they I don’t know anybody who probably hasn’t got the spare time to come and speak to us because it’s just a churn of people going through. That’s going to be interesting, that, because you’re going into this historic magical place and uh Andrew and Tony, you know, they’re talking about the the sausage factory, weren’t they? You know, and that kind of and it it’d be interesting to know of or get an idea if that’s the kind of feel there. The people that I’ve heard reviews from have said although you you appreciate you’re along you’re a you know number 120 in the line, sort of thing, yeah, yeah, but it does still feel good, and like the welcome is well done, it’s well practiced, of course, so they know how to sort of get you excited about the round. So I think I’m expecting it to be like a magical experience and and all that kind of thing. But I think that we will probably be acutely aware that there’s we are just a very small number that day. So they they didn’t get in touch, which uh you know I wasn’t expecting either way, but you know who knows? We might get surprised when we get there. But then you know, we were with a member. I think Paul as well he said there’s a chance that because you’re playing with me um that you don’t get the full welcome experience because you’ve just been signed in. Yeah, you know, so we don’t know, we will find out when we get there. But uh yeah, certainly Clubhouse looks like an amazing place to go in, and obviously they’ve got like replicas of the claret jug and all that kind of stuff. So first one we’ll have seen. Yeah, we haven’t seen that anywhere. I think it feels special into this feels this one feels special because of the course. That’s what feels special. Rather than the club. Like there’ve been other ones that we’d be like, yeah, the whole like the club, the club and everything that feels very magical and special, but yeah, this is the course, the golf. Yeah, yeah, you know, standing there on Hogan’s alley and all this kind of stuff, and you’re like, oh yeah, yeah, like walking in some famous footsteps here. Yeah, it’s pretty cool. So it’s gonna be pretty, yeah, yeah, it’s gonna be cool. I think cool’s the right, the right word. Well, it’s probably what we’re playing this. It’s Scotland in October, so it’s definitely the right word. Yeah, it’s probably the reason this course is probably the reason we we are doing this, you know, to experience stuff like this. Yeah, absolutely. You know, and they’re like these are like bucket list memories and yeah, and and experiences. Next time on the top 100 in 10 golf podcast, we’ll be reviewing a modern classic golf course the as good as brand new Dumbarnie Golf Links.