The Heavenly Heathland – Hankley Common Golf Club Review

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, episode 43, the Heavenly Heathland of Hankley Common Golf Club.

Nish: 0:20

Say that after a couple of gins or a few spiced rum and ginger beers. After a couple of gins or a few spiced rum and ginger beers, it’s billed as the finest Heathland course in England by themselves. But did Hankley come and deliver? In short, yes, but there’s a little bit more to it than that. Stay tuned to find out what got us so enthused about this wonderful golf course and also let us know what your thoughts are on it in the comments.

Nish: 0:44

But before we carry on, I’d like to just make everybody aware that there’s a lot of people who listen to the podcast or watch the podcast who haven’t yet hit the follow or subscribe button. It’s a tiny little thing to do and it would be a massive favor that we can ask you to do just to hit that button. It doesn’t cost you anything, but it does help us a lot because it helps us be able to expand our production. If we can get the reach a bit more, we can get better guests on and we can get better opportunities to hopefully do things like get interviews at golf clubs and also just continue doing what we, what we love in doing any minute. So if we could ask you for a very, very small favor, just hit that button. Like I said, there’s no cost to you, but we’d really appreciate it. Now back to the episode. So, jim, I have a question for you. Do you remember what was getting us worried about the golf that happened to be common in the preview episode?

Nish: 1:34

heather yeah, heather in tight fairways, right, it was more playable than I feared. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it was definitely, because I think yeah, it was.

Chris: 1:44

It didn’t feel that difficult to play it didn’t feel narrow.

Nish: 1:48

No, it didn’t feel narrow. I thought I kept saying to you the fairways were really wide. Yeah, like you stood on the tee. I don’t remember there being a tee where I was like, oh, there’s a premium on hitting the ball really straight here.

Chris: 2:02

I mean I did because I have the shanks.

Nish: 2:03

So I was okay, I’m not gonna hit this fairway I’m not gonna hit this fairway. Yeah, and I didn’t come on to that challenge. Later he confirmed you all your biases all the way straight away it. Just I was a little bit worried and we kept saying it because they kept saying on the website about pace of play pace of play, pace of play. You can only play as a three ball. If you need to do four, you need to have all this sort of stuff.

Jim: 2:32

Yeah, yeah.

Nish: 2:32

And it was like wow, I think it’s going to be difficult, it’s going to be narrow, it’s going to be lots of lost balls, but it just didn’t have that feel about it?

Chris: 2:40

No, it wasn’t, and we played off the effectively what would be the white tees, didn’t we, which was number 65?

Nish: 2:47

Something like that, yeah.

Chris: 2:48

Yeah, which I later learned is actually it’s basically the yardage, so it’s basically 6,500 yards. So 65 is 6,500.

Nish: 2:57

You know, when you get the answer, it’s the most obvious thing thing in the world, isn’t it? Of course it is. We were going around and we were like why is it 65 and 72? We couldn’t figure it out and then afterwards oh yeah, of course it is.

Chris: 3:08

That’s ridiculous, makes total sense.

Nish: 3:12

We played with Andrew, who was our man in Surrey and he’d organised this for us and we’d played with a member of Hankley Common as well, so we had great course guides. It was amazing playing with them again. It was just. My overall impressions of this golf course were that it’s a proper pucker grown-up golf course yeah, I think the most, definitely the most beautiful golf course we’ve played like the actual course itself, manicured incredibly well. So beautiful, wasn’t?

Chris: 3:45

it like everything, like the sand was just pristine white. The heather just looked. I mean, the heather was in bloom we were in august, so it just looked like this beautiful purple kind of like funnels down the side of each fairway, the fairways were just immaculate.

Nish: 3:57

The trees were really well like trimmed back and I don’t think they’re just scott’s pine, aren’t they? So I think that’s how aren’t they just tall and beautiful looked it to me we just stood there, I think on the first tee. I just went. This is a beautiful golf course and it feels like the right side of manicured, where it’s not manufactured but just everything’s in it’s right place. And they have this thing there. They had it at Hindhead as well, to be fair. They had this thing there. The bunkering is natural, but manicured natural.

Chris: 4:30

It felt a little bit like, you know, when you go into someone’s house and you go does anyone actually live here, Like it felt a

Jim: 4:37

little bit like that.

Chris: 4:37

It was just so perfect Like how is this even possible?

Nish: 4:41

Some of those tee boxes are better than my artificial turf in my garden.

Jim: 4:45

Absolutely, it was you know that game you play. It’s a good standard of players, obviously, then, isn’t it?

Nish: 4:49

Well, not taking any divots, you know that game you play on the tee. Sometimes when you’re waiting where you just you put across the tee box Like I think you could actually just do that with your putter.

Jim: 4:58

Yeah, you genuinely could.

Nish: 5:05

Like be amazing that. What a place to play golf. Yeah, again blinding day. Like we got lucky with the weather again.

Chris: 5:07

Yeah, it was just a wonderful experience I mean, do you know what one of my favorite bits of the day that I experienced was? Just as you go into the clubhouse, you go in the doors and you kind of walk through and then there’s just like a big, a big open bit at the back and you can just see the fourth green there. And as soon as I saw that, I was just like, oh, this looks incredible. And I came out to you, didn’t? I was like let’s just go and have a look at that through there.

Nish: 5:29

Well, I think, yeah, your exact words were you’re gonna fucking love this clubhouse yeah, and I did, I did.

Chris: 5:35

That’s one of the things I’ve written.

Nish: 5:36

It was fantastic clubhouse like, but it also felt relaxed as well. It didn’t feel like it was um a place you’t go into. It wasn’t busy at all. I think there were two other people in the clubhouse when we were there.

Jim: 5:47

Yeah, so what you mean by that is basically you didn’t get told off again, I could do whatever I want, yeah.

Nish: 5:53

They had some stuff in there that was like I’ve not seen anywhere else so far in the journey. So this is what course 12, where they had. It’s quite a celebrated club, isn’t it? There’s been a lot going on. They host, yeah. So they have this thing, and I’ve never seen this before. I thought it’s worth a mention. They’ve got these tables up at the bar and bar stools around them and within the table is a glass display case with some of the trophies and stuff that you can the player, the club, championships or whatever and you’re like that’s a really good way you’re doing it because you’re not taking up a huge amount of other space, but you’re making a bit of a feature out of that table.

Jim: 6:29

Quite glad it was quiet then. Really from from there, and I think, because you would have been annoying all the other members, yeah, yeah, can you just move your pint lads, get out of our country club. Your glass of champagne, yeah but?

Nish: 6:41

but even like that clubhouse, the facility, like the locker room, was great, wasn’t it? Big, long locker room, yeah, I’d like brushes to clean your shoes with. They had every. They had like men’s toiletries that you could use when you’re in the shower and all that kind of stuff. So it was, yeah, it was like pucker, wasn’t it? Yeah, it was, yeah, beautiful grown-up place. I thought the service was quite good. Actually, it was like are there any golfup?

Chris: 7:03

place.

Nish: 7:04

I thought the service was quite good actually.

Jim: 7:06

Are there any golf clubs that you’ve played that haven’t been grown-up? What do you mean?

Nish: 7:10

by that? Maybe? Yeah, I should explain what I mean by that. I feel like they’re not trying to bedazzle you with bells and whistles. They just know they’re a good golf course and a good golf club and there’s a great clubhouse. They just don’t need to do anything fancy with it. Yeah, there’s no. There’s no gimmicks, is there? Like it’s not a gimmicky place at all?

Chris: 7:35

a difficult, challenging, beautiful golf course, that’s incredibly well looked after. Yeah, and they caught. The holes are really well designed. There’s no, you know so much thought’s gone into that hasn’t it.

Nish: 7:48

You don’t have to zhuzh it up at all.

Jim: 7:50

It’s just a golf course, right.

Chris: 7:52

It’s just beautifully done?

Nish: 7:54

Yeah, I’ll put it here my overall impressions of everything. Was it just oozed class? Yeah, that classy golf course, that’s how I’d describe it and, I think, classy clubhouse. You can see why tournaments and trophies are held there, because the facilities are great for the people playing. You said in the preview the word spacious and it felt that it was just relaxed. It was breathe out.

Chris: 8:17

You’re going through the gates and it’s like whoo, yeah, and you’re just kind of walking. You could quite probably have just gone for like an afternoon walk there. Couldn’t, you know, not play golf, or you could have just wandered around and you’d have had a beautiful walk in the afternoon, like yeah.

Jim: 8:30

Very peaceful very peaceful, very beautiful.

Chris: 8:34

Yeah, it was. It was a pretty special place, isn’t it?

Nish: 8:36

Yeah, so obviously we, we, we started off, we went and they’ve it was just pro shop. There’s a few things you can buy whatever Pro.

Jim: 8:52

It was very apologetic because the greens have been maintained and been aerated, so they were like oh, we’re really, really sorry.

Nish: 8:58

I said no. From a personal point of view, I’d take those greens everywhere because I was on fire with my butter it it’s because they kept bubbling bubbling into the hole, yeah, yeah just had to find the right trench to follow.

Jim: 9:10

But even like how much did you?

Chris: 9:11

pay them? I don’t think it really like it didn’t really detract and kind of. When we got there I was like, oh no, I feel like this is going to be a real yeah a real negative and it’s going to feel like we’re not going to get the full experience. But actually it wasn’t a thing, was it?

Nish: 9:25

it didn’t, really didn’t matter. What does that say about the quality of the greens? I mean, if they were on tip top form?

Chris: 9:30

I can imagine, once those greens are in full, in tip top conditions, they would be absolutely rapid and incredible. I think it helps us probably all of it.

Nish: 9:39

So much friction on those greens, but we should mention that terrace again, actually, because we had a drink there afterwards. Yeah, yeah, we did, yeah, and that is a stunning place to have a drink after around the sun afterwards.

Chris: 9:50

Yeah, that was pretty special.

Nish: 9:51

It was great. Fourth green, right in front of you. It’s in a good mood, isn’t it? Straight away, you see, then you go.

Chris: 9:54

Oh yeah, can’t wait to get back to that yeah exactly right it’s like I almost felt like the green in that golf course was like it’s like it was fake, it’s like it wasn’t really. It was so green like it’s so lush yeah, like it just felt the contrast was like yeah, it’s not real, yeah it didn’t feel real, like it was a weird sensation, but it was just so beautifully manicured and so perfect that it just didn’t really feel real because you were playing that?

Jim: 10:18

was it about 30 degrees when you were playing? Was that the third during the third it was hot.

Chris: 10:22

Yeah, it was very hot. Yeah, yeah, yeah, in fact, yeah yeah, there wasn’t a spot of like tinged grass anywhere or anything, was it? There was nothing, it was just that green, beautiful green.

Nish: 10:31

Yeah, I mean, it was so well manicured. We had a bit of a running with a robot mower.

Jim: 10:41

It was trying to gobble our bag up, wasn’t it? Yeah, pushing the drones life we live these days, these adversaries. We were just.

Nish: 10:46

I actually filmed it, so just looking at it going these things are supposed to be intelligent, like they’ve got senses. So it just kept bumping into the jolly what’s? Going on here. Somebody having a laugh here?

Chris: 10:55

What’s going on. This is the future, yeah.

Jim: 10:58

It was so weird.

Chris: 11:00

But we were also looking to play in August, right, purple, purple. Uh, yeah, had a kind of line in the fairways.

Nish: 11:07

I can see why mr damon hill is a member there he’s. I found that out because it just why wouldn’t you be a member if you lived in that local area?

Chris: 11:15

I mean it just yeah can you imagine playing there every week like you would never. You wouldn’t get bored of that, would you? I can’t. That’s the problem.

Chris: 11:23

If I’m honest, I went down there and like being a, you know, a northerner, all my mates moved down south, down to London, I was like, no, I’m not doing that, I’m staying true to my roots, I’m staying up north. And you know, when people say, oh, it’s grim up north, I’m like, no, it’s not, it’s fucking great up north. But when I was wandering around there I was like this is why people say it’s grim up north.

Nish: 11:48

Because because they’ve got this down here it was a different world. It really was a different and I think we, because of the circumstances of how we played and who we were playing with and all that kind of thing, that it didn’t have any of that intimidation potentially I mean, I’m not, but you know, people could be a bit overawed yeah you know. So you know we’re down in. Sorry, whatever, it didn’t have any of that for me. I didn’t feel like it. I I mean maybe because it wasn’t busy, I don’t know.

Chris: 12:09

Yeah, I mean, I think you knew it was a members club, like some of the Scottish ones we’ve played feels like a bit of a more of a kind of touristy thing. It wasn’t like that at all. Right Like it’s a proper golf club. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, it’s an the plaque as you go in.

Nish: 12:24

Yeah, yeah, members club yeah, you sort of want that a little bit, only when you go down series there’s different types of golf yeah, exactly, yeah.

Nish: 12:31

Also, the one thing we we’ve mentioned this before we came on was that, even if you go through the website pictures, when we’re trying to remind ourselves of the course, it feels like it was only three weeks ago, but it feels like a long time ago and a lot of stuff has happened since, but all good. So in golf. But there are a lot of elevation changes on that golf course and which you wouldn’t expect really down into no, I thought it was gonna be a lot of elevation but a lot more than we were expecting

Chris: 12:58

because we were going in there expecting it was just like flat as a pancake narrow, like a bit like woodall spar. It was just like flat dog leg, flat dog leg. Yeah, it wasn’t really like that at all, was it? There’s a lot more elevation than the the pictures give it credit for yeah, absolutely.

Chris: 13:12

I think that they almost does it down a little bit some of the pictures, yeah because I think, if we’re honest, we were going in there thinking we were playing hind head the same weekend. We’re thinking looks a bit boring. We were looking compared to hind head. We were kind of. We were much more excited about hind head, weren’t we?

Chris: 13:27

yeah, yeah, absolutely, but yeah, I think we were both blown away a little bit by hankley, weren’t we? Because then we were and we played with andrew the day before. I was like, ah no, you, you, you won’t like hankley as much as hind head, and we’d obviously absolutely loved hind head. We were like, well, yeah, that makes sense, because hind head’s incredible, right. Yeah, but actually we both came away from hankley going actually that’s a golf course.

Nish: 13:47

Yeah, what a golf course this is.

Jim: 13:49

Yeah on the list.

Nish: 13:50

It’s 58, 58 on the list, yeah, so like you know, I mean, look it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s the 58 best golf course in uk and ireland.

Chris: 14:03

That’s you kind of feel numb to it now, like it’s the 58th best golf course in the whole, like there’s 2000 golf courses, yeah, and I can’t remember whether we said it in the Hindhead review, but like I think we played a couple of courses before that, before we’d been down to Surrey, and we’re kind of like, oh crikey, maybe some of these courses aren’t going to be as good as we thought. No, we hadn’t lost the faith in it at all, but we just kind of come away going ooh we’ve made the right decision to do this.

Chris: 14:28

This Tottenham Roof maybe there’s a lot of duds in there.

Nish: 14:31

Yeah.

Chris: 14:31

But then we came away from these two like the quality of the golf course has been amazing, hasn’t it?

Nish: 14:36

Both of them?

Chris: 14:38

And we don’t get much of a chance to play like proper Heathland courses up in the north, and that felt really, really special, didn’t it? Like just the I don’t know the pristiness and the beautiful like it was.

Nish: 14:51

Yeah, it just felt I came away from Hankley Common and Hindhead as well we should mention Hindhead in there because that left a very positive impression in our golf but I came away from that weekend going. I see now why there’s that cluster of clubs down in that part of the world, yeah, and they’re all in the top reaches and I, like I said, I’ve been a proper true Northern.

Chris: 15:17

I didn’t want to go down there and enjoy those courses.

Nish: 15:19

I wanted to go down there. I don’t want to give them the satisfaction.

Chris: 15:21

It’s really snooty and I didn’t feel welcome and I really you know much prefer Lynx golf. Yeah, really you know much prefer links golf. Yeah, but like there’s just something about the way that hankley was set up and just the way it looks, it’s just, yeah, just fabulous.

Nish: 15:36

they’ve got a lot of like elevated tees where you can see everything. I mean they actually. There were a few cases it was so hot and so like there wasn’t a cloud in the sky and it was. It was that almost tropical the weather sort of thing that there was loads of occasions when I’d look back and I’d give this as a tip to somebody playing Hacking Common Get to the green and just turn around and just look at what you just played on the way up, because a lot of the times the green’s a little bit raised up so you get a really good view of the hole.

Nish: 16:09

And it was giving me so many vibes of playing golfing like portugal because it did have that lush green like the trees, and like yeah, and like the really white sand yeah it was like for your eyes it did the contrasts there, in the colors, that it was like everything was like ultra high definition yeah, it felt a little bit like an advert for, like, golfing abroad.

Chris: 16:26

I’ll give you that like yeah, come and play golf in the Algarve.

Nish: 16:29

It was amazing, absolutely amazing and, yeah, just pristine, absolutely tremendous place to play golf. I think we got a little bit of extra warning as well. Before, again, we were about pace of play. Pace of play is really important. Pace of play is really important. But I don’t think it felt like a place that would gobble you up for pace of play really we were coming to the ninth green or the eighth or ninth green and there was three guys behind the green.

Chris: 16:55

We were like oh shit, oh, here we go. Are we behind the clock?

Nish: 17:00

It felt like we had dropped behind somebody. But I think they’d gone off.

Jim: 17:04

They’d just left the course.

Nish: 17:07

So it felt like we’d dropped behind the group and obviously we’re a four ball and we’re paranoid about it anyway and we’re like taking pictures and all this sort of stuff and it’s like, oh right, okay, we got there, walked off, like don’t make eye contact don’t engage kind of thing if he says anything just like, but one of the guys then goes like did have like a suit, jacket on or something.

Chris: 17:24

He looked smartly dressed, official. He looked official. We’re in trouble here.

Nish: 17:27

We were definitely in trouble and also I had played that hole terribly as well, so he’d just been watching me just hack all the way up this hole and then we just walked straight past them. They just went onto the green to do a bit of maintenance work while we were in suits.

Chris: 17:38

Do a bit of maintenance In suits of 30 degrees, that’s understanding what they contraption to obviously testing the soil or whatever in the green, but it looked like an expensive piece of kit.

Nish: 17:49

Oh, is that right.

Chris: 17:52

Yeah, yeah, some testing like the.

Nish: 17:53

I don’t know, I thought they had an ass to shop in Tronny Bay. You know, because I didn’t pay any attention.

Chris: 17:56

Oh no, no, it was a swanky bit of kit.

Nish: 17:58

Was it? Yeah, yeah, well, there you go, you can see why. You can see it’s been put to good use. We did bring out that this golf course does border the skyfall estate from the movie skyfall, correct? Yes, so I think it’s off the side of the 12th tee or something like that. You see this road? Or 13th maybe it is. You see this road going on? Yeah?

Chris: 18:20

and there’s only a bit earlier. Is that on the path five, the eight is up there as well?

Nish: 18:24

I think yeah, and like so the member that we were playing said, actually, when the trees aren’t as mushy and things like, you can actually see through into there. So I was like it’s just like that path. And he was like yeah, yeah, like if you go that path, you’ll be able to see. I was like are we up that far yeah, well, he was like I went, how far is it? He was 200 meters. Nah, forget it, mate, I’m not doing 200 meters uphill.

Chris: 18:45

It did also say a little bit further back, that there’s like a, because I think the MOD use it as well, don’t they? So it’s like danger, landmines pictures and stuff like that. So you probably shouldn’t have gone up there anyway, yeah.

Nish: 18:56

Suffer for your heart, don’t you? You would literally do anything for a picture.

Chris: 19:03

Yeah, that’s exactly it.

Jim: 19:06

Do you? It wasn’t for the exercise element.

Chris: 19:08

That’s what did it for me 200 metres.

Jim: 19:11

I was just thinking, no, 200 metres uphill.

Nish: 19:13

I’ve got to do that quickly. Nah, you’re saying bolt. What’s going on here? So a couple of things to bring you in on here. Jim, which was a signature hole challenge in the side bet. So the signature hole challenge was the par 3 seventh, which so the signature hole challenge was the par 3 7th, which was an amazing hole of golf.

Chris: 19:32

I might throw it out there possibly my favourite hole we’ve played so far is that your best favourite par 3?

Nish: 19:38

I think it might be. I mean, I’ve written what a hole. I’m not sure it’s my favourite par 3, though I think no, I really like that hole.

Chris: 19:44

What would beat it? Then question oh, my goodness. Yeah, that is a question my favourite. You’ve spoiled, haven’t you? You’ve been spoiled this far, anyway, I think it’s my favourite signature hole.

Nish: 19:53

Interesting, I really like that hole yeah, good tests incredibly beautiful. I mean you’ve got to be accurate on that, you’ve got to hit reasonably long.

Jim: 20:03

Yeah, it was about 180, I think it ended up being a bit less. I think it ended up being I think T to hole was like no, it was flat, actually.

Nish: 20:13

Yeah but it was. It was like I think we were on about 165 from our tee was from tee to hole Was it.

Chris: 20:21

Yeah, something like that, 170, something like that Must be more than that, because they had a punchy fire line, so it must have been, I reckon, 185.

Nish: 20:28

No, I don’t think it was, because my shot went 173, and it was past the hole. My shot went from the tee to 173 yards.

Chris: 20:36

I mean I’ll call bullshit on that.

Nish: 20:37

I mean to be fair, it is Garmin and that could be, absolute nonsense, you’re right, but anyway, we absolutely nailed this par three as well. It felt so good doing it didn’t it Stepped up.

Chris: 20:52

I mean, I’m so used to just being just me hitting a good shot into the par three. It was nice for Nish to turn he went first I think nish went first actually put the pressure on?

Jim: 21:00

obviously not. I’d won the signature hole challenge as well, you see so so it was my honor to to go first.

Nish: 21:09

So, um, yeah, absolutely, you’re just bringing it out the one signature hole challenge that you’ve actually won.

Chris: 21:15

You’d bring it out there, right?

Nish: 21:16

yeah, just to say I just it was good that he’s gonna die now I won the hind head signature hole, so it was his honor, did that one, yeah first, first honor he’s had yeah, there’s been more of one since, yeah, but that hasn’t happened in the podcast world yeah, that’s it, chris, to let you know, already hit a fire line like it was. It was a, it was a, it was a punchy fire line. It was a bit bit windy, wasn’t it A little low far line. I buttoned my six, I absolutely buttoned it, and it was like they were both on the flag, weren’t they, those shots we were?

Jim: 21:46

just looking at it.

Nish: 21:48

There was a strong possibility. One of them was going to be very close to the hole. Yeah, it was good. And then just nailed our two putts and walked away with our pars. We just turned around looking at a member and he’s like what’s going on? It was as good as early on in the round as well.

Chris: 22:04

It was up because the other six holes were absolutely gash yeah yeah, yeah, he seemed to be shanking it round.

Nish: 22:08

You know, jim, yes, no, we played Hank McCommon actually really, really well.

Chris: 22:17

There is definitely no we in that sentence, because I was absolute dog shit. I mean, I was less dog shit than Hindhead, but I was fucking down.

Nish: 22:25

We’ve got a blended handicap of 13.5,. Right, you’re 10, I’m 17. Right, okay, okay, we were 13 over if we took the best scores from each hole. But then what did?

Chris: 22:38

I score. Together we’ve played, was it? But then what did I score? So that means together we’ve played. Was it 10 handicap or?

Nish: 22:42

what did I score? You got a good smattering of pars here, mate. Did I? Yeah Maybe I’m misremembering yeah, you got one, two three Must have been the 90s right you got five pars you got. Five. Yeah, 94 you got.

Chris: 22:53

Yeah, exactly 94.

Nish: 23:01

Out in 48. Sorry, in in 46. Yeah, I went out in 42. I was. I was on a good run, you played well, to be fair, yeah, and then I got, I was back in in 49, so I was 91 total. So you were 23 over, I was 20 over. Yeah, stableford 33 points.

Chris: 23:12

I mean, that’s how bad I was playing. Jim Nish beat me. That’s how bad I was not that you can bet.

Jim: 23:18

Yeah, shock horror it’s like a friendly competition.

Nish: 23:21

I’m doing alright, yeah, but you like it felt like it was a fair challenge.

Chris: 23:28

Yeah, no, it did and I think we were both going in there that Braves and Trophy had been there. Look at the flyovers. We were like this is going to be a hard day out, but it wasn’t that at all tall, but like a really, really enjoyable round of golf yeah and you didn’t have to hit really particularly long like we paid the six and a half thousand yards, didn’t feel that long, nope um it’s quite a lot of run out.

Chris: 23:44

So you you know you could get a lot of irons, of t’s and stuff like that to keep it in play and yes reasonably short irons in.

Nish: 23:50

I really really enjoyed the playability I thought it was a great course.

Chris: 23:54

Yeah, I mean it was challenging, like it wasn wasn’t easy, but it was definitely playable.

Nish: 23:59

I mean there were some very, very picturesque holes there, the most picturesque holes we’ve seen.

Chris: 24:05

Yeah.

Nish: 24:08

Like, like I say outside of, there wasn’t a shabby one, there was there.

Chris: 24:10

There’s no kind of like, you know, like we’re saying, like Glen Eagles is just You’re in the glens, it’s just beautiful Scottish countryside. It wasn’t kind of relying on that for its beauty, it was just the actual golf course itself, like they just the greens and the teas and that it just was a visual treat all the way around, wasn’t?

Nish: 24:30

it. Yeah, the greens were receptive. You could fire it into the greens and that sort of thing and bear in mind how dry it’s been.

Jim: 24:35

That’s pretty decent.

Nish: 24:38

You’ve got fairways and again, again this is one thing that I’ve picked up on. We are playing it’s now podcast universe now, so we’re obviously in the future whatever but in two weeks time we’re playing holland. Well, and that’s one of our society days. That’s our first ever society day, so you’ve got five other people playing with us who obviously haven’t played top 100 golf courses before. So I had a few sort of messaging me and you know, a lot of worries are probably strong, but just a little bit, like you know, I hope it’s going to be a good day, whatever.

Nish: 25:08

And you’re like actually you can look at a golf course planner or a flyover, or whatever and just go oh my God, that tee, there’s like Heather right in front of whatever. But when you start thinking about it and this one says a few people, it’s like it’s a hundred yards of heather, like you could play a seven iron and clear that. Yeah, so you don’t need to try and hit it hard to clear the heather, yeah, yeah. And then it’s like bunkers and Woodhouse Bar taught me this. You’ve got to sort of take something from each course, haven’t you Wood right bunker on your left in your eye line. You’re thinking, oh my god, it’s just all bunker I’ve got a tiny little sliver to go for. Yeah, you haven’t. This bunker’s at 180. Your driver’s going to clear that. Yeah, that bunker there is at 300.

Nish: 25:45

Yeah, okay, you might roll into that, but that’s going to hit it well, so I don’t need to worry about it, and so you’ve got this and then you go well, the fairway width is from the edge of that bunker to the edge of that bunker, so that’s really wide and you’ve got a massive landing area.

Chris: 25:58

So that course management element, which does make sense, because everybody says I know the way to really get into gripping your scores is manage the course yeah, and I think I think that’s kind of part of like when you first start playing golf, all you see is the danger, right, I think, as you get better at golf, you, you don’t really see that. So when, when?

Nish: 26:18

I’m standing there Waiting for that to happen, mate, yeah.

Chris: 26:20

You’ve got a pond in front of you like a par. Three. Some people are going, that’s where my ball’s going. I don’t even see that I’m just like right. Where do I need to be on? The green you don’t really notice that.

Nish: 26:33

So I think that’s part of the weekend with with andy, who’s our society man, who’s sorting everything out for us. But you know, even he was. We’re sort of chatting about tactics of playing and stuff like that and I was like you know, a lot of the times you’re probably gonna look at it you go, oh, it’s a 370 yard par four driver out. I was like you probably don’t need to do that, you can probably just play a five iron. Yeah, get that up the middle. Some, you know roughly and roughly and that’s 200, that needs 170 in. And like you take that, no problem every day of the week.

Nish: 27:02

And I was also. I was like play your handicap on that hole. That’s actually a par. It’s a 370 yard par five. We’ve all got at least a shot. So if you just then duff your next one 120 yard shot, yeah for you to get you in on basically green regulation. So I was like it’s really, really interesting to learn and evolve that and I think I feel like I’m on an accelerated way of learning all this because you’re playing some of the finest courses. You have to pick that up quickly because you’re not going to overpower it, you’re not. I mean, I can’t anyway, because I’m not big enough hitter. But you’re not just going to keep going. I was going to keep blasting away and hope that my driver clicks.

Chris: 27:37

Yeah it’s like no, that’s not the way to play these courses you’re gonna get, you’re gonna have, you’re gonna have a bad day out. If that’s what you correct, yeah, and I mean again podcast universe.

Nish: 27:46

So we’ve since playing hankley, we’ve played three scottish courses and the value of my three hybrid like was it was unbelievable. I was particularly trump. It was just like it was robotic, almost I couldn’t believe what was going on, yeah, absolutely absolutely so.

Nish: 28:03

Yeah, a little tip to maybe take away for uh, for playing what would seemingly be a hard course. But actually you can break it down a little bit and and do it that way. Now I’m going to bring up my old pal, nick doherty. He was at hanker common, he’s taking the way that it’s the restraining order. Yeah uh, yeah, can’t mention that mate sorry I’m after edit that bit out.

Nish: 28:25

He has just been at hankly common this week because it had some bmw thing going on there or is that pre you got went with next week, haven’t they?

Chris: 28:32

so I guess that is that what it is, yeah bmw championships next week, right?

Nish: 28:36

yeah, so he was in there and it was like he does these things called tea time tips and it’s just people sending a question and he gets out on the course and answers it. And he was asked about playing out of heather and tactics to play out of heather and he was. It was definitely. I was like watching this game. That spot looks really familiar really familiar, and then this camera starts panning around.

Nish: 28:58

I’m like, yeah, that is familiar, that’s exactly where I that he played it out, the exactly the same spot that I ended up in. Well, not exactly but the same tuft of heather I bet he’s not taking four shots to get there he wasn’t talking about the previous shots just talking about playing out heather but I remember that shot because I I took a lot of time over that shot because I was right thinking about it like what am I going to do?

Nish: 29:22

and I played a really, really nice recovery shot out of the, out of the heather actually, on that, on that one challenge.

Chris: 29:28

You’re in a nick, were you?

Nish: 29:29

but he was just like the challenge here is just to not be playing your next shot from the heather and I thought better than that nick come on, mate like look at my shot tracer. Onacer on my garment might tweet him see what happens. Do you have any holes for the Dream? 18 from Hankley Common.

Chris: 29:45

I really, really loved Hankley. We both did some of those. Like I said, I think the most beautiful holes that we’ve played.

Nish: 29:51

I’ve thrown you under the bus here because I also know that five minutes before we started this episode you couldn’t remember. It’s so long since we played it.

Chris: 29:59

It is so long so it’s hard to kind of pick out the actual kind of oh, hang on, we were talking about the signature hole challenge actually.

Nish: 30:07

So this was a net one. This wasn’t when we started saying it was going to be a gross par three. So I actually won this signature hole because I got shot on it. Hang on a minute, I was just looking at something.

Chris: 30:17

What happened? This wasn’t a gross par three.

Nish: 30:19

Was it not a gross par three? No, because it’s Hindhead and no, hindhead and Hank and Common were net. Still, it was when we did the Scottish previews that we switched them back to gross.

Chris: 30:30

Can I just get a replay of the original episode? Please do I can verify that before I agree to, I listened to it earlier thought.

Nish: 30:37

I can’t remember. Yeah, yeah, it was gross.

Chris: 30:40

You know what my memory’s?

Nish: 30:41

like it was yeah, exactly.

Chris: 30:42

In Rain man. You remember everything.

Nish: 30:45

That is actually true. Yeah, it was net, so I won it. There you go, move on Next thing. Next thing, side bet.

Jim: 30:51

Side bet, which was Well, because of the course was obviously with the heather and then with the narrow fairways well, yeah, the seemingly, seemingly, yeah, but that was. That was that was the description on the website, so that obviously set up the challenge of um you know the side bet of how many fairways you’d hit.

Nish: 31:14

They were 14 of them there were 14 fairways in total, so Chris is going first.

Chris: 31:20

Is 14 an acceptable answer? Yeah, yeah, of course. You’re well at 14. It’s an acceptable answer if you actually did it. Okay, I can’t lie at this point.

Nish: 31:28

You’re not trying to have everyone’s pants down here, was this not?

Jim: 31:30

filmed or did you keep your? Did you not have your phone on your? It’s a good point.

Chris: 31:35

actually, you should look back at the film Nish, because I I know how many fairways I hit. Like I say, it’s been quite a few weeks since we played and I’m struggling to remember exactly, but I think it might have been less than two, do you think? I think so, do you?

Nish: 31:49

think it was that bad?

Chris: 31:51

I don’t think I hit many.

Nish: 31:52

You hit a lot of recovery shots from wide out.

Jim: 31:54

I felt like I played 70% of my shots from the header.

Nish: 31:58

Yeah, your driver was not working well at all.

Chris: 32:01

I think it was maybe two at best, I think it was probably one.

Nish: 32:07

Do you think two at best, or are you going to upgrade that a little bit to maybe three or four, I think?

Chris: 32:12

it was one or none.

Jim: 32:14

Truth be told.

Chris: 32:14

There was a few holes that I couldn’t quite remember, but there was only one that I definitely remember, hitting the first.

Nish: 32:19

I mean I’ve got the scorecard here. The scorecard obviously doesn’t have pictures on it, but you know, trying to revisit, I don’t think either of us did on the first.

Chris: 32:31

Definitely didn’t on the first. Second was a par three. Anyway, the par threes I played well, but between that you did play the par threes well actually.

Nish: 32:40

So you that you did play the par three as well actually.

Chris: 32:41

So you think you surprise surprise double on the second.

Jim: 32:42

Yeah, you got pars on three seconds on the third par three.

Nish: 32:43

You got, you got a double bogey. Yeah, you got five on that one, uh, but you parred everything else, yeah. So, yeah, you did play the par three as well.

Jim: 32:51

Yeah, that probably is what anyway, how many did you hit niche me? Yes, how many?

Chris: 32:55

14 out of 14 go on, have a guess. You playing. I don’t know how many you played, but you were playing pretty well off the tee. I played well on both courses off the tee as well.

Nish: 33:04

Yeah, I played well, but go on. What were your guesses Out of 14.? I think, eight Close, not really. I hit six, six fairways. I was going to go seven I I hit six, six fairways.

Chris: 33:16

I was going to give seven. I was going to give you the benefit of the doubt Chapeau I had about.

Nish: 33:22

I had four very close misses to the fairway so just dribbled into rough. Yeah, I’m pretty sure you only hit one, I hit yeah, I mean, I’d go along with that actually, yeah.

Chris: 33:31

I wasn’t playing my great goal To be day, but the previous day was literally the worst round I’ve ever played.

Nish: 33:39

Surrey wasn’t kind to you, was it? Chris Surrey wasn’t kind to me, was it?

Chris: 33:41

I mean, I’ve been very kind to Surrey. I’ve given it a glowing review but.

Nish: 33:45

Do you hate them both now Maybe I should Retrospectively.

Chris: 33:49

I’ve had Reflected, contemplated, about my worst golf in Surrey.

Nish: 33:54

I felt like going back to the course characteristics again, I just felt like there was a lovely flow I’ve said this before in a couple of courses but a really lovely flow to the golf as well. Like you felt where there was a par three, it felt like actually there should be a par three now.

Jim: 34:12

Yeah, you were ready for a par three In the momentum of your round.

Nish: 34:14

Yeah, and there were a couple of holes where you’re like it looks like it on the eye anyway, it gently meanders along and then you get into the guts of playing the hole and you’re like, oh, there’s a little bit more to it than that and it was not bunker heavy. We said that, didn’t we? It really isn’t bunker heavy.

Chris: 34:30

I think it really failed as bunkers, I think, since if you look at the course guide again, there’s a lot of new bunkers that have been Since the course map, since these pictures have been taken.

Nish: 34:42

Oh, is that right, yeah, yeah, there is, they’ve obviously added they’ve been bunkering, They’ve been out bunkering, yeah, yeah, interesting. Okay, so we’re not convinced either way about any Dream 18 holes, but just, there are a lot of oh no, you are 14 for me, definitely 14 for me yeah, I think it’s one of the most beautiful holes I’ve ever seen.

Chris: 35:07

I think he’s definitely on the Dream 8 team. Really loved it. What are you two stiggering?

Nish: 35:13

at Nothing, mate. You said it. Don’t tell the missus. I’m so leaving that in. I’m so leaving that in. Is that the first side bet I’ve won? I don’t know. Actually, I don’t feel like I’ve won many side bets. I feel like early on.

Chris: 35:31

You were doing quite well on the side bets. We had a few longest drive ones. I feel like I was missing fairways and you were winning quite early.

Nish: 35:38

Maybe I should listen back and get the scores.

Chris: 35:42

But yeah, it’s been fairly one-sided so far, hasn’t it, but I feel like recently, more recently, I think, after this episode- yeah, this summer I feel I’ve got a bit more of a grip.

Nish: 35:53

My game, I feel, is in a better place, much worse place. Yeah, unfortunately, you just feel like it’s going that way at the minute, I think. I think our we’ve got three more courses this year, definitely so I think that break’s probably going to come at a good time, isn’t it?

Chris: 36:06

just regather your thoughts I think in the end of the opposite of a break, I need to play more golf.

Nish: 36:11

Yeah, that’s that’s a fair point. Yeah, I’m just trying to think if I’ve missed anything else, because again this feels like another course. I really should. Just we should do it justice.

Jim: 36:20

I think you have you know in terms of so, if, but in terms of ratings yeah, which kind of pot would you put it in? You know, you’ve mentioned that. You know there’s some who were, you know, out of this world, some which are absolutely amazing, but not quite, not to that pinnacle and then the others are still wonderful, but it’s really really far up there really far up there in what we’ve played so far it’s very high.

Chris: 36:43

It’s. It’s not number one or anything, but it’s definitely in the top top handful.

Nish: 36:47

We’ve played three, four, five yeah, I would say, as of the 14th of august 2025, this was in my top three. Yeah, so my top three that would have been I don’t know what order, necessarily, but queen’s course at glen eagles. Ganton was in there. Yeah, this has now gone into that company and I think it’s better than Ganton. I’m really really. Yeah, yeah, I think this is better than Ganton because again it had like the manicure bits.

Nish: 37:14

There was more trees I love than golf courses, not. Yeah, do you know what I actually think? I probably agree. Yeah, do you know what.

Jim: 37:22

I actually think I probably agree, yeah, oh, my goodness.

Nish: 37:23

I actually think I probably agree.

Jim: 37:24

I’m feeling a bit lightheaded.

Nish: 37:26

Sorry what’s just happened? No, I think I probably agree.

Chris: 37:28

I’m just in shock. I think it’s very much in that same bracket as Ganton. There were two courses that I think were closest to me in that field and that was another one we came up with. We went wow, that’s a golf course, isn’t it? Proper golf course, yeah, Proper golf course, yeah. Definitely in that same bracket. I think they’re the two best golf courses we’ve played so far.

Nish: 37:48

So Ganton was in the 20s, wasn’t it? Hankley Commons 58. Yeah, that doesn’t feel. Do you think Ganton’s better? Yeah, ganton’s better. To me that feels like it’s not quite. However, yeah, I’m just trying to say I’d say like I’d put it early 40s, late 30s.

Chris: 38:07

I think it’d be around that kind of yeah for me. Yeah, okay, I could definitely definitely higher than it’s ranked.

Nish: 38:13

I think it’s definitely higher than it ranks. It doesn’t feel like it’s in the second half of the top. I suppose we haven’t played many higher up, but no, woodall Spa’s 20 odd, whatever. So that’s yeah. It was the crapper, like I’d run away hanky common any day of the week, so it’s gone into my top three as of that time before we went up to scotland. That’s probably just a massive spoiler, isn’t it? But um, yeah, what a golf course yeah, what a great golf course it was a cool place, wasn’t it?

Nish: 38:44

understated golf course just delivers if you get the chance to play this, don’t pass it up is what I’d say but yeah, it makes me very excited about the rest of the, the surrey courses that we’ve got to go and play those courses around there.

Chris: 38:58

Like I mean, I was excited about going and playing sunningdale and those kind of places anyway, but it makes me more excited about going to play them because I think and and with the way this course came back.

Nish: 39:06

I’m very excited about how that’s going to actually happen as well, because at the moment I can’t see your way in. So we’ll see. We’ll see how these things transpire. But yeah, we we ought to reflect on the two courses as a package as well, because we did do them as a doubleheader court, as a you know, playing two courses together in Surrey and, I think, definitely my favourite trip that we’ve done so far. Yeah, it didn’t let us down, did it In any way, shape or form? We got beautiful weather.

Chris: 39:30

In fact, quite the opposite.

Nish: 39:32

It punched well above.

Chris: 39:33

It did yeah.

Nish: 39:39

Yeah, what. Everybody wanted to talk to us and just fabulous golf. We have to add the usual caveats here as well. I was helped, I played well and that does always put you in a good mood and whatever but then I played my worst golf of any weekend we’ve had so far. We’ve been very good at being able to detach ourselves away from that. I think because we talk about it as we’re going through, because we do have to think about what we’re going to actually say in a bloody review yeah, you’re not just thinking about your round at that point, yeah yeah, there’s a bit of chat and it’s like I’m not having a good.

Nish: 40:06

But you know, do you know what? I know I’ve sprayed it, but actually what a goal. You know, standing on the tee, you always get that.

Chris: 40:12

I think the only one drawback is it’s was in the North.

Nish: 40:20

Actually, yeah, maybe 58’s a bit high. Yeah, yeah, Maybe low 80s. Yeah, I mean, imagine if we had a facility like that up somewhere near us. That’d be amazing, wouldn’t it? That’s not to downplay the courses that are near us. What a golf course, jim. What a golf course I’m glad you enjoyed it.

Jim: 40:37

The Modern Fox.

Chris: 40:39

The Modern Fox yeah.

Nish: 40:40

We still don’t know about the modern fox.

Chris: 40:42

We didn’t really ask anyone about that, which feels like a bit of a missed opportunity.

Nish: 40:44

Well, I felt like all the people who were working there. They were all really young, weren’t they?

Jim: 40:49

If we’d have turned around and gone tell us about the modern fox.

Nish: 40:51

They’d have been like what, what the hell are you on about? Yeah, okay, yeah, fine, next time on the Top 100 in 10 Golf Podcast.