Ben Hogan, who may have played the game better than any golfer in history and certainly played it more thoughtfully than most, once said, “A good golf hole should have both character and appeal. It shouldn’t ask a golfer to play shots that are beyond his ability, but it should present him with an interesting challenge and reward him when he hits the shots that are called for. Golf is a game in which you play your first shot on a hole in order to play your second from the best position, and so on. It’s a thinking game, a game of controlling the ball.”

In other words, a course should have the versatility to be made less punishing, but still challenging, for the average player without spoiling the character or playing value for the expert. Length is not the benchmark, but design is. No matter how far you are capable of striking the ball, each hole should force you to think out the shot you must play. Then it must make you execute it. That is the test of a great golf course.

Make the game fun for everybody. Never make a course so penal that a golfer who is not a great player will take so many strokes, be so embarrassed and so miserable that he will give up the game. They are the game. Without them there would be no one to appreciate the great tournament players. And how many of them would there be if they were all out there shooting 130 every day?

That philosophy may sound strange coming from a man who has a reputation, in certain circles, as a fiend when it comes to designing difficult golf course. But those circles almost always encompass the touring professionals, or those they have influenced. Yes, I design very difficult golf courses for that calibre of player, as well I should, for very good reasons.

Professionals complain a lot, I’ve found. They seem to want fairway traps from which they can reach the green, holes that are not too long, rough that is not too deep, greens that are dead-flat. That may be an exaggeration, but they do seem to object to severe tests. Perhaps if I made a living playing golf I would feel the same, but the fact is that if we turn golf into a putting contest, nobody will care and there won’t be a living.