Minchinhampton Golf Club

The Old Course has nothing to do with golf, I wouldn't even call it a golf course. No bunkers, no water hazards, it is just farmland and while we were there we saw more dog walkers on the course than golfers. Practice facilities were literally non-existent and we didn't dare venture into the clubhouse even when rain and gusty winds made us stop after the 8th hole. Make sure you book at the 2 other courses, the clubhouse of which is an 8 minute car drive away.

Minchinhampton Old Minchinhampton Old is a very fun course that is also affordable UKP35. I highly recommend it to anyone from handicap 24 and better. (Our beginner struggled with the undulations and forced carries over quarries and such). If there is one note of criticism: some of the greens were a bit rough. But I’m not complaining. The course runs around the outer edges of a rolling common. It's an easy walk, through undulating land with beautiful views and surroundings. I shot 87 - just about my course handicap, and found most of the holes full of character and interest. There aren’t too many blind shots. And the smallish greens have goon run ups to play the course ‘links style’. To me, the par 3’s are especially memorable. The 8th “The Bear” is a very fun and very hard 170 yard shot over a quarry to a larger green, the 10th a risky short shot over another wild quarry with a bail out area to the right. I can’t really put my finger on it but Minch Old has a very natural flow, and I’ve never felt this fresh and willing to go another round after 18 holes! A prime example of this is the almost hilariously featureless par 5 that is dead straight and just rolls on and on: “Park End” the 12th. One could argue that this makes it boring, but I just found it fun. A personal highlight of my day was hitting a 270 yard 5 wood on the 17th hole! (downhill, hard baked fairway..haha). I felt like Rory for a minute.

Minchinhampton Old is an open grassland course 700 feet above sea level on a spur of the Cotswolds. Stroud is some three miles distant, Nailsworth Valley is to the west and Frome Valley the north. Opened in 1889, the course is situated on the magnificent Minchinhampton Common. RB Wilson of St Andrews is credited with the original design, though there have been many alterations over the years. There may be as few as six original greens and likely no complete holes in play. I should mention there are two newer courses, one built in the 70s and one in the 90s. The Old Course is part of the same club, but about three miles away. The bunker free Old Course has very little fairway shaping and is punctuated with iron age fortifications, quarries, Kingtonesque earthworks around some of the greens and the ever present wind. Despite the lack of fairway shaping, there is no question the designers knew what they were doing as the angles presented bear the hallmarks of strategic golf. It should be noted that Horace Hutchinson thought enough of Minch Old to include it in his British Golf Links, a highly recommended book.

Despite the clever subtleties of the design, my favourite aspect of Minchinhampton is it's true common nature. Minch Old generally circles in a wide clockwise arc around the 580 acre common and through the remains of an iron age fort. There is a long tradition of golf on common land in England, but Minchinhampton feels unique to me. The course crosses several roads while sharing the land with walkers, horse riders, children at play, cows and horses. Minch Old was the first time I have had the pleasure to experience a true common golf scene as one might have found 120 years ago.

There are open views in every direction, but many of the holes have a strangely semi-blind nature from the tee. Usually this is due to a slight rise in the fairway, but there is also a lack of elements such as shaping, bunkers or trees to act as a guide or help with estimating distance.

Surprisingly, much of Minch Old isn't terribly old and little of the orginal 1890 design remains as the course underwent drastic alterations during and after WWI. It could well be that some holes from the orginal Ladies course are now part of the Old Course. The general post WWI routing is fairly well in place and regardless of age the course displays remarkably competent and compelling architecture which can be overlooked given the beautiful site. On the other hand, because Minch Old is visually alluring, it may be easy to disregard the short-comings of the course such as several road crossings, road noise, lack of movement in fairways, rather one dimensional shaping and green conditions which can be politely called wanting. I suspect as the course is on common land maintenance restrictions are fairly rigorous... which is a shame as there are bones of what could potentially be an outstanding course. Even so, if approached in the right spirit, Minch Old is a lot of fun and doesn't require the equivalent purchase of an acre of land to be tempted by its delights. I am not yet convinced there are any All-England candidate holes, but with so many wonderful holes such as 1,8,9,11,13,16 & 17, Minch Old provides more than enough interest. Like Painswick, it is difficult to award a star because of the maintenance au naturel, but I shall continue to return if only to experience playing proper common land golf. I might also add that Minch Old seems to play very differently on each visit and I suspect this is largely because it is common land.

Located at more than 500-feet above sea level, close to Stroud, golfers are greeted with that same motley common-land turf, iron-age fortifications, a big sense of spaciousness and lots of interesting ground undulations in proximity to the greens.

The openness of this rustic property is wonderful and I really love golf courses where this is the case. There is little chance of losing a ball here and most of the fun comes when approaching the greens. Several mounds, humps, bumps and hollows protect the greens in a similar manner to other bunker-free courses and this can ensure some awkward chips and recovery shots.

Cherington course plays like heathland/ links course, tidy. Better course of the two I played. Fast greens, well looked after.

Avening course tight parkland, too many cross over, tees & greens too close together, fast greens.

Lovely club house.

Great pro shop and informative Pro.

Wouldn't rush back to either.