A great lesson in the use of internal OOB at this excellent course, built on a key social history site
Round £25. Par 69. Course Rating / Slope Rating (yellow) 68.3/120. Value (out of 5) – 4.5
I really liked playing Bellshill. Set in lovely parkland alongside Strathclyde Country Park, it is a popular venue for golfing societies given its central and easily accessed location. Founded in 1905, with 9 holes, and later extended to 18, it has an excellent history documented here by one of its former captains Alexander Gardner; it doesn’t record the course designer.
Look deeper into the course’s history and you uncover a remarkable story of societal development, that I suspect the vast majority of local golfers know nothing about.
It’s very fitting you enter the golf course through a humble, working class area. Go back 200 years and you would be sited on the Orbiston Community, set up by ‘Owenites’, the followers of the Welsh social reformer, Robert Owen (1771-1858). It was a community of ‘co-operation and equality and to social provisions, such as education and welfare’. Robert married a local Scottish woman, hence his association to Lanarkshire. Like many ‘utopian’ projects, it didn’t last forever, albeit the par three 8th hole is still called “Orbiston”.
The course has 9 holes either side of a main railway line, with the first five and last four being on the side of the clubhouse. There is excellent signage to navigate between holes and either side of the line.
If you look at the first hole and the last 4 holes, you get a sense that it was an experienced course architect who first laid out Bellshill. Variety, undulations, appropriate bunkering and good green surrounds are testament to the quality of the designer.
There are some memorable holes, in my book most notably the sixth. A short par four of only 292 yards, from both white and yellow tees, it has a blind tee shot over a slight brow about 140 yards from the tee. With a green fronted bunker and a front to back sloping green, it is impossible to drive. I was very lucky to unknowingly hit driver, which came up just short of the bunker. With a front pin, it was then impossible to get close to. Somewhat lucky to get a par 4, I preceded to have an interesting conversation with a greenkeeper on the next hole. He said many members don’t like the 6th hole, but the more experienced golfers, “just hit two short irons hoping for a single putt”. Alternatively, with a good bunker game, a shot into the front green bunker is also an option. A good example of a short hole giving good options, at all levels.
The course had very few fairway bunkers, but that was compensated by many undulating greens, some very difficult. The good finish, from holes 15 to 18, includes some card wreckers, most notably the stoke index 4, 16th par four. The 18th, with OOB right, is also a difficult green to hit in two.
I had a solid game, scoring 88, or net 74, 5 over par. Any time over 30 points on a new course, I’m very satisfied. The condition of the course was superb when I played. At an annual membership just under £600, it represents a great value course to play on regularly amongst the many available in this urban area of Central Scotland.
I had a great and welcoming conversation with two local members in the changing rooms and did indeed get a feeling of ‘community’ which somehow felt right. They told me a great many members volunteer to maintain the course in such good condition. I was let wondering if they knew how fitting that was and how proud Robert Owen might have felt at that feeling of community.
Course Type: Parkland
Par 69 (0 par 5s, 15 par 4s, 3 par 3s)
Distance: 5818 (yellow)
Moly’s Gross score: 88
