Dear Member,

During this week’s autumn maintenance closure, we completed landscape changes on the Garden Course’s 1st green and 4th tee to address a safety concern. Earlier this year, a ball-to-player incident, and several near misses, occurred from tee shots played from the 4th tee reaching the 1st green.

Following an assessment by the Club’s Health & Safety consultant, it was determined that the shot from the 4th tee was adversely dangerous to players on the 1st green because the green is well within reach for most players and is blind. This lack of visibility was due to the obstruction of trees and shrubs between the two areas. The distances measure: 230 yards from blue tee, 215 yards from rear yellow, and 190 yards from front yellow tees to the 1st green.

The consultant recommended creating a clearer line of sight to greatly reduce the risk. To achieve this, we removed the mature shrub trees in front of the 4th tee and the self-set and planted smaller trees behind the 1st green. This work now provides much better visibility and a clear path of travel for noise should a call of “fore” be required.

Both cleared areas will be returned to grassland: the 4th hole area will be maintained at playing rough height, while the area behind the 1st green will be managed as native rough with annual maintenance to control weed growth. In line with the Club’s RTJ “Project Iconic” vision, a selected mature “rockstar” tree or trees will be planted between the 4th tee and 2nd fairway (that will not obstruct any sight lines) at a future date.

Kind regards,

John Lockyer
Director of Greens