The Prestwick Experience

Wednesday, Jul 23^rd – The “Prestwick Experience”

 

We were excited to play Prestwick since it is the birthplace of The Open Championship in 1860, which was 12 holes then and played in 3 consecutive rounds starting at Noon on a Saturday (see you can always learn something new).

  

We arrived at Prestwick early in the morning for our 8:15 tee time. The place opens at 7:30 and we were given a friendly greeting by Bobby in his green jacket with the Prestwick emblem on the breast (the jacket figures in later in the story – hence the detail given here) and his crisp white shirt and green striped Prestwick tie. When we went in the door there was a man named Jerry seated at a desk – almost like you find in an office building – also in his green Prestwick jacket and pressed white shirt and Prestwick tie. He was a bit more stodgy than Bobby. Each time we were charmed with “Welcome to the Prestwick Experience!” Very nice indeed.

There is no practice area (or what we call a driving range) so we were practicing on the putting green which is right outside the door and next to the first tee. On the far edge of the putting green away from the entrance, Steve was putting a few balls from the fringe to get a sense of putting from off the green as is common on such links courses. Good old Jerry made a bee line for Steve with a stern chastisement, “There is no practicing in this area. You must practice your putting ON the putting green.” Yes, he did emphasize “ON.” Really. I am not making this up. I have witnesses. Hmmm. A little damper on the Prestwick Experience.

 

The Prestwick course is very tough, lots of deep, thick rough.

 

 

We always had one of our caddies up ahead because tracking your ball with many blind shots and deep rough made it necessary to keep play moving. How bad was the rough? On one hole, Paul hit a ball off the fairway and we thought it was lost, but the fore-caddie found it and put his hat on it. When Paul and Steve approached the area (note the caddie was off on the other side of the fairway trying to find another one of our ever-so-slightly errant tee shots), we couldn’t find the caddies’ hat (!!) and the caddie had to return to help us find both the hat and the ball !!

The course also has a bit of an odd lay-out … some wild doglegs, a par 3 called Himalaya (remember all the holes and traps have names), which has a 100 foot high grass covered sand dune directly in front of the tee box and you have to hit a 200 yards shot over the dune to the green on the other side.

 

 

There is a sand trap on the 17^th hole called (appropriately) “The Sahara” and it is the single largest collection of sand I have ever seen on a golf course (ask Chan … it took him 3 shots to get out).

 

 

 

Steve parred a 457 yard uphill par 4 with a driver/5-wood to the back of the green and two putt.

 

At this point I need to mention that we were playing our own Open Championship – the total score on the four Open courses [Carnoustie, St. Andrews, Royal Troon (don’t forget the Royal) and Prestwick]. On the 18^th hole, as it turns out, Chan and Paul and Steve are all in the running for the best score with Chan and Paul tied and Steve one stroke behind. Steve needs to chip in from pin-high just off the green (he hasn’t done it all day J), Chan needs to get up-and-down for par from just of the front edge of the green (50 feet away) and Paul is laying 1 having driven through the green and needs to get down in 2 from the very back of the green which is about 40 feet away for a birdie to win. Steve lips out the chip-in, Chan lags to 7 feet from where he ultimately makes a clutch par putt. [Did I mention Jack was out of it at this point??] Paul has lagged his long putt to within 5 feet. Now, the tee box for the 14^th hole is right next to the 18^th green and in fact the pin placement on the 18^th is on the far side and closest to the tee box. Paul looks at the group on the tee box and asks if they want to hit their drives or whether he should putt. The group on the tee politely defers to Paul’s putt which if he makes it wins our Open Championship. So, Paul lines up the putt, one that he has been making all day and the whole trip as the steadiest putter in the group. Just as he takes his putter back, there is the whoosh and click of a guy hitting his drive on the adjacent tee box. Paul yips the putt and does the ‘angry dance’ while we are all looking over our shoulder at the oblivious group on the 14^th tee. Paul taps in for par leaving he and Chan tied and Steve one stroke behind. In a 4-hole playoff (that’s what they do at the Open) using the 4 highest handicap holes on the scorecard, Paul wins by 2 strokes !!! So, maybe justice was served.

As part of our Prestwick Experience that we paid for, we were to have a complementary lunch in the dining room. After our round, we found out that we needed to wear a jacket, white shirt and Prestwick tie [which was on sale in the Pro Shop for €25 ($32 US)] to enter the dining room. Good old Jerry was standing guard and we could not even look inside the inner sanctum. So much for the Prestwick Experience.

We went upstairs for lunch in the casual dining room instead to cash in our free lunch, only to find at the end of our lunch that the lunch in the commoners room WASN’T allowed to be substituted for the dining room lunch – even though we ordered fish-and-chips, burgers and a few drinks! The waitress fetched the Secretary of the Club who acknowledged that the lunch in the dining room was much more elegant (i.e. expensive), but that we bought the Prestwick Experience and there was no substitute for that. After some wrangling, we got off with paying for our drinks. And that ladies and gentlemen is the Prestwick experience L.

We left Prestwick to take the ferry to Ireland, and we sat in the Club Room (Chan and Steve had to vouch for the commoners to be allowed in the Club Room). We arrived at Larne where Marty met us and drove us to the Bushmills Inn (yes, Bushmills has an ‘s’ on the end of it and not an apostrophe). It is the home of the world’s oldest whiskey – Bushmills.

 

 

Shortly after arrival and check-in, Paul successfully tested the fire alarm system at the hotel by going out the wrong door. It turned out to be not a big deal since most of the guests were allowed to return to their rooms in about an hour.

I should note that the 90 minute drive from Larne to Bushmills was our first experience with Irish highways and byways – mostly byways. To call them country roads is an exaggeration as they are very narrow, bumpy and uneven and would not classify as roads in any first world country.