Golf: Kneeknockers Inc.

IT was CS Lewis who conceived of the hidden world of Narnia, accessible only through a hidden door in a wardrobe in a room at the top of a very large house.

Narnia was a fantastical, dream-like world, full of hidden dangers, strange creatures and, ultimately great joy.

There are not too many strange beasts lurking in the bushes at Mount Juliet, but on visiting a little hidden corner of the magnificent Co. Kilkenny estate you get the feeling that maybe CS Lewis had a hand in another hidden treasure.

There is a guilty pleasure in sneaking out of the clubhouse and ignoring the path to the first tee. Following the road less travelled takes you around the back of the Hunters Yard complex of bars, offices and golf shop, across a lawn and through an arch in a hedge.

You shuffle past the children's playground and take a left through a walled garden, circling the pond plonked in the middle of the path.

Then it's out the other side, resisting the lure of the equestrian centre and along another hedge before, through the sycamore trees and almost like stepping into Narnia, an 18-hole championship putting course is laid out before your eyes.

What a picture it is too. A par-53, 463-yard layout of 18 perfectly manicured and individually designed holes, varying in length from 10 to 36 yards. There are all the trappings of a full-size course, too tee boxes, bunkers and just a little more water than might be considered hospitable.

"It's been here about five years," said Mount Juliet Golf Manager Sean O'Neill, who organised last week's National Putting Championships there. "It is a unique course. I'm not aware of any other like it in the world.

"The conception of the idea came from our greenkeeper Aidan O'Hara, who's in charge of the championship course.

"He was out in Hawaii during the mid-'90s and he came across a much smaller putting course but thought it would be good for Mount Juliet. He knew there was some ground on the estate available and he suggested we build this championship putting course.

"Jeff Howes, who designed the championship course with Jack Nicklaus, designed the putting course too and Aidan then set it out to those plans.

"It takes a lot of maintenance really, because it's a big area. In fact, I don't think people realise how nice a facility this really is and how much fun you can have with it. You can go mental playing this, as long as you don't take it too seriously."

The speeds of the holes on the putting course replicate those of the greens on Mount Juliet's championship course, acclaimed last year by none other than world number one Tiger Woods, who, following his victory in the American Express Championship, said the greens were the best he had played on all year, including the Majors.

"These things are absolutely pure," Woods gushed.

The putting course greens are no different, as a few of Tiger's US Tour colleagues were only too pleased to testify.

"They had some good fun here," O'Neill said with Fred Funk and Len Mattiace particularly loud in their praise of the little gem. "I've never seen anything so cool," Funk said, "we had a ball every evening," while US Masters runner-up Mattiace added that putting course provided "the best hour's fun I've had in years."

Len obviously doesn't get out too much but we get his point. This is good, clean and challenging fun.

According to Mount Juliet's O'Neill, the course's designer Jeff Howes, who is also a member of the golf club, holds the unofficial course record of four under-par 49. With the fifth national putting championships taking place at the back end of October, however, the greens were not quite as pure as they might have been.

O'Hara's crew had sanded them a fortnight prior to the event in anticipation of heavy rain. That didn't happen so the sand and the unseasonably dry weather contrived to slow the greens down just a little bit, much to the relief of the 20 competitors, who answered O'Neill's invitation.

"It would have been nice to see more competitors here," he admitted. "We sent out invites to 300 clubs asking them to nominate someone to come. I just don't think they realised what a superb facility we have here. Maybe they thought they would just be coming to sink a few balls on the putting green in front of the clubhouse."

This was more serious stuff, though. There were no handicaps and so everyone played off scratch in this strokeplay competition, with the normal Rules of Golf applying more or less.

O'Neill explained: "If you go into the water you drop out under penalty and place it where the ball was originally struck from. So if you go out from the teeing ground you have to go back and start again, which is the case for most of them.