Yale Golf Course with Hickory Golf Clubs - Course Vlog #25

A shot-by-shot hickory golf course vlog featuring Connecticut hickory golfer Christian Williams playing hickory golf at Yale Golf Course in New Haven, CT.

Regularly ranked one of the best classic golf courses in the United States, Yale Golf Course was designed by Seth Raynor in 1925 in collaboration with the father of American golf architecture, Charles Blair Macdonald. Raynor was a protege of Macdonald and did most of the heavy-lifting in designing Yale while utilizing the template approach that his mentor made famous and benefitting from his supervision on the project.

Macdonald's famous templates were based on his favorite holes from time spent in Scotland during the 1870s. These holes, cherry-picked from courses such as St. Andrews, Prestwick, Machrihanish, and others were - in Macdonald's opinion - representations of the ideal golf holes. Yale's No. 9 Par 3 Biarritz hole is widely considered the best example of that challenging template easily identified by a massive green bisected by a swale. Read more about the history of the course and the modifications to each hole over the years here: https://campuspress.yale.edu/yalegolf...

Built at a cost of $400,000, the steep price was worth it as Yale was instantly recognized as a masterpiece. Over time, the considerable number of trees surrounding the course have encroached on the original layout and time has eroded the original character of many of the bunkers. The course also suffered from neglect during the first year of the COVID pandemic when maintenance ceased for a period of months. Fortunately, the course recovered and reopened in late 2020 under the guidance of new general manager Peter Palacios and new superintendent Jeff Austin. In 2021, Gil Hanse was selected to take on the long-awaited task of restoring Yale to its 1925 glory. Read more about the plans for the restoration here: https://thefriedegg.com/october-musin... and here: https://www.golfcourseindustry.com/ar...

"What's in the Bag?" sponsored by Steurer & Jacoby (use the promo code HICKORYHACKER24 to save 10% on any purchase at http://www.steurerjacoby.com ):
- Circa 1928 MacGregor Master Brassie "Fancy Face," 10 degrees, D3, 43-1/2 inches
- Circa 1912 David Kinnell splice-neck brassie, 18 degrees, D7, 43 inches
- Tom Stewart "J" Iron, 25 degrees, D1, 38-3/4 inches
- Tom Morris mashie, 36 degrees, D4, 37-3/4 inches
- MacGregor Popular B flanged mashie niblick, 45 degrees, D1, 37 inches
- Walter Hagen Iron Man flanged sand wedge, 55 degrees, G+ swing weight, 34-1/2 inches
- Tom Stewart RTJ putter, 5 degrees, C8, 34 inches

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