What makes a golf course fun? Is it the challenge of hitting every fairway? Is it making a bucket load of birdies? Or is it simply the feeling of wanting to go straight back out and do it all again?
For years, there has been an assumption that bigger and harder means better. Length has become one of the easiest ways to measure a course’s challenge, at least in the professional game.
This compares to shorter courses which have historically carried something of a stigma. But that is changing, and Formby Ladies is helping to demonstrate why.
Speaking on the NCG Top 100s Podcast, the club’s course manager Rob Sandilands explained how attitudes towards shorter courses have changed – both within golf clubs and among visiting golfers.
“We’ve definitely noticed a change in how people approach it and their attitude to it,” he said. “It’s specifically people who know their golf and know their courses and know what they like and and have travelled and seen a few places. They understand what it is and they understand what it isn’t, and that’s really important.”
Why is Formby Ladies so fun to play?
“It’s just fun,” Sandilands added. “Who doesn’t love making birdies or having a chance to make birdies? It’s a bit of a plotter’s course. It’s one of those where so often people come off, and they just think, ‘I want to go back round again. I would play that totally differently’.”
Formby Ladies requires players to consider their club selection and Sandilands explained golfers may need to take a more strategic approach than simply driver off the tee. Where you’re hitting your second shot from is just as important.
And there is another obvious advantage to shorter courses. They don’t necessarily demand the same physical commitment as a traditional championship layout. Formby Ladies can be played relatively quickly and taking on multiple rounds in a day is a real possibility.
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“A lot of the time, it’s that mental feeling of ‘I have to hit my Sunday best on every hole’. It’s not something that doesn’t wear thin after a while,” Sandilands said.
“Of course, we all want to go and see these great courses, but a lot of the time, you’re absolutely knackered when you come off. And you just feel like you’ve been destroyed, maybe that’s just me.
“It’s (Formby Ladies) the complete antithesis to that. I’ve had a lot of people, even some course managers, who come off just sort of saying, ‘you know that’s just something that’s been so thought-provoking on how the game could and should be played’.”
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