Alister MacKenzie was a prolific writer and essayist in addition to being a golf course architect, and he left behind something of a hack for contestants who enter drawings in the annual Ray Haddock Lido Prize contest, sponsored by the Alister MacKenzie Society.
It’s actually not so much of a hack as much as a set of stated guidelines, a list of 13 principles or “essential features” for designing and building golf courses he published in 1920.
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It’s important to note that MacKenzie did not always follow his own advice. One principle is that “The course, where possible, should be arranged in two loops of nine holes.” Cypress Point, to name one major design, does not have returning nines. Another is that the greens and fairways should be sufficiently undulating, but there should be no hill climbing.” Well, there’s plenty of hill climbing at Crystal Downs (though it also has very sufficiently undulating greens. But these principles were outlined fairly early in his design career (he died in early 1934), and most are simply common-sense goals that every worthy architect now attempts to achieve (“Every hole should have a different character.” Who doesn’t strive for this?).
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Cypress Point
Logan Whitton
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Nevertheless, the principles do provide a road map that helps amateur architects produce intriguing and sometimes winning entries in the design contest. The architects who judge the Lido Prize each year (Brian Costello did the honors this year) certainly reference MacKenzie’s principles when analyzing each hole design.
Some contestants have gotten so good at infusing these MacKenzieisms into their theoretical holes that their concepts often look like the Doctor drew them himself. Several have gotten it down to something of a science, cracking the code on their way to multiple wins.
This is beginning to be the case for Robert Hoye, the 2026 winner who also won in 2025 and is the fourth person to take home the prize more than once along with Bo Links (four wins), Cameron Hurdus (three) and David Hoekstra (two).
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“Saddle Up!”, the winning hole for 2026
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Hoye’s conceptual par 4, called “Saddle Up!”, is set in an imagined pine barren, one with both natural and artificial mounds and hollows built around the green. Drives must play across an open sandscape to an island fairway, and approaches are hit into a deep green set in a saddle with elevated contours around the edges that can be used as backstops and feeding guides. This certainly aligns with MacKenzie’s advice for ample undulation.
At no more than 395 yards, the hole isn’t overly long but emphasizes tee shot placement to either set up an optimal line into the green that’s angled against a deep, front-left bunker, or to set up a short wedge shot by risking a longer drive past a fairway hazard. This satisfies MacKenzie’s eighth principle: “There should be a sufficient number of heroic carries from the tee, but the course should be arranged so that the weaker player with the loss of a stroke or portion of a stroke shall always have an alternative route open to him.”
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It also meets the seventh principle stating that the course should be beautiful and the features as indistinguishable from nature as possible. Hoye even includes a sidebar demonstrating the integration of the manufactured elements into the green surrounds.
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Hoye’s 2025 winning drawing
If you think of a mash up of holes at Pine Valley with holes at Crystal Downs, you’ve got the concept of “Saddle Up!” The comparison is apt. Hoye will receive $3,000 in prize money, plus additional travel funds to participate in the Alister MacKenzie Society’s annual meeting this fall at, you guessed it, Crystal Downs.
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