Clayts could be viewed as the oracle of golf, a former high level amateur golfer in his home country of Australia (winning the Australian Amateur tiltle in 1978) Mike turned pro in 1981 and over the intervening years he forged a successful playing career throughout Australia, Asia and Europe.
Much like the great Peter Thomson, one of his heroes, Mike had and has a way with words, as a result of his column, in the Melbourne Age Newspaper, he was approached by Bruce Grant and John Sloan (Superintendent Greenkeepers of some repute) to see if he would be intersted in partnering with them in a new golf course design business.
Over the course of the next decade Mike, Bruce and John would influence the restoration of many of Australia's classic golden age courses such as Victoria, Kingston Heath, Kingswood and Royal Adelaide. They would also be centrally involved in the building of new courses at Barnbougle Dunes in Tasmania and RACV Healesville in Victoria amongst others.
Mike Clayton Golf subsequently became Ogilvy Clayton and then OCCM (Ogilvy Clayton Cocking & Mead) and further new builds, renovation and restoration projects were secured both at home in Australia and farther afield.
Mike is now ensconced in CDP, a design collaboration/partnership with Mike De Vries and Frank Pont. In addition to working on the Seven Mile Beach development in Hobart, they are also restoring the classic Abercromby/Colt design of the Addington in London, in addition to other high profile jobs at the Royal Dublin Golf Club, Royal Belfast, Fountainebleau, Wallasey, Cleeve Hill, Spey Bay, Royal Perth (with Harley Kruse) and a master planning project at the home of Stableford at Wallasey Golf Club in Merseyside.
We are always tremendousy excited to welcome Mike to the show, Clayts is always will to proffer interestiing opinions and ideas that are based upon a lifetime spent in and around the game.... he knows more than most and sees the game through many lenses....we hope you enjoy our chats.
Mike wrote a series of articles for Golf Architecture Magazine during 2020, please find some links to these articles below:
https://www.golfcoursearchitecture.net/content/brown-is-just-fine
https://www.golfcoursearchitecture.net/content/tree-free-golf
https://www.golfcoursearchitecture.net/content/rough-justice
https://www.golfcoursearchitecture.net/content/design-rankings-or-beauty-contests
https://www.golfcoursearchitecture.net/content/the-irresistible-variety-of-british-courses
https://www.golfcoursearchitecture.net/content/rein-in-the-ball-or-prepare-for-bludgeon
https://www.golfcoursearchitecture.net/content/uninspiring-venues-do-golf-no-favours
https://www.golfcoursearchitecture.net/content/custodians-of-the-course
Mike Clayton has been a guest on 4 episodes.
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Episode 53: Mike Clayton Returns to F&F
November 21st, 2024 | 1 hr 36 mins
Mike Clayton joins me on this episode and provides us with an update on grow in at 7 Mile Beach, The Sandbelt Invitational, the Australian Summer of Golf and some local projects that Clayts, Harley Kruse and Lukas Michel have been working recently.
We also explore the challenges the flatter sites present to the course designer, the relative under appreciation of English Golf, Tom Simpson, CDP in France, why routing and flow are important elements in course design and some bucket list design projects.
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Episode 30: Dutch Golf Series #1 - An Introduction
September 18th, 2023 | 44 mins 12 secs
frank pont, george waters, golf in the netherlands, jasper miners, mike clayton
And now for something completely different! A podcast series inspired by a golf trip to the Netherlands in June 2023.
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Episode 29: New Series on Dutch Golf... Releases tomorrow... Advance Bonus Content
September 17th, 2023 | 3 mins 52 secs
And now for something completely different.... new docupod series releases tomorrow
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Episode 2: Mike Clayton
February 18th, 2022 | 2 hrs 11 mins
7 mile beach golf, alistair mackenzie, barnbougle dunes, golf course architecture, melbourne sandbelt, mike clayton golf
Mike Clayton joins us from Hobart where he is hard at work at the construction site that is the 7 Mile Beach Golf project. ln this episode we take a trip down memory lane from Eastern GC by way of the European Tour, playing with Seve and Nick and the timelessness of the Melbourne Sandbelt.