A sublime golf course nestled by the north Cornish coast, near Padstow
Trevose is one of the most beautiful courses in the whole of the South West with glorious coastal views of the Atlantic. Since it opened 100 years ago, it has gone from being a beautiful, quirky course and an outpost for family holidays, to being a very fine golf course with additional facilities that broaden its attraction. In recent times it has hosted a variety of professional and amateur events including the Legends Senior Tour and the Brabazon Trophy for England Golf.
Trevose is celebrating its Centenary
The course was originally laid out by the renowned Harry Colt, who was responsible for so many of the world’s greatest courses. The Championship course has undergone a complete overhaul, with Tom Mackenzie, who is one of the world’s leading experts on golf design, being asked to implement a series of changes to the historic links over the last ten years.
The first hole
Golf Features caught up with Tom recently.
Golf Features: Over the last 10 years you’ve been working on the wonderful course at Trevose. Can you outline the major changes that you have made?
Tom Mackenzie: Our priority was to make the course more playable and enjoyable for everyone and for it to feel more rugged. We also wanted to make better use of the setting which led to the relocation of the 4th green so that players see the bay in all of its glory which was not the case before.
Golf Features: How have advances in club and ball technology affected your work over the last 10 years?
Tom Mackenzie: On many courses it is really hard to keep pace with that. It is not so much the equipment itself, but the way that young players are taught, and then the shafts and heads that are selected to match them, that is making the situation so challenging. On a course like Trevose, though, almost no-one plays the back tees and I think we actually made the course a little shorter.
Golf Features: Do you think too much emphasis has been placed on how far elite players hit the ball?
Tom Mackenzie: Our work everywhere in recent years has been more focused on making sure that the slower swing speed golfers are much better looked after, with scaled tees so that males and females have equivalent tee offerings. They have been poorly served, but it is great to see things changing. Two clever and committed individuals, Sharon Eales and Fiona Womack, have been championing the value of shorter courses for women and also highlighting the folly of higher handicap women having to play courses with ratings as high as 76 every day of the year. Only an elite male amateur would choose to do that, but on many courses the women have no choice. It is madness and it is great to work with them to help to encourage change. The scaled tees at Royal Birkdale are a great example of this in action.
Golf Features: Do you regard your work as bringing courses up to a 21st century standard, or taking them back to their majestic past?
Tom Mackenzie: I don’t really think of it in either way. It was all about making the course more memorable, enjoyable and stimulating for as many people as possible to do justice to such a wonderful place. A huge part of the re-awakening of the course was the landscape management with vast areas of scrub being removed, exposing sand which gradually grows back over. It is like a landscape re-boot and that has helped to transform the character of the course. It also helps with the biodiversity around the property, which adds to the overall experience of playing at Trevose in my opinion.
Golf Features: With regard to bunkers, are you in favour of modern construction methods which seem to promote better drainage and easier maintenance?
Tom Mackenzie: As a company, we have seen almost all available lining methods being used, from upturned turf, to matting products, to crumb rubber on a stone base. They all serve a purpose, solving problems like wash outs and contamination, but all also come with their own drawbacks. With our experience, we help our clients find what is the best approach for their individual circumstances as they all have different soils, climate and budgets. We do not push any one product, as it is a complex subject.
Golf Features: Golfers in general seem to be obsessed with the pace of greens. What is your view on stimpmeter readings and preparing courses with faster greens throughout the year?
Tom Mackenzie: Increasing green speeds alter the character of greens and how they putt hugely. We do technical analysis that plots how green speeds reduce sensible flaggable areas. Twenty years ago, 8 feet on the stimp was normal – now some clubs strive for 12 feet in the summer and speeds between 10 and 11 are common. This makes putting harder, the game slower because less skilled players take more putts and reduced variety as flags are set in smaller sections of the greens. These areas receive more wear and the grass becomes stressed and more susceptible to disease, to the point where greens which are cut too short can only be managed through constant use of fungicides. It is like humans taking antibiotics just in case. My preference is to stick with speeds around 10 feet as this keeps greens on the great old courses more playable.
The 18th green and some of the superb accommodation units
Golf Features: With so many courses facing ever increasing play, there seems to be quite a bit more pressure on the tee complexes to cope with extra golfers. Are you making teeing areas larger to accommodate the extra play or do you use any special skills to make the tees harder wearing?
Tom Mackenzie: When we do a course review, we assess tee sizes on each hole and it is common to find courses with more tee space on par fives and long par fours where everyone hits drivers, and less space on short par threes. We encourage clubs to enlarge tees where the wear is the greatest and reduce tees where it is less. Another trend is for tees to be raised unnecessarily with steep banks and steps. That reduces the available tee space and wears the grass out at the top and bottom of the steps. It is much better to have shallow banks and lower, larger tees, eliminating the need for steps. Modern fine-leafed rye grasses are also brilliant at taking wear so using a blend suited to the local conditions and then getting the growing environment for the tee right makes a huge difference. People under-estimate this as a factor in excessive wear on a tee.
Trevose has been owned by the Gammon family for over eight decades and it is now Nick Gammon’s job to oversee all aspects of the course and business. Nick, who is a very good player in his own right and recently just increased his handicap to scratch, works very hard to ensure that the course maintains its standards and the place maintains its magical family feel and attraction.
Nick Gammon on the patio
Whilst the renovations to the main course have been going on, Nick Gammon and his team have further refined the par three short course and the excellent nine hole Headland course. These extra nine hole layouts provide a less expensive and easier route into golf and are ideal for younger and older players; there is more room for offline shots than on the Championship course, but it shares the beautiful backdrop of the wild Atlantic crashing against the shore nearby. The same is true of the par three course and the excellent short game areas.
Golf Features caught up with Nick Gammon:
“We are really pleased with how the whole complex has moved on in the last 10 years. We sadly lost my father in 2019 and he had done so much to create this wonderful club. The work Tom Mackenzie has done has also substantially improved most of the holes on the main course and this has helped us to become not just a wonderful club for all of our regular visitors and members, but also a fully-fledged international championship course. It is very important to me and the rest of the team that we don’t lose the special Trevose family feeling and I’m confident that this will endure for many decades to come.”
The clubhouse is light and airy and provides plenty of space to accommodate masses of golfers along with those who live nearby whether permanently, or whilst on holiday. The food is excellent and from all points you can see glorious views across the course to the Atlantic coast.
New patio areas have been added – all benefitting from glorious views
The golf range, which was built over 15 years ago, has recently been extended so there is no risk of longer golfers disrupting play on the Headland course. The covered bays have solar power on the roof and provide a wonderful opportunity for all standards of player to warm up before their round and work on their game in all weathers. Soon technology will be introduced so that golfers can track their statistics and play interesting games to enhance their time at the range.
For many years Trevose has had plenty of accommodation available and today there are several different four- and five-star quality accommodations on offer: there is the Club Flat, Fairway Cottage – which sleeps up to 6 people with three twin rooms – the Golfing Bungalows, the Fairway lodges, the Dormy apartments and the Treheul Apartments. All offer the ideal chance to stay on site and enjoy the course as well as the wonderful charms of the world class beaches a few hundred metres away. Dogs are an important part of family life for many and they are welcome at Trevose, provided that they are well behaved and not a nuisance to others. This greatly adds to the appeal of this family-centred destination – everyone is included.
Padel courts are a popular recent addition
It has been quite a journey over the last hundred years, but with its unique charm and great location it is hoped that Trevose will continue to shine for many more years.
For more details, please visit the website: trevose-gc.co.uk