Golf Course Architecture: Issue 57 - July 2019

ADAM LAWRENCE 1 Ranking rankling N o two golfers are ever going to agree exactly on the order of every course they have played. So, a big list and lots of golfers is bound to cause disagreement. That’s why publishers like rankings; they get readers talking about your content. I know how this works. When GCA did our own course ranking, six years ago, voted for only by golf architects, we released the results over a two-week period on our website, and our traffic numbers went through the roof. Some of the rankings like to claim that their list is the most credible, in fact objectively created, because voters are required to rate courses by certain criteria. This is natural: there is little point doing a ranking unless it has credibility. Unfortunately, of course, the criteria are themselves subjective (as well as impenetrable – I have still never heard a good explanation of what ‘shot values’ means and how it can be measured). Yet, for all their flaws, rankings are important. For a publicly-accessible course, a good performance on a major ranking can result in a lot more visitors; for private clubs, there’s no doubt that memberships at top 100 courses are more desirable than elsewhere. The irony here, of course, is that for the very top courses, it is irrelevant – no-one is joining Sunningdale or Cypress Point because of its performance in any ranking. But in the middle levels, the importance is real. There are different approaches to compiling a ranking; you can seek out lots of voters, and accept that some will not be very discerning (this is the problem with entirely customer-sourced rankings in other areas, for example Zagat in restaurants). Or you can go for a small panel of experts, and accept that a couple of votes will skew your results. The best of both worlds would be a ranking where anyone can vote, but every voter has a weighting calculated. Even then, rankings are only opinion. Enjoy them by all means. But don’t take them too seriously. WELCOME