The Old Course at St Andrews: Here’s to New Beginnings

They say people do not remember what you say to them, only how you make them feel. My first golfing memory is absent of words but decades later the shame persists. How this story ends with myself playing golf at the Old Course in St Andrews, Scotland is nothing short of remarkable.

As a 12-year-old, my dad took me to one of the few nearby courses that we could afford. There is no recollection from the actual round that I can remember, only being chastised by the manager when we got back to the pro shop for taking out a chunk of grass on what was undoubtedly a poor attempt at a golf swing.

Her words lingered like an early-morning fog as I did not pick up another golf club again for nearly a decade. When TravisMathew approached me about doing a story about their partnership with St Andrews with a week filled of golf, my response left out the small detail about my inability to play. As any writer can attest, you never let the facts get in the way of a good story.

Months later, TravisMathew CEO Ryan Ellis is wearing a long-sleeved shirt with dark jeans looking more like someone you would see at Austin City Limits than your local country club. I pepper him with questions about how to make golf more accessible knowing that it is far from the job of an apparel company.

There is no shortage of think pieces on how to grow the game, but my question is admittedly self-serving. Is there room for me? It is my own question that I feel obligated to ask for my own reasons but also for those that may not have the chance.

“The inclusivity of the old school felt like, ‘Okay, you got to be tucked in. You have to dress in this attire,'” Ellis explained. “And it’s like, trying to respect where golf was but modernize it a little bit and push the envelope on how we can look on a golf course. How can we dress so I don’t feel like I’m in a stuffy golf uniform and I think that progresses the game as well.”

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The Old Course Is Closed for Golf on Sundays & Open to the St Andrews Community

As we talk, a golden retriever runs across the 18th green and there is no security guard in sight. A little more than a month ago, Cameron Smith walked the same area on his way to winning The 150th Open Championship.

The approach is admittedly different with the people of the St Andrews community believing the ground is so holy that it needs to be walked on, quite the opposite from many of the historic courses in the United States. Every Sunday, the Old Course is closed for golf and open to the public to do as they wish, a celebration of the past week that with an eye on the one that is to come.

This can also a way to describe the collaboration between St Andrews Links and TravisMathew as the lifestyle brand transformed what was once a trinket store behind the final hole of the Old Course and turned it into a stand-alone store. The store features understated apparel that looks more stylish than a traditional pro shop featuring rubber-stamped apparel. The hope of the partnership is for St Andrews to appeal to the next generation of golfers while TravisMathew leans on the history.

For about the price of a new PlayStation, Scotland residents can become a Links Ticketholder which gives you access to playing the Old Course and other notable places annually. The geography of the course speaks to its uniqueness with both the first and 18th holes situated in the center of the town. During a conversation with St Andrews Links chief executive Neil Coulson, I asked about the temptation to preserve the history of the Old Course.

“I think the thing that makes it special is the fact that you can walk out here on a Sunday and walk your dog across the golf course or go out with a group of friends and just have some sandwiches out there somewhere,” Coulson remarked. “I think that’s actually what makes it part of a special experience. If we put a big fence up and said nobody can come in or it’s some enormous sum to come and play on the golf course, I think you’d lose a lot of that.”

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There Is No Way to Learn How to Play Golf Without Embarrassing Yourself

My approach was simple: arrive at my local driving range early in the morning or just before close when there would be as few people for me to hit as possible, picking a spot on either end of the practice green. Like the last day before a semester exam, the previous two months have been a cram session. After just two lessons, I broke up with my first instructor who seemed perplexed by my mission to able to at least keep the ball airborne by the time I walked onto the Old Course.

Instead, I found a new coach with long hair who loves trucker hats and speaks with a southern accent. He says things like, “you’re doing great” as I nail my neighbor in the face with an errant ball. With so much focus on the financial barriers to golf, the biggest hindrance may simply be belief and invitation.

There is no way to learn how to play golf without embarrassing yourself. To have someone alongside you when the embarrassment happens may be more of the solution than how to lower the price of a round of golf. Ellis referenced TravisMathew’s parent company Callaway’s recent acquisition of Topgolf as part of a new approach to help make the game more accessible.

“How do we capture moments [in golf] to [help] people to get into the game, [and understand] you don’t have to go play 18 holes,” Ellis described the thought process of the company. “There’s a lot of fun things you can do, go practice at home and do things like that that are actually affordable, too. You just need a club and a ball, right? You don’t have to have a whole set. …I think it’s trying to find it a way to make it approachable.”

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St Andrews Partnered With TravisMathew to Launch a New Store at the Old Course

At the top of the historic Rusacks St Andrews hotel, you look out onto the Old Course which blends seamlessly into the beachfront where the film “Chariots of Fire” was filmed. The bottom of the ocean is undoubtedly full of golf balls of less legendary golfers like myself.

The hotel itself features relics of the golfers who conquered the elements and the unconventional course designed by Mother Nature to hoist the Claret Jug. Legends like Tiger and Jack, who only need one name.

If you think this story ends with my own rapid skills advancement, landing a lucrative offer to join the LIV Tour you would be mistaken. There was no birdie at St Andrews.

Sometimes I hit the ball and it just rolls a few feet in front of me. Other times the ball goes directly right looking for the first tree it can find. Over the past two months, I have chunked, sliced, faded and completely whiffed on a sizable number of swings.

Yet, we were made to do hard things, and when we do you will find people willing to help, even if the journey starts in the woods. If my week with TravisMathew and St Andrews taught me anything, it okay not to take yourself so seriously.

“I think there’s times to be very serious and take golf serious and there’s times to relax and just have fun and enjoy yourself and have a good experience,” Ellis added. “I think St Andrews really gets that balance of being prestigious, knowing when to be serious and then knowing when to be laid back and relaxed and let people walk on the course and have fun.”

The experience reminds me of the quote from Theodore Roosevelt about the value of the person in the arena. Our stories can be redemptive when we are able to overcome our own shame to enter the arena that we long ago left.

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better,” Roosevelt stated. “The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming.”

Standing in the new storefront behind the 18th hole on the Old Course, Ellis is still admittedly surprised at the ascension of the brand. A company that considers itself part of the future of golf on the same greens with all the ghosts from the game’s past.

“Who would have ever thought that TravisMathew would have a store off 18 at St Andrews Links?” Ellis reflects.

It is a relatable moment of self-reflection as minutes earlier I teed off at 17 on the Old Course and the ball headed straight for the hotel window. My shame was replaced with laughter, because by some twist of fate, today the arena was St Andrews and that walk across Swilcan Bridge on 18 was not going to make itself.

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