Stoneham

I haven’t written up any of the courses that I played in England in awhile but it’s time to dip into the back catalogue because there are some excellent ones that I’ve left off. I’ve decided to start with Stoneham, a 1908 Willie Park Jr. design because it’s easily the most under-appreciated of the bunch. The reason for this is simple: it isn’t in the London suburbs. It’s about two hours southwest, just outside of Southampton. But it’s a heathland course (or at least they’re trying to make it one by planting heather), so it belongs in the discussion with those. And among those in southeastern England, it certainly belongs in a discussion of which of these are among the best.

The first thing to note about this course is that it’s very hilly, hillier than all of the great London heathland courses except maybe St. George's Hill. But the routing makes beautiful use of this tough property. I’m always amazed that the old greats could take a difficult property like this and build something that’s completely walkable with several great holes and no bad ones that recent architects’ takes on easier properties can’t even accomplish one or two of these.

But part of the reason why Stoneham works so well is that Park, like all the great old British architects, was ok with building holes that we might find a bit suspect today. Extremely hilly corner of a property? Build back-to-back par 3s. Have a severe slope in the middle of the property? Eh, route a long par 4 along it…a weak drive will kick left and leave a long approach while a good one will kick forward and leave a much shorter one. There are, of course, some tricky uphill holes, but why is this frowned upon while marsh and ponds everywhere are ok? An uphill hole is a real test of hitting the ball solidly, which is an important skill.

There’s also an elegance to this routing, with the front nine working generally counter-clockwise around the outside of the property and the back nine moving back and forth across its interior. The whole property has tremendous contour and the course’s use of it reaches its zenith with a set of par 5s in the middle of the back nine that fall as beautifully over their stretches of land as any course that I’ve seen. Combine this with Park Jr.’s minimalist green construction (similar to his work at Sunningdale) and you have a course that’s as good an expression of its land as just about any that I’ve seen.

Note: This review draws several pictures from the club’s website, which has excellent pictures of the holes. Looking through these, I see that they’ve done a lot of work to the bunkers since my visit. Where this is significant, I’ll show both and discuss how I think the changes might have affected the holes.


Like Park Jr.’s Old Course at Sunningdale, Stoneham starts with a short par 5. It’s about a 200 yard carry to reach the top of the first hill. For good players, the bigger challenge is a bunker about 275 out on the left. While it looks just as close, the one on the right is 70 yards further out.

The carry up the hill isn't too much of a challenge if you hit a decent one...but it is the first tee. The bunker on the left is bigger trouble for longer hitters.

The approach is slightly downhill to a simple built-up green with bunkers at its front-right and left. It’s a pretty inviting first hole…as long as you hit it straight.

Like many other heathland courses, Stoneham has been getting a lot of bunker upgrades. The left fairway bunker here reflects the new common style: wavy edges with heather across the top.

The downhill approach is quite inviting.

The green is built up in the back but still quite simple.

I thought that the ~190 yard par 3 second was the weakest on the course but looking at the website, it looks like they’ve redone the bunkering since I’ve been there. It looks much better now. Still, this land slopes away but the green is built-up to slope back-to-front, which I generally don’t like. I wonder if the green pad is original?

The view of the green in 2017.

And the current view from the club's website. I prefer the look of the new bunkering on this hole. But that won't be the case with all of the renovations.

Three is a tough short par 4, tough because this time it takes almost 250 from the tips to clear the ridge in the fairway. The ball can also kick left if you’re in the left side, toward what centuries-old oak tree in the left rough. The first of many holes where the contour of the fairway plays an important role in how you need to think about your drive.

You have to clear a hill like on one, but this one is much tougher.

Even if you make the carry, the view of the green isn't completely clear.

The magnificent, ancient English Oak in the left rough.

Another of these holes is the long par 4 fourth, the aforementioned long par 4 playing along a hill. This is a hole that you’d never see in the states. I played the course in May and it was tough because the fairway was soft enough that you weren’t guaranteed a kick to the base of the hill. With firm fairways in the summer, it might be tough to keep your ball from kicking forward into a creek 325 from the tee.

Here's a type of drive that you don't see often in the US: downhill, yet blind.

Whatever time of year it is, the gradually uphill approach to the lay-of-the-land green is one of the best in southeastern England.

The approach is magnificent although I'm not sure how you'd stop the ball from running into the creek if the fairway is baked-out.

Five is a somewhat-awkward 325 yard par 4. A long hitter could get pretty close to the green if they carry the bunker on the right with a fade. But it’s difficult to hit enough of a fade to keep yourself from ending up short and left of the green, which isn’t a place that I’d recommend; it’s a super-awkward pitch to a narrow green that slopes left-to-right. The smartest thing to do here is just hit it 200 yards from the tee, then hit a wedge. It’d be a bit less awkward if they trimmed the trees on the right, but I don’t mind the awkwardness as a complication for someone who’s playing the hole aggressively.

The trees encroach a bit too much on the right but you can still get near the green if you hit a fade over the right bunkers.

The sightline isn't great if you layup short of the left fairway bunker.

It's much better if you sneak past it. But you have to be much more accurate if you go any further than this.

From behind the green, we can see that it's narrow and pitches left-to-right, making the approach very difficult from left of the fairway...especially if you get too close to the green.

Six is another short par 5 (~500 yards, like most English par 5s) where the landing area is not visible from tee. The drive is awkward because there are hidden bunkers at 260 on the right and 290 on the left. Looking back at my pictures, I’m realizing that they’ve also changed the bunkering scheme here because when I played, the one on the right was further out.

Another downhill, blind drive.

The old unpleasant surprise fairway bunkers.

And the new ones. These might be a bit more visible from the tee.

But the most noteworthy thing about this hole was the awkward approach, which doesn’t look to have changed. Unless you can get it within about 50 yards of the green, you’ll be shooting blind from a valley. The bunkering around the green has changed a bit in style (more heather around them), but not in placement.

A bit like Lawsonia's thirteenth hole, it's tough to find a good spot to layup unless you can get pretty close in two. Fortunately this hole is about 60 yards shorter.

The par 3 seventh is an example of one of my favorite types of holes: a long par 3 where you can use the slope of the ground to run the ball on the green. This one is also semi-blind but you can tell from the general slope of the land off the tee enough about what’s going on. There’s a blind bunker short-left of the green but it’s not a bad spot if you end up there.

Here's a very English hole: a blind, 230 yard par 3.

I just loved the simplicity of these green site. Just one bunker on the left and the land gently feeding in from the right.

The green pad, which reminds me of Park Jr.'s greens at Sunningdale, is simple and perfect.

Eight is the second of the aforementioned back-to-back par 3s in the tough corner of the property. Like five and six at West Sussex, its a nice pair because seven is long (~230) while eight is medium length (~165). It appears that the club has done some work here since my visit, splitting the front bunker into two and adding heather around the edges.

Uphill and with a bit of a false front, the eighth is completely different from the seventh.

The ~380 yard ninth is another nice example of ‘well, we’ll just have to do the best we can with the land’ and the result is an interesting hole. The fairway crests at about 250, then it’s all downhill into the green. But you have to be careful.

​I see that the club has added a bunker on the right since my visit, which makes the drive a bit tougher. At the same time, without the bunker, if you hit a push, it was possible to run into the woods on the right because the land right of the fairway slopes left-to-right.

Another hole where a good drive is necessary to clear a hill.

The renovation added a bunker on the right in what I think is a very sensible place. I didn't think it was the easiest driving hole before and it's probably tougher now. But it also looks like they expanded the fairway a bit on the right.

Ten is another fine par 3, about 185 yards to a narrow green, which requires a precise mid-long iron shot.

You need to be accurate with your mid-iron here because the green is narrow and drops off at the right.

I suspect that the 400 yard eleventh is one of the most controversial holes on the course because the approach is all carry over a stream valley to a very shallow green. I’m not a big fan of greens benched into hillsides like this, but it’s a different and more demanding kind of shot for this course. The bushes behind the green have been cleared and replaced with heather since my visit, definitely an improvement.

Another drive with poor visibility. There's a hidden bunker about 230 out on the right.

The approach is one of Stoneham's toughest.

The club has replaced the bushes behind the green with heather. Good choice.

The par 5 twelfth begins the best three hole stretch on this course and one of the best that I’ve seen anywhere. It starts with another semi-blind drive, but one with plenty of room and no hidden bunkers (unless you can hit it into the cross-bunkers 350 out). Still, you either need to hit a draw or drive up the left side because the ball will run right into the trees if you miss over there.

Another blind drive but one with plenty of room, especially up the left side.

The approach is one of the best-looking that I’ve ever seen, over beautiful cross-bunkers, down hill with the ground sweeping left-to-right. But you also need to be careful because if you get one running a bit right, there’s a big ditch filled with junk. And if you’re short and left, the angle into the green will be awkward. So it’s no dumb beauty.

The downhill approach is one of the best-looking that I've seen. It's also interesting because there's a dip about 65 yards short of the green.

The approach from a bit closer with the heather in bloom.

You really don't want to be weak and right on the approach or you can get into some junk. The ground slopes beautifully to feed your ball into the green using the high left side.

Thirteen is the course’s drivable par 4, only 275 from the tips. Yet it’s seriously challenging if you get even a bit offline because the green is very narrow. This is actually one of the only holes that I’ve played that’s improved by its cart path—it provides the aiming point for the drive. Really, it’s probably best to lay back at least 50 or 60 yards here because it’s just such a difficult shot if you go for it and miss wide.

Another blind drive, but the cart (walking) path in the distance is a good aiming point.

The green is extremely narrow. You don't want to go for it and miss too far wide.

The area left of the green was rough when I played but looks to have been mowed down. Excellent choice. You don't see these intricately contoured chipping areas much outside of links courses in England.

Fourteen, a par 5 of ~480 yards, is another beauty. The drive is not the course’s most interesting but the approach is both that and one of the course’s most beautiful. The great thing about the approach is how the land feeds into it. There’s a rise short and left of the green and if you haven’t hit the longest drive, you can still use this to feed the ball on. If you miss right, a valley catches your ball. It’s a very short and easy par 5 for long hitters but this option makes it a very interesting reachable par 5 for the rest of us.

This was one of my favorite holes in southeastern England.

Downhill then uphill on fourteen. There's a magnificent, ancient Yew in the left rough here that must be as old as the oak on the third. These ancient trees are probably remnants of the native southern English woodland that is almost completely gone.

Walking toward the landing area. The Yew is on the left.

I like this green site and the contours leading into it about as much as any I've seen, certainly on a parkland/heathland course.

This excellent back-and-forth stretch continues with the fifteenth, a 425 yard par 4. This is one of the toughest holes on the course because the fairway gets much narrow about 270 out and you’re likely to have a handing lie in the fairway. The green is open and receptive so if you haven’t hit your best, it might be smart to hedge to the front.

Another downhill semi-blind drive where the path helps show the way. It's easy to run into junk on the left as the fairway narrows.

This is a tough green to hit if you've left yourself a long second.

I loved the look of the trench bunker in front of the short par 3 sixteenth hole’s narrow green. Unfortunately the club has turned this into three small bunkers. Perhaps it creates aesthetic consistency with the other bunker renovations, but that isn’t a good enough reason to do it. Aesthetic consistency is important but when a feature looks good in its own right, it shouldn’t be changed just to improve aesthetic consistency across the course.

The ~135 yard sixteenth from the tee.

I loved the look of this bunker that wrapped around the front and right side of the green.

Like the redone seventeenth at Swinley Forest, the new bunkering looks good. But it's not an improvement over the original and I don't think that the change was justified.

Seventeen, along with two and eighteen, is a lesser hole. The problem is caused by the trees just off the right side of the tee box. They block the right side of the fairway, pushing you to the left, where the club has planted some ugly American maple trees in the rough. I’d lose the first tree off the tee on the right and the ones in the left rough.

The drive on seventeen is awkward because you either need to carry or work your ball around this tree on the right side.

The approach is much better, over a winding stream with bunkers on the hill to the right. It’s one of the course’s loveliest green settings. It’s a shame that the drive is so awkward because this is otherwise a fine hole.

But the approach to a green tucked in a bend in the creek is a beauty.

It looks to me like the short, uphill par 5 eighteenth has undergone some changes. It was a bit of a dull slog when I played it. But it appears that the club has removed all of the trees on the left to expand the practice area and has added two staggered fairway bunkers, 230 out on the left and 275 out on the right. This appears to have made it a much tougher, but much more interesting driving hole. It also looks like the club has added a bunker about 60 yards short of the green on the left, enhancing what had been a dull approach.

Unlike the other holes, where the changes haven’t made much of a substantive difference, it looks like the bunker additions and tree clearing have significantly improved this one.

The old eighteenth was a bit bland.

Big changes here, with the club removing the forest on the left next to the practice area and adding fairway bunkers. Counterpoint: the forest setting was nice and is unusual for England, where there's little forest left.

Stoneham was a bit of a trek for me because it’s about 75 miles from London’s Victoria Station. Fortunately, there’s an express train that stops near here so it was only about four train stops and a short cab ride. Still an easy day trip. I’m glad that I did it because this course is a serious contender for a place at the lower end of the top tier of heathland courses with company like Walton Heath’s New Course and Woking. I preferred it to some of the other, more renowned heathland courses like the Addington (although renovations appear to have made it much better), Hankley Common, and Worplesdon.

What to say about Willie Park Jr.’s design style? It’s a bit more minimalistic than Colt’s, with less shaping around the greens. These greens tend to be simple, built-up pads, like those at Park Jr.’s Battle Creek CC in Michigan. Owing probably to the severity of the land, some of these are quite built-up, like the ninth.

I’m not sure what Park Jr.’s bunker style looked like though because the club has redone many of the bunkers. While the new bunkers look good in their own right, I suspect that they are not consistent with the original style. If I had to, I’d guess that the more trench-like bunkers like that (previously) on sixteen and those with built-up ridges in front of them, like the cross-bunker on twelve are original. These remind me of Fowler’s work at Walton Heath and a bit of some of the bunkers at Sunningdale, although again there, it’s difficult to tell what’s Park and what’s Colt.

Like old country club courses in the US, there’s been a lot of work recently on England’s classic courses. But unlike the US, where the trend has been to try to restore the original designs, there seems to be more ‘modernization’ in these English course renovations. I don’t think that I like it. While I’m fine with building bunkers in new places because the old ones don’t provide a sufficient challenge, I don’t understand why these renovating architects don’t try to shape these in the style of the originals. I’m not averse to modernization if what was there in the first place wasn’t great, but I don’t understand it when what was there probably was.

It seems like most of these clubs are enthralled with putting heather around the bunker edges to give their course the ‘heathland’ look because heathland courses are higher status than ‘parkland’ courses, always an issue in a country where status hierarchy is so important (which they try to downplay). As far as I can tell, there’s no fundamental difference between a heathland course and a parkland course except that the former has heather and a few more pine trees. Sure there’s an ecological difference—the former has acidic soil and the latter doesn’t—but that doesn’t matter much for golf in itself. There’s no systematic difference in the topography of these types of land. Some of these clubs are going overboard with the eye-candy heather, which can be functional in a bad way (you carry a bunker just to end up in it).

I’d prefer it if these renovations focused more on capturing the original styling of the bunkers. To me, it’s a bit ironic that the historically more progressive US is emphasizing restoration while clubs in the more historically-minded UK are modernizing. It’s a bit unfair that I’m putting this in my Stoneham review because Stoneham isn’t the worst offender (cough…cough…Swinley Forest). Most of the changes here appear to have improved their respective holes (though emphatically not number sixteen). Still, there aren’t too many notable Park Jr. courses in the UK and it would be nice if one of the best examples of his work there were presented in its original style.