Par-69 is divine. Par-68, too.
The iconoclast in me likes a course that does not conform to having a par of 72 simply for the sake of meeting a perceived industry standard. In addition, I enjoy the quirkiness that so many sub-70 tracks possess and how they test a golfer’s shot-making skills through the bag.
And I delight in the ways they play with golfers’ heads by making them believe that layouts of that ilk are somehow easier to play even as they increase our odds of breaking 80 by allowing us an extra bogey or two in our quest to do so.
When I think of such a course, my thoughts first wander to a couple of icons in England. Such as Swinley Forest, the Harry S. Colt layout in Surrey that plays as either a par-68 or par-69 (depending on whether they decide to make the 15th hole a 4- or 5-par on a given day) and that the designer once described as his “least bad” effort.
Another beaut is Rye, which also was designed by Colt, who was a founding member and the club’s first captain. There is nothing uninteresting or diminutive about that par-68 layout in East Sussex, with 10 of its 12 par-4s at least 400 yards in length.
Doak has described his approach at Sedge Valley as finding 18 great green sites and then building the course around them, with the actual length of the holes and the pars they possessed being secondary.
On this side of the Atlantic, we have our share of these sorts of courses. Two of my favorites, Misquamicut and Wannamoisett, are located in America’s smallest state, Rhode Island, and are as fun to play as they are challenging. Both happen to give at least partial design credit to Donald Ross.
Ross is also the architect of record for the tight and very testy Country Club of Waterbury in Connecticut. And this par-69 layout is regarded as one of the best in the Nutmeg State.
This past week, I was able to play perhaps the newest member of the sub-70 set in the Tom Doak-designed Sedge Valley, at the Sand Valley resort in central Wisconsin. Par is 68, and the course measures 5,829 yards from the tips. It features a quartet of meaty par-4s, one of which is an up-hiller, 455 yards in length, as well as one of the most charming stretches of holes I have ever played. That would be Nos. 5, 6, 7 and 8, and they include three par-3s ranging in distance from 136 to 227 yards and a 4-par that measures 294 yards.
Doak has described his approach at Sedge Valley as finding 18 great green sites and then building the course around them, with the actual length of the holes and the pars they possessed being secondary. And what he has done at Sedge Valley only reinforces what I have learned at places like Swinley Forest.
There is nothing subpar about sub-par-70 courses. Even in the modern era.
John Steinbreder
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Top: Sedge Valley scorecard
JOHN STEINBREDER, GGP