Klein on Design
Bradley S. Klein, Golfweek’s architecture editor, offers his opinion on one memorable hole.
Length: 641 / 554 yards, par 5
Architect: Pete Dye, 2009
Where: French Lick, Ind.
Ranking: No. 6 on the Golfweek’s Best Casino Courses list, 2009
It’s great because . . . Dye has tamed a wild piece of Indiana hilltop and hammered the holes onto the land as if they were terraced sculptures. He has saved his boldest shaping for the par 5s, all of which twist and turn, in large part blindly to the approaching golfer, who ends up stumbling with vertigo. The course starts on a disarmingly rational basis. But all hell breaks loose at the pencil-thin third hole, which climbs steadily, then suddenly twists sharply left to a green suspended over a grassy netherworld. It’s dramatic and impressive. Also terrifying. The message here is clear, even if the sight lines and depth perception are not: This is a golf course whose outrageous scale will torment even the most skilled golfer.
It would be even better if . . . there were the occasional bailout that Dye so generously allowed for on his earlier great courses (for example, PGA West-Stadium or TPC Sawgrass-Players Stadium). Nope, not here ...
High in style
For the past decade, the year in review always has included a strong mix of major renovations along with new course openings. But 2009 appears to be unique in terms of how slow the U.S. market has become – only 55 course openings for the year, as per the National Golf Foundation, the lowest figure since the early 1980s.
An anecdotal look at the U.S. design map for the year shows – despite, or maybe because of, the slow down – plenty of experimentation as architects and developers try to snare public attention and market share.
Case in point: the Pete Dye Course at French Lick (Ind.) Resort, where the Marquis de Sod has blessed the hills of his home state with as sharply honed a set of holes as he has ever created in his half century of Hall of Fame work. The 8,104-yard back tees on this par-72 layout are a reminder of how absurdly hard and long an architect can make a course today. From the middle tees, its iconic etched fairway contours are far more negotiable, but the edges often tumble off so precipitously that you get the feel Dye’s out not just to make ...
Tiger Woods course in Dubai pushes forward
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates – While Tiger Woods’ business partners in Dubai won't comment on the golfer's personal woes, they are pushing ahead with plans to build a course bearing his name despite the emirate's cash problems.
The company building “The Tiger Woods Dubai” housing development and golf course said in a statement Wednesday it remains committed to finishing the first course designed by Woods.
The developer, part of the Dubai Holding conglomerate owned by the city-state's ruler, says “progress continues” on the project but gave no specifics.
Woods told The Associated Press in June that the long-delayed project was “out of my hands.”
Some of Woods’ sponsors are distancing themselves from the golfer over reports of marital infidelity.
Hamilton Hall to get face lift
When Herb Kohler let the world know that he had purchased Hamilton Hall last week, it made perfect sense. Who else could undertake such a mammoth project in an economic climate like this? In fact, who would want to? But Kohler loves golf and clearly loves St. Andrews, as he owns the Old Course Hotel and the Dukes Course, just outside the “Home of Golf.”
“It’s a shambles,” Kohler said of the interior of Hamilton Hall. “You take your life in your hands going from floor to floor.”
So why do it?
Kohler said he loved the location, the history of the property and, as he said, the views of the golf course, the North Sea and the R&A clubhouse are magnificent.
The golf course view from the 6th floor, the highest at Hamilton Hall, must be something, looking down the 18th hole to the 17th green and then off to the right is the first green and more of Old Tom’s home course.
The plan is not to start construction until around August of next year, just after the Open Championship at St. Andrews in July. Kohler is opening the decision making process to members of ...
Klein on Design
Bradley S. Klein, Golfweek’s architecture editor, offers his opinion on one great hole:
Yards: 555, par 5
Architect: Jose Maria Olazabal, Brian Curley and Lee Schmidt, 2003
Where: Shenzhen, China
Event: Omega Mission Hills World Cup, Nov. 26-29
It’s great because . . . more than any other hole at the 12-course complex, it’s completely over the top and embodies the most crass and extreme design values. The Olazabal Course is a showcase for immoderate shaping, thanks to concave fairways and massive, cauliflower bunkering with flash-white sand. This wild, relentless dogleg par 5 looks like a seahorse in convulsions. It culminates the entire Mission Hills experience, thanks to a lake down the inside left of the hole with two distinct bays and 24 bunkers, roughly equally distributed at each crucial point: in the primary landing area, the lay-up second-shot zone and around the green.
It would be even better if . . . this hole were not so focused on making it so bold for pros while leaving behind the everyday player. Down the aggressive left side the hole plays only 497 yards, which is like a normal par 4 these days for pros, although the approach shot here has to be struck ...
New and improved
Despite the down market in golf course construction recently, there has been plenty of turnover and interesting new developments on our Golfweek’s Best lists of the top 100 Residential Courses, the top 100 Resort Courses and the top 50 Courses of the Caribbean & Mexico.
The newcomers start with the country’s premier real estate property, Rock Creek Cattle Company in Deer Lodge, Mont., where innovative traditionalist – no, that’s not an oxymoron – Tom Doak has honed a down-to-earth design out of scrub land and turned it into desirable ground for folks looking to get away to the American West.
Retreat and escape into the vast open spaces of the Western frontier is a recurring theme on this list, in fact, with the team of Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw having utilized this in their design of Colorado Golf Club in Parker, Colo., No. 2 on our list, on the south-facing outslope below Denver. And for those interested in experiencing a rugged recreational environment within the cocoon of indulgent service and luxury, there’s another top 10 newcomer, Gozzer Ranch (No. 6) in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho. Here Tom Fazio has combined infinity-edge looks into Lake Coeur d’Alene with ...
A reshaping on two fronts at Bethpage
Bethpage State Park’s Black Course, home to U.S. Opens in 2002 and ’09, is getting a new 15th green. It’s also getting a new head superintendent.
The historic A.W. Tillinghast-designed daily-fee layout in Farmingdale, N.Y., opened in 1935 and rated No. 18 on the Golfweek’s Best Classic list, went under the knife (actually, a bulldozer blade) on Nov. 17. The plan is to reduce the slope of the notoriously elusive, steeply pitched green on the uphill, 478-yard, par-4 15th hole.
The green has so much back-to-front slope that it offers only two usable hole locations. It gets special treatment during U.S. Opens, with rolling and reduced mowing so that it doesn’t become unplayable. Architect Rees Jones, who oversaw extensive renovations of Bethpage Black before both U.S. Opens, also is in charge of the latest project. Plans call for rebuilding the green, with the back lowered slightly and the front raised just enough to create more level areas for hole locations. Construction is being done by McDonald & Sons, with the work expected to take two weeks and with grow-in not to be completed until spring. The course is closed and will reopen ...
Klein on Design
Bradley S. Klein, Golfweek’s architecture editor, offers his opinion on one great hole:
Yards: 240, par 3
Architect: Rees Jones, 2004
Where: Charleston, S.C.
Event: Nationwide Tour Championship, Oct. 22-25
It’s great because . . . this dramatic hole sits out by itself on the far northeast corner of a remote, 4,000-acre Lowcountry golf development. It’s the longest of the par 3s, and plays across a marsh and into a prevailing cross breeze that’s unforgiving for shots that come up short.
It would be even better if . . . the approach shot squeezed players more in terms of angle. In an effort to maximize length on this hole, the tee has been aligned on a path that’s wide open into the green, with all of the bailout to the left. Tour-quality players rarely hit short; they miss left or right. By pushing the tee to the right and creating more of an acute angle over a large bunker there, that hazard would come more into play. And by placing a small pot bunker deep left into the green, players would face more of a risk/reward option on the left side than they do now when they opt ...
Novel approaches
THE LIST: Golfweek’s Best New Courses
When the economy goes upside down, all sorts of new and innovative ideas suddenly have a chance to emerge. The same goes for golf development, where there’s been a long-term slide
in the number of new courses opening, but no falloff when it comes to innovation.
As our 2008-09 Golfweek’s Best New Courses list attests, there’s a wide range of talent out there and plenty of opportunity to make a mark.
Golf architecture traditionalist Tom Doak has struck a responsive chord in the scrubland of southern Montana with Rock Creek Cattle Co., our No. 1-rated new course to have opened in the past two years. Our team of raters was impressed by the scruffy look, the wide-open sensibility of the place and a land plan that has seen homesites pulled away from the golf course.
Legendary powerhouse Jack Nicklaus leads the list with four new designs, including his high-profile Ritz-Carlton Golf Club at Dove Mountain (Saguaro and Tortolita nines) in Marana, Ariz., No. 11 on our list and home to the PGA Tour’s WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship. Twenty-five states placed courses on the list; California and Florida lead with ...
Klein on Kingsbarns
Yards: 444, par 4
Architect: Kyle Phillips, 1999
Where: Fife, Scotland
Event: Alfred Dunhill Links Championship, Oct. 1-4
It’s great because . . . Kingsbarns, now a decade old, revolutionized Scottish golf with a retro-links look that combines scruffy old dunes, deep bunkers and greens contoured to function as hazards when approached from the wrong angle. The finishing hole calls for a drive into a prevailing wind that quarters from the right and brings fairway bunkers into play on the left side. From there, the approach is to a steeply sloped green pitched above a nasty burn – the only forced-carry water hazard in play from a fairway shot at Kingsbarns – that will capture any approach that comes up a little short.
It would be even better if . . . they would rebuild the steep back-to-front green and marginally modify its slope. As for high-handicappers looking to lay up on their second shots, the fairway tilts toward the burn and leaves an awkward third shot from a downhill lie to an uphill green – virtually impossible for the kind of player who has laid up. It would help here to counter slope the fairway and provide just a little more cushion for the high-handicapper, lest he ...
Klein on Merion East
Yards: 403, par 4
Architect: Hugh Wilson, 1912 (course rated No. 4 on Golfweek’s Best Classic list)
Where: Ardmore, Pa.
Event: Walker Cup, Sept. 12-13
It’s great because . . . it’s Merion, with all of its wonderfully disheveled elegance. The hole plays through a narrow chute of trees to a fairway canted left to right, protected by bunkers on the high side and dense tree canopies on the bolder, low side. A precipitous green looks like it’s sliding off its moorings and about to tumble into a steep front-right bunker.
It would be even better if . . . the green was rebuilt to marginally reduce the slopes of the putting surface to provide more than two adjoining hole locations on a green that’s too heavily pitched for modern putting speeds. There’s no problem taking the existing contours and toning down all of them by dropping the back of the green 3-4 feet and reproducing (in more moderate fashion) the same relative slopes on the hole. Then they’d have more pin-able ground for a greater mix of hole locations, including front left and back right over that bunker.
Klein on Design: No. 10 at Turnberry
Bradley S. Klein, Golfweek’s architecture editor, offers his opinion on one great hole:
Yards: 456, par 4
Architects: Mackenzie Ross, 1949; Tom Mackenzie and Martin Ebert, 2007
Where: Turnberry, Ayrshire, Scotland
Event: British Open, July 16-19
It’s great because . . . for all the heralded seaside courses on the British Open rota, this is the only hole where the water actually is supposed to be in play, as opposed to reachable by a poorly struck shot. Since the last British Open at Turnberry in 1994, the setting along the headland has been dramatically enhanced by a new tee on the rocky outcrop by the lighthouse and an extended fairway that comes left toward the beach.
It would be even better if . . . they would move the 10th green way left to the site of the present par-3 11th tee along the shore, which would make for an even more dramatic par 4. To accommodate this, they easily could shift the 11th hole farther back and left so that it, too, would play entirely along the shoreline. Then you’d have back-to-back stunners hard along the Scottish coastline.
Klein on Design: No. 18 at Congressional
Yards: 466
Architect: Devereux Emmet (1924), Donald Ross (1930), Robert Trent Jones Sr. (1959), Rees Jones (1989)
Where: Bethesda, Md.
Event: AT&T National, July 2-5
It’s great because . . . Congressional’s most recognizable hole has been a stage for both the famous – Ken Venturi limping home a winner at the 1964 U.S. Open – and the infamous – Tom Lehman dumping a 7-iron approach into the water to lose the 1997 Open. (It played as the 17th hole in ’97.) The genius of this downhill hole lies in the peninsula green, canted diagonally, with water lurking on both sides and to the rear. With the fairway tilted ever so slightly right to left, it’s easy to turn the ball over into the left rough, from which point getting to the green (and holding it) is very tough.
It would be even better if . . . a new back tee were added. The downhill tee shot runs so fast and firm that Tour-quality players are hitting wedges into this green, but the hole works best when players have a middle iron in. There’s room to move back another 40-plus yards, which not only would lengthen the hole but also make it ...
Klein on Design: No. 18 at Bethpage
Yards: 411
Architect: A.W. Tillinghast; Rees Jones (2000)
Where: Farmingdale, N.Y.
Event: U.S. Open, June 18-21
It’s great because . . . it’s much better for the average player hitting driver from the middle tees than for the U.S. Open golfer laying up from the back. From a dramatically perched tee, the hole plays to a bellowed fairway that’s littered with bunkers on both sides. The approach plays to an elevated green set in front of the clubhouse. It all makes for great visuals and a demanding tee shot that has to thread the deep sand and thick rough.
It would be even better if . . . this wonderful stage didn’t produce disappointing theater. Rees Jones’ reworking of A.W. Tillinghast’s original design effectively takes driver out of the equation for long hitters. There’s little reward for hitting a bold drive because the carry past the narrow neck of the fairway is 315 yards from the back tee. That means everyone lays up to the 37-yard-wide fairway short, leaving a 175-yard approach. That’s a bit of a letdown for the 18th hole of a U.S. Open. The last array of bunkering should be ...
Klein on Design: 14 at Muirfield Village
Yards: 363
Architect: Jack Nicklaus-Desmond Muirhead
Where: Dublin, Ohio
Event: The Memorial, June 4-7
It’s great because . . . it revived the art of the short par 4 when it debuted in 1976.
A creek bisects the fairway, all but forcing players to lay up short off the tee. The challenge is its elusive green, which is tight across and narrower as you go deeper. There is heavy bunkering on the left and a decided tilt toward a mowed-down slope on the right that propels the ball into the water. The hole proves its guile with contour, not length, playing last year to a 4.113 stroke average during tournament week.
It would be even better if . . . when dry weather permits, PGA Tour officials would move up the tee on weekends and utilize a front-hole location at the widest part of the green, thereby encouraging bold play that could result in eagles. With the usual setup, there’s no reward for the risky 300-yard carry over the creek.
Recent Golf Architecture Galleries
Renovations enhance Bay Hill Club
Before-and-after photos of the changes made to Bay Hill Club in Orlando, Fla.
