65 The three holes added to the east of the original ones, which serve as the closing loop of the golf course, are very plain. It is a decidedly flat ending to a round so spectacular for most of its length, and the club’s land does not include the fairly narrow strip further to the east that separates these holes from the ocean. The three best holes on the course, in my opinion, are the opener; the par-five ninth (the original closer) that plays away from the water to a side sloped fairway, culminating in the course’s best green; and, perhaps best of all, the 223-yard par-three fifth. The hole is at the far south of the site and plays around a horseshoe-shaped bay. It demands a carry straight over the ocean if the golfer wants to hit the green, but has, effectively, a Cape-shaped fairway short and to the left, allowing the cautious (or sensible) to play a safer tee shot that, if hit with a fade, might still reach the putting surface. It is a brilliant hole, offering much of the drama of the most famous water carry par three of all, the sixteenth at Cypress Point, but with a much better option for the longer handicapper than MacKenzie’s masterpiece. So, in short, Brautarholt has some remarkable features, but is far from the finished article. It is, in many ways, a great shame that Edwin Roald, an Icelander in Iceland, was not able to finish what he started a decade and a half ago, but that is water under the bridge. Instead, the course’s owners hired Tony Ristola, the Canadianborn but longtime European-resident architect (he was based in Germany for many years, but now calls the Czech Republic home), to add six extra holes to the north of the existing course, bringing Brautarholt to 18. Ristola is a singular architect. He first came to Europe as a young man to play professional golf on some of the continent’s mini tours, discovered he loved course design, trained as a shaper and an architect, and has been practising his art ever since. His best-known work is probably the completion of the (rather excellent) Sand Valley course in Poland. He also has a self-produced book titled ‘What Most Golf Architects Prefer You Did Not Know’, and his website proclaims clearly that time is the golf designer’s greatest gift to a project and that he, almost uniquely among practising architects, is on site every day of construction. He shapes his own projects – very unusual only a few years ago, a little more common now the shaper-architects that have graduated from the Coore & Crenshaw, Doak and Hanse family trees are starting to win their own projects. This level of focus obviously means his business model is not scalable, and helps to explain why, despite his undoubted ability, the world is not littered with Tony Ristola-designed golf courses. At Brautarholt, Ristola has been on site (not continuously obviously; golf construction in mid-winter this far “ The fifth is a brilliant hole, offering much of the drama of the most famous water carry par three of all, the sixteenth at Cypress Point” BRAUTARHOLT GOLF CLUB Brautarholt’s original nine holes include the long par-three fifth, which plays around a horseshoe-shaped bay Photo: GCA
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