What is the antithesis of Cypress Point?
Carnoustie.
One is located on the west coast of America, the other on the
eastern shores of Scotland. New World, Old World. One dazzles, one devours.
Cypress Point has been described as the “Sistine Chapel of Golf.” Carnoustie has
been called a “great big shaggy monster.”
Carnoustie may be golf’s ultimate championship examination.
Certainly, Carnoustie is Scotland’s toughest links course, a test as epic as it
is relentless. The links rewards good golf and punishes poor golf better than
any other course on the British Open rota.
Walter Hagen was one of the first American golfers to sing
Carnoustie’s praises. He rated it the “greatest course in the British Isles and
one of the three greatest in the world.” While Hagen said it, it was Ben Hogan
who largely proved it. In 1953 Hogan competed in his one and only British Open.
He arrived at Carnoustie having already captured that year’s Masters and U.S.
Open titles. For two full weeks he studied the links in minute detail, turned
the locals’ respect into admiration (they dubbed him the “Wee Ice Mon”) and then
compiled ever-decreasing rounds of 73-71-70-68 to win by four strokes. It was
golf’s ultimate case of “veni, vidi, vici.”
Historians believe the game has been played at Carnoustie since
the early 16th century; it was definitely being played on the adjoining Barry
links at that time. The first official golf club at Carnoustie was founded in
1842, when golfers played a 10-hole course laid out by Allan Robertson. Old Tom
Morris extended the links to 18 holes in 1867, and the last major revision was
undertaken by James Braid in 1926. Carnoustie’s first Open was staged in 1931
when Tommy Armour triumphed, and it returned in 1937, when Henry Cotton claimed the second of his three
titles.
Like St. Andrews, Carnoustie is a public links, and the small town
near Dundee lives and breathes golf. It may lack the sophistication and
scholarliness of St Andrews—only a die-hard golfer would choose to spend his
vacation here—but the town is not quite as gray and dour as people imagine.
It has been said that Carnoustie “was a good place from which to
emigrate,” a comment that has often been taken the wrong way. In the late 19th
and early 20th centuries, many people left the east coast of Scotland and headed
for the New World. Some of those who left from Carnoustie happened to be
especially gifted at golf and disseminated their talents in North America.
Stewart Maiden, the famous mentor of Bobby Jones, came from Carnoustie, for
example.
