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Golf on Cape Cod Course ReviewPlymouth Country Club
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Photography by George Peet
As Francis Ouimet is quoted in Great Donald Ross Golf Courses You Can Play, "Plymouth is a course which should serve to make you play splendid shots. I consider it one of the best 18-hole courses in New England [as it calls] for an exhibition of skill that is not excelled in any other course."
Around the first third of the last century, the Dornoch, Scotland-born Ross designed all or parts of some 300 courses in America, including Oyster Harbors, Bass River and Hyannisport on the Cape; Dunedin, Delray Beach, Seminole in Palm Beach, the Biltmore and Daytona Beach in Florida; Pinehurst and Pine Needles in North Carolina; the Old Course at the Homestead in Virginia; Ponkapoag and two dozen others in Massachusetts.
Donald Ross was to golf course design what Ford was to the automobile and Edison to electronics, but Ross’ creations had lasting style, in addition to innovations. "Ross’ original training as a greenskeeper is reflected in the natural look of the roughs and plantings of shrubs and native New England grasses," Paul and B.J. Dunn wrote in their coffee table book of Ross courses. His courses, as exemplified by Plymouth, are friendly, inviting, natural, hilly, challenging and charming all at the same time.
After all the shots have been hit, when all the golfers and caddies have gone home and the rangers and greenskeepers have left for the day, what remains is the permanent beauty of the course itself. And judging from his far-flung legacy, Ross understood that. He knew that a course shouldn’t repeat itself, shouldn’t bore.
Ross believed that golf should be a pleasure, not a penance, and he was true to his belief down to the smallest detail – the solitary tree, the maximum view, the well-placed bunkers guarding typically elevated greens, easy to see, not so easy to stay on. First-time guests of Plymouth Country Club members often look at the par 69 and wonder, "Wouldn’t it be better to turn a par four into a par five and play the course at par 70?" "Why?" is the typical member’s typical response, and after playing the course you understand why indeed!
Donald Ross designs give the player many options. The sixth hole is a good example. It is a short par 4 that plays from an elevated tee to an elevated green over a huge valley. Big hitters can attempt to hit for the green, but with great peril left and right. The safe way is to tee with a long iron or utility wood to the fairway at the base of the hill, thus avoiding traps to the left. From there, it’s a short iron to the elevated green that is severely pitched from back to front. Getting to the green is the easy part; getting in the hole is not so easy. Putting from above the hole will test all your skills to save par.
The back nine at Plymouth Country Club is simply wonderful. It opens with a difficult par three that looks easy, and ends with two tremendous par fours. In between is the course’s only par 5, the sixteenth, where two well struck shots will land the ball at the base of the elevated green, about sixty yards from the hole. The player looks, sees no bunkers and thinks, "Bingo! Birdie time!" A closer look at the green reveals the true story. Making five will be a good score.
The par 4 seventeenth is a fabulous hole that doglegs left over a ravine to an elevated green. Many a match will be turned on this hole. The drive must be straight and long enough to have a clear shot to the green. The mid-iron second shot must be accurate. Missing left or long makes bogey probable, and missing right is jail. Pure fun, pure Ross!
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