Looking back at the ‘Alps’
The first hole is so good that, as with the first at Hoylake, it is a pity that we have to play it while we are still, perhaps, a little stiff and nervous. The crime against which we have chiefly to be on our guard is that of slicing, for the railway runs along the entire length of the hole on the right-hand side, quite unpleasantly near us. We must not hook either, for rough country awaits the ball hit unduly far to the left, and, indeed, the shot is such a narrow one that there are some strong hitters who advocate the taking of a cleek from the tee. The second shot may be described on a calm day as a longish pitch, and there is a big bunker in front of the green, rough ground and a sandy road behind, the railway to the right, and tenacious undergrowth to the left. There is apt to be an engine snorting loudly on the other side of the wall just as we are playing a critical and curly putt, and the said putt is none the easier from the engine having liberally besprinkled the green with cinders. Altogether, we shall have done good work if we get a four, and what a hole to do in three, when it is the thirty-seventh, as did Mr. John Ball in his great final with Mr. Tait—as good a hole under the circumstances that I ever saw played in my life.
The second is quite one of the shortest of short holes on any first-class course, but it is not a bit easy, for a bunker behind the green has now been cut to reinforce the one in front, and the green is generally very keen.
The third is the ‘Cardinal,’ and has done a vast deal of mischief in its time. A topped brassey shot into the cavernous recesses of the bunker was generally thought to have cost Mr. Laidlay a championship when he played Mr. Peter Anderson; and, to come to more modern times, it was in this very same bunker that his supporters saw with horror the great Braid trying to throw away the championship in 1908 by playing a game of racquets against those ominous black boards. Yet, in the ordinary way, if we can but hit a reasonably straight tee-shot, we ought to send our second flying far over the Cardinal’s sandy nob and a good long way on towards the green. Then comes a delicate little pitch over some hummocky ground, or, if we are lucky, a running-up shot, and we find ourselves on a small green under the shadow of the wall, and should obtain a respectable five; a four is, as a rule, the score of heroes only.
At the fourth we cross the wall with a drive that varies in direction with our bravery and skill. If we are very brave, and very skilful, we shall hit a ball with a suspicion of a slice that shall keep close to the rushing waters of the burn, and shall be rewarded with an easy pitch, and haply a putt for three. If we do not trust ourselves, we shall give the burn a wide berth and pull far away to the left, where we should still get a four—but only by means of a longer and harder approach shot.
The fifth is the ‘Himalayas,’ a hole of great fame, but no transcendent merit. A good cleek shot should see us safely over this big hill and on to the green on the other side, which is now guarded by pot-bunkers. All these holes at Prestwick seem to have some tragedy connected with them, and the ‘Himalayas,’ in all human probability, lost Mr. Hilton his third Open Championship in 1898. Just one bad shot—he can hardly have played another during the four rounds: but he made this one fatal mistake with a club that was strange to him (he has told the sad story himself), and took eight to the hole. Yet he finished in the end but two strokes behind the winner, Harry Vardon, and at one time he had actually caught him in this terrible stern chase.
After the ‘Himalayas’ come several holes which do not, like the earlier and later holes, cry aloud for description. The sixth has a sufficiently difficult second on to a plateau green, and there is fierce punishment for the slicer among the bents. The seventh is a long short hole (this is such a convenient expression that it must pass), with rushes to catch a slice; and of the eighth, which runs alongside the railway, I have already said something.
The ninth and tenth are really fine two-shot holes; as far as length is concerned, there are none better on the course, and they are both thoroughly difficult into the bargain. The green at the ninth is especially attractive and difficult, consisting of a little hilly peninsula of turf that seems to jut out from a mainland of rough and bents. At the tenth we sidle along parallel with the range of ‘Himalayas,’ and at the eleventh we cross them with a drive—no cleek this time—for we have to carry as well the burn that runs beyond them. Then we turn our noses for home and make for the wall that we left behind us at the fourth hole. We shall need two full shots, and then a little chip on to a typical Prestwick green; long, narrow, and well guarded by lumps and bumps of various shapes and sizes. If, perchance, the wind is blowing very strongly behind us, we may try to carry the wall in two, and the ball will very likely light on the coping of the wall to bounce thence into unfathomable bents, while we are left lamenting our lack of contemptible prudence.