Craw's Nest Tassie Preview

The Intro

The last of my major competitions of 2010 is the Craw’s Nest Tassie at Carnoustie from September 6^th – 11^th.

The Background

I grew up near to Carnoustie and saw the press coverage of the Tassie every year, thinking it would be great to play in it one year. In 2009 I had a conversation about the tournament with someone from another club, which got me thinking that there was no reason for me not to try and enter it this year.

The Location

Carnoustie doesn’t need much of an introduction, having hosted the Open Championship several times, most recently in 1999 and 2007. Situated on the east coast of Scotland about 10 miles northeast of Dundee, it is a traditional Scottish town with its golf courses within walking distance of the town centre. The town itself is these days very much a commuter town for Dundee, with over 40% of the working age residents working in Dundee. Previously it was heavily involved in the textile industry, with tourism being the secondary source of income for the town.

The location hasn’t helped the tournament in recent years, with severe flooding causing chaos last year. The Championship course was reduced to 16 holes as 2 holes were flooded, and the Burnside course was abandoned and replaced with the shorter Buddon course for the other qualifying round. Touch wood, but the weather forecast is much better for this year, with little rain forecast and light winds.

The Course

The first two days of the competition are qualifying, with one round each on the Championship and Burnside courses. The Championship round will be played from the green tees, making it 6,400 yards, par 70, SSS 73. What makes Carnoustie so difficult is the positioning of the bunkers, especially the fairway bunkers. They are everywhere, and are positioned so well that finding a safe spot off the tee is one of the greatest challenges. Another difficulty is the size of the greens, some of them are absolutely huge, finding the green isn’t good enough, you need to be close enough to be able to get down in two shots. Any round on the Championship course without a 3-putt is a very good round indeed. The Burnside course is just over 6,000 yards, par 68, SSS 70. Although seen as a secondary course to the Championship course, it has some incredibly difficult par 4s, with lengths of 450, 460, 432 and 473 yards. The greens are much smaller than on the Championship course, and with there being five par 3s, good iron play is an absolute must.

The Competition

The Tassie has been going since 1927, and is now a bit of an institution in the amateur golfing calendar, not least for the quest to get into it. Unlike most other competitions of this standing, it is the first 350 applicants that get into the tournament, not the 350 with the lowest handicaps. Over the last two years the average handicap of competitors has been 7.7. This year the 350^th and last entry was submitted 4m 57sec after the website went live. After the two qualifying rounds, the top 64 scratch go into matchplay from Wednesday – Saturday over the Championship course. The top 64 handicap scores who don’t qualify for the Tassie will play in a handicap competition called the Maulesbank Trophy over the Burnside course. Players who don’t qualify for either matchplay competition get to play consolation competitions on the Wednesday and Thursday, meaning that every player is guaranteed 4 competition rounds, with at least 2 over the Championship course (except for the 32 players who get past the first round of the Maulesbank Trophy). There is also a practice round available on the Sunday before, I missed the boat for the Championship course spaces, but am perfectly happy to play a practice round over the Burnside course, as I haven’t played it for quite a few years whereas I played the Championship course last year. The finalists of the Tassie will get 7 or 8 rounds over the Championship course, and 1 or 2 rounds over the Burnside course, all for the £185 entry fee.

The prize fund is around £3,800 in total, which is around 6% of the entry fees, a lot lower than most competitions. However, considering that Carnoustie Links are losing visitor revenue for a whole week, and competitors are getting at least five rounds at Carnoustie, with at least two on the Championship course, for an equivalent green fee of £175, it still represents excellent value.

The Target

As detailed at the start of the year, my target is to get to the last 32 of the Tasssie matchplay. Looking at the previous 2 years results, there are defined lines of who is likely to qualify and who isn’t. In each year the 64^th lowest handicap has had a handicap of 4. Almost all players with a handicap of 1 or less got through qualifying, dropping to 79% of 2 handicappers, 63% of 3 handicappers, then a dramatic drop to 32% of 4 handicappers, 19% of 5 handicappers, and very few thereafter.

Although based on historic data, this is all theory, it’s up to me to perform during qualifying. Whether my handicap is 3.4 or 3.5 won’t make a 31% difference whether I qualify for matchplay or not. In terms of what I will need to shoot in order to qualify, it’s difficult to tell because of the change of plan last year, and the fact that this year the Championship round will be entirely played from the green tees. The weather conditions can make a dramatic difference as well, but based of all the available information at the moment, I will make an educated guess that the 64^th and last Tassie matchplay spot will go to someone with a qualifying score of 153.

I’ll be updating the blog after each round, and the scores will be published on the Carnoustie Links website.