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A Zen Approach To
Playing Golf In
Scotland

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James C. Plowden-Wardlaw

James Campbell Plowden-Wardlaw hit his first golf ball into the gorse bushes at Old Prestwick -- the cradle of championship golf and site of the first British Open -- at the age of nine, during a family visit to a great aunt in Ayr, Scotland. He returned home to America impressed by the game, but waited more than fifty years to play again in Scotland...(More...)

Alex B. Pagel

Alex B. Pagel dubbed his first shot at the Maidstone Club course on Long Island in the 1940s under the Scottish eye of the club professional Jack Ross. This legendary man endeavored to teach him how to hit a ball, never a total success, and how to enjoy the game, by contrast a long and continuing success story. Old Jack also frequently implied that the true object of the game was to play in Scotland on a links course in the wind...(More...)

 
 
 

 

Hole # 10 Crail (Equipment—More is Not More)

Crail is the 7th oldest golf club in the world, having been founded in 1786. However, Old Tom Morris (aye, once again), laid out the ‘new’ course in 1895, and if you don’t want either the waits or the protocols of nearby St. Andrews, but nevertheless want to play an excellent links course by the North Sea, Crail is the spot for you.

Crail Golfing Society - 18 holes - Balcomie Clubhouse, Crail, Fife KY10 3XN. Further details in our book 'A Birdie For Buddha.'

Crail, if we may say so, is even more gorgeous than the Royal and Ancient of St. Andrews, with a great sweep of rich green velvet rolling down to the sea or up to the cliffs that surround it. It is also a course whose clubhouse position allows the elimination of the last 4 holes behind the clubhouse to make an ideal (see Shiskine) length for the Zen golfer.

That brings to mind caddies and equipment. Scottish caddies are both professionals as to service and expertise, but imbued with the amateur golfer’s love of the game and of the courses themselves. Unlike in England and the U.S.A., golf in Scotland is a democratic game, a popular sport, an individual’s right. A right of access to courses originally - after the pasture/course stage of golf was made by the community on clan land. A Scotsman had a right to play because play was on his (or part of the community) land, and when it wasn't, there was usually a hard-bargained agreement between crofters and players that gave sheep at least partial access.

Another topic is equipment. There is a certain obvious and un-Zen distortion in playing a 1917 course not with a hickory shafted carved long nose brassie, but with the latest high compression ball hit by a “Big Bertha”. It can be exhilarating, but it is distorted. And sometimes it’s a distortion that robs the game of fun and challenge. Moving the tees back is not always a non-distorting modification - Links courses, courses set by a sea or on a river estuary on dunes with wind, sea and beach coming into play, are not easy to “upgrade”. A Zen archery master would not replace bow and arrow with a rifle.

You can read the entire chapter in our book "A Birdie for Buddha"
  

 
The Links & Clubhouse of Crail
Crail Scorecard

 

In short, care must be taken to harmonize your equipment with the course so that the natural Zen balance is preserved. It is very un-Zen to use equipment that saps the pleasure of playing a hole’s natural obstacles, including, one might add, the wonderful sensation of a good exit from a bunker. Golf is the joy of play, not the nastiness of a competition medal score game.

     

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