Praise for refurbished Roehampton

25 May 2011

One of the new bunkers on Roehampton's eleventh hole

The Roehampton Club in London has reopened its golf course after a major refurbishment and engineering project.

EIGCA past president Ken Moodie of Creative Golf Design was the golf course architect for the project, working with his regular consultant, professional golfer and BBC commentator Ken Brown. Following an extensive course review and bunker audit, the course improvements were implemented by contractor MJ Abbott, in two phases over a 12-week period between June-September 2010, keeping nine holes in play throughout the work.

Moodie said the project’s main focus was bunker renovation, since the old bunkers had lost their original shapes, provided variable playing conditions and generally drained poorly. Bunkers were connected to a new main drainage system and lined with turf in order to protect against stone-ingress into the sand. Moodie also proposed that many fairway bunkers, plus some green and approach bunkers, were moved to provide a more relevant strategic challenge for better golfers and to improve safety on the course boundary.

The green of the par three seventeenth hole was redesigned to create a better range of pin positions and a more exciting penultimate hole, and some new tees built. A new home green was also built to allow stormwater mounding to be constructed to protect the clubhouse and sports buildings from flooding. Moodie said this provided the opportunity to design an elevated two-tier green which provides a more challenging finish to the round.

Roehampton chief executive Marc Newey said: “The new playing strategy for the course combined with the excellent bunker renovation works by Abbotts has made the course three shots more difficult for the better player. All our golfing members and the ever-increasing number of guests love the changes made by Ken and his team.”