About Gary Slatter
Venerable Canadian golf pro Gary Slatter discusses his opinions on the state of golf, golf course design and construction, teaching and more, based on a lifetime in the business. 
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With Gary Slatter. A blog with opinions on the state of golf, golf course design and construction, teaching and more, based on a lifetime in the business.
2007
You are browsing the archive for 2007.
FRED BELL, unfortunately we’ve lost another of our heroes
I received an email from Gerry Stevenson in Freeport Bahamas last week, letting us know that Fred Bell had passed away. I spoke to Fred recently, he was planning to visit Scotland and “get a Pro Am going, maybe even call Ron Hewat at CFRB to host it”. Fred Bell pioneered golf travel. In the ... read more »
The DEVLIN COURSE back nine
Interesting comments I’ve received since doing the front nine of the Devlin. Most are very positive however two emails mentioned the fact that the Devlin is not a Scottish golf experience. Well, it’s definitely in Scotland, in the Kingdom of Fife. Two of the shapers (Mick McShane and Conor Walsh) also did Kingsbarns and The ... read more »
The DEVLIN COURSE Fairmont St Andrews
St.Andrews, December 25, 2007 [photopress:Devlin_braeside.jpg,full,pp_image] The Braes (cliffs) on the Devlin Course 17th and 18th holes The DEVLIN golf course, open since august 2002, was designed by Dennis Griffiths, Bruce Devlin and they were aptly assisted by the legendary Gene Sarazen. “Mr. Sarazen was very involved in the routing of the course” remembers Head Pro ... read more »
Scotland, home of Golf
You can’t go wrong, no matter where you arrive in the UK there are great golfing experiences close at hand, and all of them have historic non-golf related side trips (y’ nay kin live on gawf alone). When Carolyn and I took our first golf trip here we landed in Manchester and played along one ... read more »
St.George’s Golf Club
I just read Robert Thompson’s piece about all the departures from St. George’s and whether or not the club might still hold the 2010 Canadian Open. I worked there in 1969. It is one of my favourite golf places in this world. My father, Bob Slatter, worked on the construction of the course, it was ... read more »
4 nice guys and me! 5 nice guys!
[photopress:Sam_Torrance_October_16.jpg,full,pp_image] from left to right Ian Bunch, the excellent Secretary at PRESTWICK, probably the best course south of Dornoch (follow the latitudes, Dornoch is level with Hudson’s Bay); next to Ian is Jamie Bunch, his son, a scratch player who played on North Carolina’s team. Jamie runs events and tournaments, good ones. In the middle, ... read more »
What does Trump mean?
Until Donald Trump came along I thought trump was a bridge term. Now it means “outlandish statement” or refers to golf courses with phoney waterfalls, as in that course is all “trumped up”. Anyway, he is trying to build the world’s finest links course with the worlds finest gated community in an area of Scotland’s ... read more »
Teachers vs. Coaches
Some nice chap just asked me to explain what I meant when I sent a note to Robert Thompson’s blog about Sean Foley the Teacher of Stephen Ames. In my opinion there are teachers and there are coaches, usually the teachers are PGA pros, family or others. The coaches are people who often will drive ... read more »
Where are you now Mike Harris ?
[photopress:Mike_Harris.JPG,full,pp_image] Where are you now Mike Harris? I really hope you get a few pages in Robert Thompson’s book! [photopress:Jack_John_Gary_1969.JPG,full,pp_image] and where are you John Dudley?
Prestwick
Last week I went to the Scottish Golf Awards for 2007. I used to feel “different” when I went to events like this in Jamaica or Bahamas and it’s the same here. For a different reason of course, here I was one of the few not wearing a skirt, sorry, a kilt. My skinny legs ... read more »
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