I'd give it 4 eggs, but what do I know. Hearing Navy training across the street is very cool.

Andy caveats the 2 egg score with a primary takeaway I had from a round there. The most interesting land is found exactly where you don't want your ball to be. The ravine system is distinctive and lovely, but then hitting fairways didn't capture the same emotional register. Fortunately I'm no good, so I got to explore the right side of 11 and plenty of other neat spots. The greens are terrific, and seeing those really helped bolster my interest in Raynor as an architect and builder. His routing ability, particularly at SA and CGC, is surgical--but is it too clinical? As an analogy, I don't think he'd be the internist you'd want for bedside manner. Colt or MacKenzie would've likely been more suitable. But Raynor would've been the specialist who saved your life in an emergency and was gone before you woke up. Why would I play more rounds at Old Elm than SA? Is it because I find Raynor to be more of a puzzler than an artist? Am I making the mistake of not identifying enough heart in his work? I wonder how could such a talented builder, who learned under Macdonald, never fall in love with the game enough to want to play it?

Id you haven't yet, check out Glen Golf Park in Madison. Every city needs courses like these.

That was my experience there and at main Sand Valley too years ago. Looked green, lot of thin grass that was mostly sand. Although I loved both at the time, I love them more now grown in and more settled. Landmand was another one for me. I played it opening fall and it was very shaggy with heavy equipment ruts off every fairway. Personally I try to imagine what it could/will be but it can be tough. Pinehurst 2 is my biggest mental block. Played it soaking wet in the spring which killed the design features and options.

The Loop is great

I played Sand Valley in a group of 80 guys. No one seemed to enjoy the Lido, especially considering the ranking. Some of this was the wildness of the design. But a lot of it was the conditions. It was too soon. I do not know what Golf Digest did to make its Every Hole look so green, but that was far from our experience. 3 years from now, I assume, will be quite different.

A top 10 course in America. One of the greatest injustices of American golf: Seth Raynor is somehow *not* in the hall of fame!

Is there one underrated aspect of Cypress you are most looking forward to seeing play out in the walker cup? Both course wise and competition wise if possible.

I think I'm stuck between both. I've played a few courses right after opening. First posts and early reviews get the attention. As a couple others have pointed out the conditioning is usually not there yet and the course is not playing "normal". It may have been said on Fried Egg at some point, but I wish courses were not rankable for at least a couple years, give them time to mature and be more realized versions of themselves.

Hard to justify visiting a new course until I know it’s well grown in, so I’ll let someone else find out first. As for innovation, the hot new courses seem to be going huge, while we probably need to go small for the sustainability of the game (money, time, energy) so I’m much more interested in shorter walkable course like the Loop in Chaska, of which I’ll be testing out today.