Check out StackaLine’s hole-by-hole maps for Monterey Peninsula’s Shore Course for the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am.
Monterey Peninsula Country Club’s Shore Course in Pebble Beach, California – one of three layouts used in this week’s AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am on the PGA Tour – opened in 1959 but was extensively renovated by architect Mike Strantz beginning in 2003.
Taking advantage of the unique coastal setting, Strantz designed 12 new holes and remodeled the others that originally were laid out by Bob Baldock and Jack Neville. The result of Strantz’s work has elevated the private club to a tie for No. 27 on Golfweek’s Best list of top modern courses built in or after 1960 in the United States. It also ranks No. 8 in California on Golfweek’s Best list of private courses.
The first three rounds of the Pebble Beach Pro-Am – Thursday through Saturday – also will be played on nearby Spyglass Hill and Pebble Beach Golf Links. Sunday’s final round after the cut will be played only on Pebble Beach Golf Links.
The Shore Course will play to 6,957 yards with a par of 71 in the PGA Tour event.
Thanks to yardage books provided by StrackaLine – the maker of detailed yardage books for thousands of courses around the world – we can see exactly the challenges the pros face this week. Check out the maps of each hole below.
StrackaLine provides hole-by-hole maps for the Robert Trent Jones Sr. layout in California that will host the PGA Tour event.
Spyglass Hill in Pebble Beach, California – one of three courses used in the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am on the PGA Tour – was designed by Robert Trent Jones Sr. and opened in 1966. The layout features an opening five holes through dunes to the water’s edge before climbing into a forest for the rest of the round.
The first three rounds of the Pebble Beach Pro-Am – Thursday through Saturday – also will be played on nearby Pebble Beach Golf Links and Monterey Peninsula Country Club’s Shore Course. Sunday’s final round after the cut will be played only on Pebble Beach Golf Links.
Thanks to yardage books provided by StrackaLine – the maker of detailed yardage books for thousands of courses around the world – we can see exactly the challenges the pros face this week. Check out the maps of each hole below.
Count down the top 30 courses of the past three decades, as judged by Golfweek’s panel of raters.
It’s been a crazy string of decades in golf design, with construction going gangbusters through the 1990s and early 2000s before grinding nearly to a complete halt after the financial crisis of 2007 and ’08. Things have picked up a bit in recent years, especially when considering high-end destinations scattered in far-flung locales around the U.S.
Through it all, these are the best 30 courses opened in the past 30 years in the U.S., as voted by Golfweek’s Best panel of raters.
The hundreds of members of our course-ratings panel continually evaluate courses and rate them based on our 10 criteria. They also file a single, overall rating on each course. Those overall ratings on each course are averaged to produce a final, cumulative rating.
This ranking is compiled from data included in the 2021 Golfweek’s Best Modern Courses list, and it focuses on the golf courses themselves, not on resorts or private clubs as a whole or other amenities. Each golf course included is listed with its average rating from 1 to 10, its location, architect(s), the year it opened and its status as a private club (p), a resort (r), a daily-fee operation (d) or a real estate development (re).
StrackaLine provides hole-by-hole maps for the PGA Tour event in San Diego.
Torrey Pines’ South Course in San Diego is the site for three of the four rounds in this week’s PGA Tour’s Farmers Insurance Open alongside the Pacific Ocean, which will be played Wednesday through Saturday.
The first two rounds of the event will be on the South Course and the North Course at the municipal facility, and the final two rounds will be played on the South after a cut is made. The South was home to Jon Rahm’s U.S. Open victory in 2021 and Tiger Woods’ U.S. Open title in 2008.
The South was designed by the father-son duo of William P. Bell and William F. Bell and opened in 1957. The course has been changed significantly over the years. While the Bells’ routing remains, all greens, tees and bunkers were redesigned by Rees Jones in a 2001 major renovation with later refinements in 2019.
Thanks to yardage books provided by StrackaLine – the maker of detailed yardage books for thousands of courses around the world – we can see exactly the challenges the pros face this week on the South. Check out the maps of each hole below.
The short course will be built near Streamsong’s lodge and feature holes stretching from 70 to 300 yards.
BOWLING GREEN, Fla. – Streamsong, already home to three highly ranked courses built by some of the biggest names in modern golf architecture, plans to add a fourth course that will open in late 2023 or 2024.
The design duo of Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw have signed on to construct their second course at the resort, this one an 18-hole, non-traditional layout for which the early routing shows holes ranging from 70 to nearly 300 yards. The yet-to-be-named short course will be built on lumpy, bumpy, and sandy land just east of the resort’s main lodge, easily within walking distance of guest rooms.
Streamsong – which celebrates its 10th anniversary this year – also will add another putting course near the new course and lodge. It is projected to be larger than the resort’s popular Gauntlet putting course at the Black Course’s clubhouse. Food and beverage components will be constructed alongside the new short course and putting course with a dedicated clubhouse.
All combined, the new amenities should make for a perfectly relaxed way to spend an afternoon after playing one of the resort’s traditional 18s. The Red Course by Coore and Crenshaw ranks No. 2 on Golfweek’s Best Courses You Can Play list of public-access layouts in Florida and is tied for No. 37 on Golfweek’s Best rankings of all modern courses built since 1960 in the United States. Streamsong’s Black Course by Gil Hanse and Jim Wagner is No. 3 among Florida’s public-access layouts and ties for No. 44 among all modern U.S. courses, and the resort’s Blue Course by Tom Doak ranks No. 4 in Florida and ties for No. 55 among modern courses in the U.S.
Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw also designed Streamsong’s Red Course. (Courtesy of Streamsong/Laurence Lambrecht)
Coore recently visited the site with course shaper and architect Keith Rhebb, who frequently works for the Coore/Crenshaw team, and they set out initial stakes on the land that cuts across a scrubby, roughly 100-acre site with several lakes in play.
Because it’s a non-traditional course, it’s entirely possible to introduce exciting features that might not work on a traditional course. Think imaginative greens, big run-offs, and other opportunities to show off creative design that might not work as well on a traditional, full-size course.
It’s a similar concept to the new par-3 courses that have become incredibly popular at many top destinations, only longer in spots. Streamsong already is home to a par-3 course, the seven-hole Roundabout near the Black Course’s clubhouse.
And because the new course won’t stretch to a traditional total length, it will be possible to play it with fewer than 14 clubs – players can leave their drivers in their rooms, if they so choose, and tackle it with just a handful of irons, wedges, and a putter.
Coore and Crenshaw often include devilish short par 3s on their traditional courses, including the 147-yard eighth hole on the Red at Streamsong. These holes typically feature extreme putting surfaces and surrounds that can frustrate even good players who have only a short iron or wedge into the green, making them among the most interesting holes on the course despite their diminutive length. Their experience building such holes, as well as par-3 courses such as the much-heralded Preserve at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort in Oregon, should help make for a very interesting 18 holes at Streamsong’s new short course.
You can see the water early. It’s the Caribbean Sea, blue and perfect, and of course there’s no missing it. Visitors likely saw plenty of it on the flight to this island nation.
Before a player ever sets off the first tee of Teeth of the Dog, the sea is seemingly right there in view from the main Casa de Campo clubhouse, down and across the ninth and 18th holes. There are glimpses of blue on the early holes. It’s oh-so-close on the third and fourth holes, just a skosh more than a hundred yards away, providing a taste of salt on the air to make you think you know what it means to play golf alongside the ocean.
But it’s not until you step onto the fifth tee box that you experience the sensory overload of playing golf directly alongside the sea. Salt spray. Trade winds. Palm trees. A tiny green perched above the waves – take one too many steps backward while reading a putt, and you might make a splash. It’s almost too much for the golf-travel obsessed.
No. 5 at Casa de Campo’s Teeth of the Dog in the Dominican Republic (Gabe Gudgel/Golfweek)
Right there on that tee box is where many golfers learn what it means to play tight to the ocean. Not playing near the water with a restricted view through some condo towers or mansions, not on a cliff high above the waves, not on the inland side of a beach dune with the wet stuff a full wedge away. Instead, this fifth tee shot is an incredible introduction to swinging so close to the sea that you might get your socks wet – a real possibility if your approach shot falls short and you go for a bold recovery from the rock-strewn beach.
“I remember the first time I played Teeth of the Dog and I pulled up to No. 5,” said Robert Birtel, director of golf operations at the sprawling Dominican resort, “and I was like ‘Whoa, what’s going on here?’ ”
What’s going on is up to 176 yards of bravado, beauty and visual intimidation. It’s the late Pete Dye at his finest – an unforgettable golf shot set in a postcard.
And it’s just the beginning. No. 5 is only the first of seven holes on Dye’s Teeth of the Dog – so named because the sharp rocks along the shore called to mind a canine’s canines – where it’s not only possible you blast a ball into the sea, it’s frequently surprising if you don’t.
These courses top Golfweek’s Best rankings in Mexico, the Caribbean, the Atlantic Islands and Central America.
Welcome to the Golfweek’s Best 2022 list of top golf courses in Mexico, the Caribbean, the Atlantic islands and Central America.
The hundreds of members of our course-ratings panel continually evaluate courses and rate them based on our 10 criteria. They also file a single, overall rating on each course. Those overall ratings on each course are averaged to produce a final, cumulative rating. Then each course is ranked against other courses in the region.
This list focuses on the golf courses themselves, not the resorts as a whole or other amenities. Each golf course included is listed with its average rating from 1 to 10, its location, architect(s) and the year it opened.
The state bill proposes unspecified funding for repurposing publicly owned golf courses into housing developments.
A California Assembly bill that potentially could fund the repurposing of municipal golf courses into land for housing is moving forward again after dying in committee in 2021.
The gist of Assembly Bill 672 is that California faces huge homelessness problems and soaring housing costs, so municipal golf courses could be shut down and the land developed into housing, including at least 25 percent occupancy by low-income households.
Since being revived in early 2022, AB 672 has been significantly modified and passed two Assembly committees this week. It likely will reach an appropriations committee next week, and if approved there, it eventually would move to the full Assembly and then the California Senate for a vote.
The bill has caused outcry from many golfers and organizations, especially in the form in which it was written in 2021 that would have mandated that municipal golf courses be converted into housing.
In the bill’s current form, there is no such mandate. Instead, local governments and authorities would be allowed to make choices about closing municipal courses, and state funding would be made available to subsidize development into housing. Basically, it’s a much softer bill now than in its original form. And it faces huge obstacles in ever passing into law, not the least of which is that its current form does not specify any funds for development subsidies. In its original form, AB 672 provided $50 million for subsidies, but that funding line has been stricken from the current bill.
My bill #AB672 passed Asm Housing & Local Govt Cmt today! 🎉 It will create a voluntary incentive for public agencies to consider municipal golf courses for affordable housing & open space.
This is about providing more tools to address housing issues and think outside the box. pic.twitter.com/jzdnyBDXJW
Craig Kessler, the director of public affairs for the Southern California Golf Association, on Thursday told Golfweek that the bill has gone from having a devastating impact in its 2021 form, to having significant impact, to now having much less impact if it were to pass. He also predicts many hurdles for the bill from supporters of public-access golf in the state.
“While I was never optimistic about this bill dying early in the 2022 process, I remain optimistic that it will not get signed into law in 2022,” Kessler said, “but only if the golf community continues to be as engaged in the next few months as it has in the past few months.”
There are more than 200 municipal courses in California, making up 22 percent of all courses in the state, including such highly ranked facilities as Torrey Pines, site of the 2021 U.S. Open in San Diego. AB 672 does not address privately owned public-access courses, such as most daily-fee courses, or privately owned country clubs.
The bill in its current form would:
Provide incentives in the form of grants to local agencies that enter into a development agreement to convert a publicly owned golf course into housing and publicly accessible open space.
Mandate that at least 25 percent of all new dwelling units would be occupied by lower-income households for a period of no less than 55 years.
Garcia describes the proposed law officially as the “Conversion of Publicly Owned Golf Courses to Affordable Housing” in the bill, but the bill does not specify or cap what type of housing might constitute the remaining 75 percent of dwelling units.
At least 15 percent of any such development must be open space, but golf courses would not be considered open space.
No more than a third of any such development could be used for non-residential purposes, including parking.
The municipal Rancho Park Golf Course used to host the PGA Tour’s Los Angeles Open. (Todd Kelly/Golfweek)
Larry Bohannan of the Palm Springs Desert Sunreported last April that the proposed law would remove municipal golf courses from protections of the Public Park Preservation Act, provide an exemption to the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) and make it easier to rezone public open-space land for housing.
Proponents of the bill have said thousands of dwellings could be built on converted golf courses to ease housing problems. Garcia’s bill states that “Existing law establishes the Department of Housing and Community Development and requires it to, among other things, administer various programs intended to fund the acquisition of property to develop or preserve affordable housing.”
Municipal golf courses in California are under attack.
These facilities carry a special meaning to California golfers, allowing all to access the game.
Learn how you can #SavePublicGolf, and join the SCGA in opposing the Public Golf Endangerment Act!
Supporters of golf – including the Southern California Golf Association and the California Alliance for Golf – have countered that golf courses serve as necessary green spaces in otherwise crowded cities, and that municipal golf courses typically serve lower-income players of diverse backgrounds, frequently with programs designed to introduce the game to such players.
“Removing golf and only golf from the 50-year-old protections of CEQA and the Public Park Preservation Act amounts to a determination by legislative fiat that golf is no longer part of the greater family of publicly accessible recreational activities,” James Ferrin, president of the California Alliance for Golf, a non-profit trade organization, said in a letter to the Housing and Community Development Committee and other assembly members in 2021, as reported by Bohannon. “The State of California should not be favoring or disfavoring specific recreational activities nor picking winners and losers among them.”
The new layout will join Jack Nicklaus’ original course at the property that offers stunning views of the Pacific Ocean.
Jack Nicklaus will return to Mexico to build a second course at Quivira Los Cabos, where he designed Quivira Golf Club that opened in 2014.
The routing is in progress, and ground is expected to be broken by the end of 2022 for the as-yet-to-be-named new Jack Nicklaus Signature course. It will be laid out in the northwest portion of the 1,850-acre development in rolling desert foothills and valleys interlaced with arroyos, and the southern portion of the course will offer panoramic views of the Pacific Ocean.
“The first golf course at Quivira is a spectacular layout playing across a remarkable piece of property,” Nicklaus said in a media release announcing the news Tuesday. “Now, I am excited that design is well underway on the second course at Quivira, which should be stunning and equally as spectacular. I hope golfers who play the second course will enjoy the views, the quality of golf, and the challenge.”
The original course at the property, Quivira Golf Club, tied for No. 25 on Golfweek’s Best 2021 list of courses in Mexico, the Caribbean, the Atlantic islands, and Central America.
Streamsong celebrates its 10th anniversary with three highly ranked courses in Florida, but how do you choose the best of the lot?
The question comes all the time from players who have frequented top golf resorts in the U.S. and want to verify their opinions, as well as from golfers who have never played a certain top destination but dream of a trip.
“Which course at the resort is your favorite?”
Normally there’s a simple response, based on the evaluation of Golfweek’s Best Resort Courses list.
Going to Kiawah Island Golf Resort in South Carolina? There are several courses available, but you must experience the Ocean Course. Destination Kohler in Wisconsin? Sure, Blackwolf Run offers two strong layouts, but Whistling Straits is the clear favorite among the resort’s four full-size tracks. Pinehurst in North Carolina? As much admiration as the recently renovated No. 4 has received among an impressive roster that includes four of the top 200 resort courses in the U.S., Donald Ross’s No. 2 is a classic masterpiece and repeat U.S. Open site that clearly shines brightest among the resort’s offerings in the rankings. Pebble Beach Golf Links is part of a larger California resort that stuns, but the classic seaside track is a can’t-miss for golfers.
But the answer to which is best isn’t always so cut-and-dried.
Which is your favorite of the five 18-hole courses at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort in Oregon? There’s plenty of debate around the fireplace outside McKee’s Pub, and all five courses rank in the top 11 on the 2022 Golfweek’s Best Resort Courses list. There really isn’t a wrong answer when all the options are that strong.
How about the best of the two current courses at Sand Valley in Wisconsin? The resort is operated by Michael and Chris Keiser, sons of Bandon Dunes founder Mike Keiser, and as at Bandon Dunes the Golfweek’s Best list doesn’t necessarily establish a definitive winner between the eponymous Sand Valley layout and the resort’s Mammoth Dunes, both top-15 resort courses. Grab an Adirondack chair behind the clubhouse and let the “Which is better?” discussions begin.
Streamsong Red and Blue are intertwined. (Courtesy of Streamsong)
It’s the same story at Streamsong in Bowling Green, Florida, home to three courses ranked inside the top 20 on the 2022 Golfweek’s Best Resort Courses List. Red? Blue? Black? “If you had to play just one,” I am frequently asked, “which would it be?”
My stock answer: The next one. And I’ll defend that simplified response on the basis that I’ll gladly take a day at any of the three courses built by Gil Hanse, Tom Doak or the team of Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw. There are noticeable differences between the layouts, but they are so tightly packed in the Golfweek’s Best rankings as to inevitably invite debate – that’s a big part of the fun. Ask me which you should play, and I’ll tell you to sample all three and get back to me.
Bandon Dunes, Sand Valley and Streamsong combine to include 10 of the top 20 resort courses in the country. Apologies in advance for my dalliance into cliché, but asking to choose the best layout at any of them is like being asked which of your kids is your favorite. Only in this case, golfers often are more than willing to loudly announce their personal preferences.
Me? Not so much. Returning to Streamsong as a case study, there’s nuance to be considered. And the skill of the golfer. Putting prowess. The wind on any given day. Dozens of considerations, many of which change in time and with repeat rounds. Feel free to pick a favorite, but don’t be surprised to change your mind on another visit.
The Lodge at Streamsong in Florida (Courtesy of Streamsong)
Streamsong celebrates its 10th anniversary this year, inviting reinspection of its leap into the course rankings. Much has changed since the two original courses, the Red and the Blue, opened in 2012 on a former phosphate mining site that offered plenty of sand and a raw, rollicking landscape unlike anything else in Florida. A luxurious 228-room hotel and spa opened in 2014, auxiliary sports such as shooting and bass fishing were introduced, and most importantly the Black course came online in 2017.
The resort and courses continue to evolve, recently with the introduction of new putting surfaces on the Red and Blue and with new restaurant themes and names that include the rebranding of the Black course’s Bone Valley Tavern into a seafood restaurant – the staff might suggest the salt and pepper fritto misto, and you can’t go wrong with the lobster mac and cheese.
Despite the changes, the focus remains on the golf, perhaps more sharply than ever.
The three layouts share many similarities: strikingly open vistas and easy walks with few trees in play, mostly firm and bouncy turf, beautiful bunkers that appear as simple sand scrapes and great mixes of memorable holes routed in natural fashions upon what in actuality are completely unnatural sites left over from mining operations. A common refrain is that Streamsong, full of jagged dunes and rugged boundaries in middle-of-nowhere inner Florida, feels like playing golf on the surface of the moon – in the case of these three courses, that is a compliment.
