When you warm up to play a championship links course and the wind bends everything in sight, you know you are in for an interesting day. When your local caddy for the day (a young member playing off +4) tells you that he wouldn't dream of venturing out in this weather, you begin to doubt your sanity

It's well known that the way you play, radically influences your opinion of as course and it is certainly feasible to run up some big numbers here.  On the other hand if you are long, straight and putting well, you will love it!

The finish is gruesome – the long par 3 sixteenth hole and the water dominated seventeenth where you criss-cross the Barry Burn, are a serious test of golf. Just when you think you are home and dry, up pops an "out of bounds" fence down the left hand side of the eighteenth and if that's not enough, Mr Barry Burn reappears just in front of the green

It is tough but very fair. It doesn't have spectacular views like some of its counterparts but it is very cleverly designed and a true test of links golf.