Tag: course design

Jack Nicklaus free to design golf courses as court case about name, likeness continues

‘If you want a golf course designed by Jack Nicklaus, give me a call.’

Jack Nicklaus is free to design golf courses as himself and to compete with his former company after an arbitrator ruled he was no longer under obligation to Nicklaus Companies LLC,  which the golf legend no longer owns.

Nicklaus the man sold equity in Nicklaus Companies in 2007 to New York-based banker Howard Milstein, who has since acquired total ownership of the company, including the golf course design business once headed by the Golden Bear.

Nicklaus – who has designed more than 300 courses around the world – and Milstein fell out in recent years, and the winner of 18 professional major championships for the most part ended his participation with the company in 2017. His contract with the company included a five-year non-compete clause, and Nicklaus continued to work on behalf of Nicklaus Design until May of 2022. He was precluded during that period from designing courses on his own outside Nicklaus Companies.

In late 2022 Nicklaus began offering course-design services through his new company 1-JN, which operates through his family instead of Nicklaus Companies. Milstein had sought to prevent Nicklaus from using his own name and likeness as part of that new 1-JN business. The arbitrator ruled that Nicklaus “is now free to engage in the activities” once restricted by the contract’s covenants and to compete against the company that bears his name, activities that include among other things the design of golf courses and the solicitation of the Nicklaus Companies’ customers and employees.

“The arbitration process was an arduous learning experience, but I am thankful for how it ended,” Nicklaus said in a media release announcing the decision. “I get to keep doing one of the things that makes me happy – bringing new golf courses to life and making old ones new again. … I am involved in some great projects at the moment and look forward to a lot more of the same now that the effort to keep me on the sidelines has failed.”

Milstein has expanded his reach in golf in recent years and has acquired other golf-related businesses, including Golf Magazine, TrueSpec and a variety of golf equipment and service enterprises.

The media release from the Nicklaus team explains there are still conflicts between Nicklaus and Milstein. Nicklaus Companies have filed a lawsuit against the retired golfer in New York addressing similar issues under other agreements, but the judge in that case has denied the Nicklaus Companies’ request for a preliminary injunction to prevent Nicklaus the man from designing courses in his own name, finding was not enough evidence at that point to prove that Nicklaus Companies would prevail at trial.

The response from Nicklaus Companies LLC about the ongoing New York trial states that nothing much has changed after the arbitrator’s ruling, and that Nicklaus Companies still retains the rights to the Nicklaus name and image as the New York case continues. The company’s statement is:

To be clear: Mr. Nicklaus has been able to design golf courses since the preliminary injunction issued, subject to the terms of the preliminary injunction. So the status quo has not changed.

The media release from Nicklaus’ team spelled out some of the arbitrator’s response to those issues as well:

“[T]o the extent the Company attempts to argue in another forum that other agreements prevent Jack Nicklaus from acting as a golf course designer or consultant or lending his personal endorsement to, or providing services as an endorsement spokesman for, any product, service or Person (which would logically include using his name and image), such efforts would circumvent this Tribunal’s decision and be an attempt to implement an unlawful and indefinite non-compete provision which would prevent Mr. Nicklaus from earning a livelihood. It is undisputed that the Employment Agreement’s restrictive covenant provisions were ‘a critical part’ of the overall deal. … They gave the Company significant rights, and they also gave Mr. Nicklaus rights.  He bargained for the ability to end his Employment Term after five years and then compete with the Company five years after that.  The plain language of the [Employment Agreement] compels the conclusion that when the restrictive covenants expired, he would be free to engage in the restricted activities on his own and in his own name. Otherwise, the covenants would be … illusory and effectively be made permanent, as one cannot serve as a designer of record or endorser without the use of one’s name and related publicity rights.”

A trial date for that lawsuit in New York has not been set, and clearly there are issues yet to be decided.

Nicklaus said in the media release that he is sorry his relationship with Milstein did not turn out positively and regrets “having to fight for rights that were an important part of the bargain we made back in 2007.”  Nicklaus ended on a positive note:

“If you want a golf course designed by Jack Nicklaus, give me a call.”

Tiger Woods, Mike Trout announce routing for Trout National in New Jersey

The golf star teamed with the baseball star to build a private club on an old silica mine and rambling farmland.

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Tiger Woods and baseball star Mike Trout announced in March they were partnering to build a new private golf course, Trout National – The Reserve, in New Jersey about 45 minutes south of Philadelphia.

The routing, perhaps the most important part of the design puzzle, is now complete. The group released a map of the routing Friday in a media release, timed with a new social media video of Woods and Trout at Trout National. The course – par 72 at 7,455 yards – is slated to open in 2025.

With the course designed by Woods’ TGR Design, the club will also feature a “cutting-edge” practice range, short-game area, clubhouse, restaurant, “five-star” lodging, a wedding chapel and more.

Trout National Tiger Woods
The planned routing for Trout National – The Reserve in Vineland, New Jersey, includes a former silica sand mine and rambling farmland. (Courtesy of Trout National – The Reserve)

Trout recently spoke on Bleacher Report’s “On Base With Mookie Betts,”  about what inspired him to build a course and his love of working with Woods.

Here’s the full release on how the routing came together:

(VINELAND, N.J.) – Trout National – The Reserve, a world-class golf club collaboration between Mike Trout, the three-time American League MVP and 10-time Major League Baseball All-Star, and local partner and businessman John Ruga, announce the course routing by golf icon Tiger Woods’ TGR Design.

The 18-hole, par-72 golf course, which is slated to complete construction in 2025, is routed through two unique natural landscapes giving distinct character to the course. A former silica sand mine and rambling farmland offers ample playable sandy waste areas as well as sprawling fairways offering multiple routes from tee to green. Large and undulating greens with low-cut surrounds emphasize the challenging, yet fun design where risk-reward opportunities create the ideal environment.

“Some of my favorite golf experiences have been ones that have challenged my game while still having fun and that’s what we wanted to create at Trout National – The Reserve,” said Trout. “Tiger, John and I walked hole by hole and this course will do just that. Our vision and his design is creating something special here in my hometown.”

“Mike and John found a site with a lot of character to make some outstanding golf holes,” says Tiger. “The sandy and diverse terrain has so many great natural features that have given us a lot of options on how to create a world-class golf course.”

“The land that is home to Trout National – The Reserve has great history here in the city of Vineland,” said Ruga. “Tiger and his team were able to incorporate the history and let the land shine through in this championship golf course. It will truly be a memorable experience on the course.”

Accompanying the 18-hole championship golf course, the golf offerings at Trout National – The Reserve will also include a flexible short course and expansive putting course along with world-class practice facilities and performance center. Other club highlights include a modern state-of-the-art clubhouse, five-star lodging, innovative amenities, a chapel and more.

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Justin Thomas partners with Jack Nicklaus to build new Panther National course in Florida

Panther National will be Justin Thomas’ first foray into course design, and he has an experienced partner.

Justin Thomas is throwing his hat into the course design ring, as the 14-time PGA Tour winner joins forces with Jack Nicklaus to build Panther National in Palm Beach County, Florida.

The new 18-hole layout will be a Jack Nicklaus Signature course, and it will be the first foray into golf architecture for Thomas, 28. It’s not dissimilar to how Nicklaus got his start: Then 28 years old, Nicklaus first worked as a course designer with Pete Dye in 1968 at Harbour Town, which opened in 1969 on South Carolina’s coast at Sea Pines Resort. Nicklaus has since designed more than 425 courses in 45 countries.

The new golf facility at the planned residential community of Panther National is slated to include a training facility with a nine-hole, par-3 course, a short-game area and hitting bays supported by technology to improve performance.

A rendering of a home to be built at Panther National in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida (Courtesy of Panther National)

Timelines for construction and completion were not included with a release that announced the new private course and community. An official launch announcement was planned for later Thursday (this story will be updated with any details provided). The developers said Panther National will be built on the last remaining parcel of buildable land in Palm Beach Gardens and will be the first new golf course community in the county in nearly two decades.

The Panther National community will include 218 custom homes designed by architect Max Strang and will range in size from 4,000 to 10,000 square feet. Swiss developer Dominik Senn plans to focus on minimizing environmental impact and clean energy, and will partner with Tesla Energy to power the estates and amenities.

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Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player form course design alliance as Black Knight seeks to start building again

The Golden Bear and Black Knight have been friends for decades, with this design alliance further proof of that.

The course design firms of Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player announced Wednesday they have formed a strategic alliance to help Player relaunch his business building golf courses.

Player has designed more than 135 courses worldwide since starting in the 1980s, but his design business was on hold for several years during a legal dispute with his son Marc Player that was resolved in 2020. Now his marketing firm, Gary Player Enterprises, is ready to start building again.

A page announcing the two Hall of Fame players’ partnership on nicklausdesign.com said the alliance will allow Player to draw on the talents and infrastructure developed by Nicklaus Design, which has built more than 425 course in 46 countries.

“When I approached Jack, my goal was to create a relationship that would elevate my design business, and I am thrilled to have my design work supported by the most talented and thorough design firm in the world,” Player said in the release on the Nicklaus site. “… I love working with the land to develop a truly memorable, challenging and enjoyable golf experience, and working with the support of Nicklaus Design will allow me to concentrate on the unique, creative opportunities that each site presents to me.”

Nicklaus and Player were rivals on the course for decades starting in the 1960s. Nicklaus went on to win 18 professional majors among his 73 PGA tour titles, while Player won nine majors among 24 titles on the PGA Tour and more than a hundred more around the world. The Golden Bear and the Black Knight have been friends for decades, with this design alliance further example.

“When I partnered with Howard Milstein (executive chairman of the Nicklaus Companies) in June 2007, one of the goals was to institutionalize and strengthen the Nicklaus Companies to continue my personal legacy in the golf business and ensure the expertise and resources needed to develop and support the people who will design the golf courses of the future,” Nicklaus said in the announcement on his site. “Now, we’re happy to be in a position to facilitate the next phase of my dear friend Gary’s career.”

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Forrest Richardson, Jeffrey A. Danner team up in rebranded golf course design firm

The newly renamed Richardson | Danner Golf Course Architects will continue emphasis on environmental awareness, access and inclusion.

Golf course architect Forrest Richardson, who has dozens of design credits including Baylands Golf Links in California and The Hideout in Utah, is taking on Jeffrey A. Danner as a design partner.

The former Forrest Richardson & Associates has been rebranded to Richardson | Danner Golf Course Architects, with offices in Phoenix and northern California.

Danner previously worked for Greg Norman Golf Design, Lohmann Golf Designs and Golfplan.

“Our personalities, skill sets and approach to things really complement each other, which provides a huge value to clients,” Danner said in a media release announcing the partnership. “We offer a combination of rich and diverse experience.

Golf course designer Forrest Richardson

“Certainly, Forrest has seen just about everything, but I’ve seen a lot, too, in my 16 years in the business, especially with different cultures, climates and site conditions around the world. It gives a client the best bang for the buck when you have two people on the design team who can bounce ideas off each other. It’s a win-win to have that type of collaborative environment.”

Richardson, the president of the American Society of Golf Course Architects through October and the author of five books on design, said he has no plans to step away from his firm after 32 years.

“It’s a goal we’ve had for several years, to bring the right person aboard,” Richardson said in the media release. “There’s strength in having two golf course architects coming together to build upon a shared passion that golf must be fun, inclusive and sustainable.

Golf course designer Jeffrey A. Danner

“It’s especially effective when one golf course architect is older and has ‘seen it all,’ and when the other is experienced, but younger, with a fresh perspective. Jeff fits the bill perfectly. He’s a young guy, but he has already done so much. We see great promise with Jeff and his abilities to create a bigger and better offering for our clients and the world of golf.”

Richardson said he hopes to continue the firm’s emphasis on building courses with an eye on environmental awareness, access and inclusion, the release said.

“I believe that golf needs to be more inclusive,” Danner said. “I’ve always been excited to be working on public-access courses, probably because I grew up around public golf. Sustainable golf is more than environmental stewardship. Without inclusivity and golfer participation, golf isn’t a viable business. It all goes hand in hand.”

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Jack Nicklaus to build his first golf course in Saudi Arabia at Qiddiya

The Nicklaus Design private course will be at Qiddiya, a new entertainment and residential development about 40 minutes from Riyadh.

Jack Nicklaus has signed on to build his first Signature course in Saudi Arabia, located about 40 minutes from the Saudi capital of Riyadh.

Nicklaus and his eponymous design company are creating the course, which will be framed by the Tuwaiq Mountain range, for a private club within a residential community in the Qiddiya development. Nicklaus said he has been involved in the planning and expects to break ground this year.

Nicklaus Design has built more than 425 courses in more than 45 countries, but this will be the first foray into the Middle East for the 18-time major champion.

“I am excited by this project and my first golf course design in the Middle East,” Nicklaus said in a media release announcing the project. “To be selected as one of the first international designers to work in the Kingdom is a great honor.

“I’ve already spent time looking at the topography of the land, images of the backdrop and terrain, and discussing with our design team a strategy for the course. The design will fully integrate the natural environment and the beautiful Qiddiya landscape, bringing together green spaces and mountainous terrain to form a picturesque canvas for both a beautiful and challenging golf course.”

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The media release said construction on the Qiddiya development began in 2019 and will feature a high-end resort hotel and spa plus homes. Qiddiya – called Saudi Arabia’s capital of entertainment, sports and the arts in the media release – hopes to attract international golf championships to the new course.

“By being involved in this project, we hope to promote the development and enjoyment of the game in the Kingdom,” Nicklaus said in the release. “We not only want to entice Saudi residents to take up the great game of golf, but we also hope this presents employment opportunities for citizens of the Kingdom that are within or related to the golf industry. This mirrors the vision of Qiddiya.”

Qiddiya also plans to build a second course at the development and is seeking designers for that layout.

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman announced the plans for the project in 2017, and Qiddiya Investment company was born. The media release states the company has a “dual economic and social purpose: to advance economic diversification and unlock new professional pathways while enriching lives of the youth in the Kingdom.”

“The underlying philosophy behind this entire development is to introduce a new, active lifestyle to the people of Saudi Arabia,” Qiddiya Investment Company CEO Philippe Gas said in the media statement. “This project has been carefully planned to ensure an unmatched resort experience for both golfers and regular guests. We expect the Jack Nicklaus Signature Golf Course and residential offering to provide the most entertaining challenge for golfers and the most appealing homesteads for residents seeking an extraordinary lifestyle.”

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Tiger Woods’ Playground par-3 course opens in the Bahamas

Tiger Woods built a par-3 Playground course at Jack’s Bay in the Bahamas and is slated to build a full 18-hole course.

Tiger Woods’ 10-hole Playground has opened at Jack’s Bay in Eleuthera, Bahamas, with the 10-hole par-3 course joining a growing trend of premium short courses at destinations around the world.

The Playground sits atop a bluff overlooking the Atlantic Ocean, and the holes range from 55 to 170 yards and can be played in multiple configurations. The Blue Bar snack shop sits off the fourth tee.

“It is great to be part of this spectacular project in paradise,” Woods said in a press release. “The natural terrain and coastline are incredibly beautiful and call for an equally spectacular golf experience. The golf course complements the true spirit of the Jack’s Bay development because it’s designed for golfers to have fun, foster friendships and create memories within an unforgettable setting.”

Tiger Woods designed the par-3 Playground course at Jack's Bay in the Bahamas. (Courtesy of Jack's Bay)
Tiger Woods designed the par-3 Playground course at Jack’s Bay in the Bahamas. (Courtesy of Jack’s Bay Company)

The private Jack’s Bay is a 964-acre property with 2 ½ miles of Atlantic Ocean frontage 10 minutes from Rock Sound International Airport. Woods’ TGR Design also is slated to build an 18-hole course at the property that will include approximately 500 residences, bluffs that reach 80 feet above the ocean and a pink sand beach. The Playground was the first major recreational amenity to open at the community.

“Bringing Tiger to this private membership community opportunity in the Bahamas is nothing short of remarkable,” Franklyn Wilson, chairman of Jack’s Bay Company, said in the release. “Uniting the rich Bahamian cultural heritage and Eleuthera’s unmatched beauty with the skill and attention to detail brought to the table by Tiger Woods and TGR Design, makes this an exceptional opportunity.”

The welcome sign for the par-3 Playground course at Jack’s Bay in the Bahamas. (Courtesy of Jack’s Bay Company)

Adding short courses is a growing trend for operators of premium golf destinations, with the 13-hole, par-3 Preserve at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort in Oregon and the nine-hole, par-3 Cradle at Pinehurst in North Carolina serving as prime examples.

Other recent openings include the Nest at Cabot in Nova Scotia and the Short Course at Forest Dunes in Michigan. Woods also is renovating the par-3 Peter Hay Golf Course at Pebble Beach Resorts in California.

The shorter courses can attract families and novices as well as serve as a fun break from larger, traditional courses for traveling groups of players looking to fill an evening with a few cocktails and laughs.

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Tiger Woods building new par-3 course at Pebble Beach

Tiger Woods and TGR Design to build short par-3 course at Pebble Beach Golf Resorts to replace Peter Hay Golf Course

Tiger Woods and his TGR Design firm on Thursday released plans to transform the Peter Hay Golf Course at Pebble Beach Resorts in California.

Woods and his team will build a nine-hole par-3 course with holes ranging in length from 47 to 106 yards. The total length will be 670 yards. They also will build a 20,000-square-foot putting green and plans include a new food and beverage venue with a large outdoor seating area.

The short course will be between the Pebble Beach Pro Shop and the Golf Academy, just a few hundred yards from the famed 18th green of Pebble Beach Golf Links.

The plans for Tiger Woods’ redesign of the Peter Hay Golf Course at Pebble Beach Resorts. Photo courtesy of Pebble Beach Company

Woods said his design philosophy for the short course will focus on playability, creativity and fun for any golfer, including families and those new to the game. The result will feature dramatic movement with the terrain, plus four holes playing directly toward Carmel Bay to capitalize on the long views of the water. Each hole will be distinct from the previous course.

“Everyone who plays this golf course is going to enjoy the playability of it,” Woods said in the press release. “Golfers will have the choice to play nearly any club off most tees and around the greens, which will make them think and channel their creativity. It will also play differently from day to day depending on the tee and hole locations and wind direction. It’s going to be a lot of fun. I can’t wait to play it.”

With one exception, the length of each hole will correspond with a significant year in Pebble Beach’s history, and plaques on tee boxes will tell those stories. The exception will be the second hole, a replica of the stellar, seaside par-3 seventh hole on Pebble Beach Golf Links.

“Pebble Beach is such an iconic golf destination, we want guests to feel the entirety of that spirit when they play this course,” Woods said in the press release. “We also know not everyone who comes to Pebble Beach will have a chance to play the U.S. Open course, so we wanted to create the opportunity for all visitors to experience one of its most famous holes.”

The course is scheduled to open in the spring of 2021.

“We are thrilled to elevate the quality of our short course to a level consistent with our other world-class golf courses,” Bill Perocchi, CEO of Pebble Beach Company, said in the release. “You can see the genius of Tiger Woods and TGR Design come to life when you walk the site, the way it all fits together. I expect all aspects of this new facility will be very popular for junior golf events, resort golfers, outings, resident hang-outs and everything in between.”

Woods and his firm have built several courses including Bluejack National in Texas, which ranks No. 47 on Golfweek’s Best list of modern courses in the United States, and El Cardonal at Diamante in Mexico, which ranks No. 25 on Golfweek’s Best list of courses in Mexico and the Caribbean. He also is building Payne’s Valley at Big Cedar Lodge in Missouri, 13 holes of which are currently open for preview play.

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Stuck in a tropical paradise: Course shaper Keith Rhebb sits tight in Saint Lucia

In normal times, most travelers would be chomping at the bit to visit Saint Lucia, the island nation that is part of the Windward Islands marking the border between the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. Mountains, beaches, not too crowded. … who …

In normal times, most travelers would be chomping at the bit to visit Saint Lucia, the island nation that is part of the Windward Islands marking the border between the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. Mountains, beaches, not too crowded. … who wouldn’t want to go? It’s a tropical paradise 1,500 miles southeast of Miami.

That would be in normal times, not since the coronavirus pandemic teed off on the world’s travel industry.

Keith Rhebb, a golf course shaper who frequently works for the design team of Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw, is currently stuck in paradise. He’s helping build a course at the new Cabot Saint Lucia, and with work shut down on the island to only essential tasks as the nation’s government tries to prevent any new cases of coronavirus, he’s biding his time until he can climb back onto his bulldozer and return to shaping the course.

“One guy on a dozer out in a field, I’m not sure what the risk would be, but we’re following the guidelines,” Rhebb said in a call via Facetime audio, one of his best ways of staying in touch with family and coworkers in the U.S.  “There’s no traffic coming in, there’s no traffic going out. The government has been really proactive on that, making sure everyone is trying to be safe here.

“I think they’re doing the right thing. We’re just kind of abiding by all the social distancing, washing hands, being mindful of not just going out and being out and about. We’re basically staying put, not going out and lining up in the street for KFC. Life is just continuing on here. There’s still food on the shelves. They are limiting the amount of people that can be in the store at one time. There wasn’t a run on toilet paper or anything like going on in the States, you know.”

Rhebb said local news reports have indicated three cases of coronavirus on the island: Two people from the United Kingdom were infected and later flown off the island, and one local resident was sick but has recovered. All travel to and from the island is effectively shut down until April 5.

The last flight out was this past Saturday, and he chose to stay on the island so he could return to work as soon as possible. After arriving in Saint Lucia on Feb. 24, he had planned to return to his home in Winter Park, Florida – his design credits include the Winter Park 9, a short course that ranks as the 27th best in Florida on Golfweek’s Best Courses You Can Play – on Thursday for a break.

“Basically, if I took that option to leave on Saturday, I knew I wouldn’t be able to know when I could come back and nothing would happen on the site,” he said. “Talking with my wife, she’s working from home and has everything she needs there. This is kind of what we’ve always known, a long-distance-type thing. She said, you’re probably safer there than traveling back to Florida and having to go through the airports in Florida. So we just made the decision for me to stay put.

“We’re working a plan to get things started. There’s plenty of work to do. That’s the reason I stayed here, because I wanted to be productive to keep things going.”

Rhebb is the only Coore-Crenshaw shaper left on the island, staying in an apartment in Rodney Bay in what he described as a popular shopping area. A handful of other contractors working on the course are there, too. He said there aren’t many Americans left on the island, where about 65 percent of the gross domestic product is reliant on tourism, according to the CIA World Factbook. With no cruises arriving and the airports closed, things are certainly quiet.

“I’m a creative person, and my outlet is kind of being creative and building stuff and wanting to be productive,” Rhebb said. “I know that’s kind of a first-world problem, so I don’t want to complain too much.”

Rhebb – whose work in the past year has included stints at Kapaulua’s Plantation Course in Hawaii and the new Sheep Ranch at Bandon Dunes in coastal Oregon – described the course, Cabot Point, as “spectacular.” The site has eight holes that directly contact the coastline, and the ocean is in view from all 18.

“The coastal holes are off the charts,” he said. “And personally, I’m really excited about these inland holes that aren’t right on the coastline. They have their own character and beauty. They might not be right on the ocean, but they’re just as spectacular.”

But for now, he’s staying away. He said that judging by what he sees outside his apartment, life appears to be continuing just fine on the island. He sees people lined up for fast-food takeout or visiting a nearby bank, but he and the other contractors are “just staying put for the most part.” He goes for jogs and has been taking photos, and despite many travelers’ fantasy of life in a beach bar, he’s staying away from beer.

“You find appreciation for the things you kind of took for granted earlier,” he said. “You take it day by day. Trying to make a plan for even four days out, you know it’s all going to change. You can just take time to put things in perspective and not waste energy on things that aren’t positive.”

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Kapalua’s Plantation Course ready for PGA Tour pros with restored and speedy surfaces

Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw finished a project at Kapalua, where thatch buildup had slowed the roll in the fairways.

The PGA Tour players in this week’s Sentry Tournament of Champions are in for a firm, fast and bouncy experience, the result of a nine-month renovation project to Kapalua’s Plantation Course that restored much of the original intent of designers Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw.

The debut course of that now-famous design duo opened in 1991, playing some 400 feet up the side of a mountain in Maui, Hawaii. The coastal course features wide fairways and dramatic slopes, with long views over Honolua and Mokuleia bays. The course has become a staple of the PGA Tour, blasting snow-bound golfers back on the mainland with views of sunshine, tropical breezes and the occasional breaching whale.

The Plantation Course played firm and fast for years, but the venerable track – rated No. 1 on Golfweek’s Best Courses You Can Play list for public-access layouts – had started to show its age. Thatch buildup had slowed the roll in the fairways, and regular maintenance and top-dressing of the greens had softened some contours and steepened others, leaving fewer reasonable locations for pin positions.

Coore and Crenshaw returned to start a project shortly after the 2019 Tournament of Champions to restore the firm conditions and recreate more hole locations on the greens. Working with management company Troon Golf, which operates the Kapalua courses, and with former golf professional and current Golf Channel personality Mark Rolfing, Coore and Crenshaw rebuilt the greens and bunkers, restored tees and re-grassed the entire property. The course reopened in November.

The second hole at Kapalua’s Plantation Course during restoration (Courtesy of Keith Rhebb)

The course routing is the same, but the fairways are now Celebration Bermuda grass and the greens are TifEagle Bermuda. The 93 bunkers also were rebuilt with a capillary concrete liner system to help handle heavy rains, with several bunkers being reduced in size while others were expanded, all with more natural shapes and edges.

Keith Rhebb, owner of Rhebb Golf Design and a frequent contractor who does course-shaping work for Coore and Crenshaw, spent about three months at Kapalua. Having worked on top-rated courses such as Cabot Cliffs in Nova Scotia, Streamsong Red in Florida and the soon-to-be-opened Sheep Ranch at Bandon Dunes in Oregon, Rhebb said the work at Kapalua was all intended to restore the original playing conditions, where wide fairways offered strategic options but also could play tighter because a golf ball might keep trundling along until it reached trouble.

“The biggest thing was, the ball wasn’t rolling in the fairways as much,” Rhebb said. “The length of the course, for (resort guests) coming to play, it was just getting way too difficult. It had more to do with the conditioning of the fairways – the thatch was slowing the ball down. With the new Bermuda grass, Celebration, it can get a better surface to it to get the firmness back in the fairways. They really de-thatched the fairways, got almost back to basically the dirt and sprigged right back into the fairways.”

Coore and Crenshaw’s assembled teams included Dave Axland, Jimbo Wright, Jeff Bradley and Riley Johns, as well as 15 to 20 contractors. The group faced tight deadlines to finish everything in time for this week’s Tournament of Champions, with frequent logistical and operational challenges tied to renovating a course on an island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.

“You could really feel that pressure because there’s a hard date,” Rhebb said. “All kinds of things could have happened, created big issues. They were shipping in the grass sprigs from another island that were, I think, in refrigerated shipping trailers. There could have been one delay in a shipment, and everything would have been off. It took a lot of logistics and planning to make sure everything came together. …

“Andrew Rebman (Kapalua’s director of agronomy) and his crew pulled it all off, got everything grown in and ready, and kudos to them. I can’t even imagine the amount of pressure for them, having construction going on and having to wait on us before they could get to work, knowing they’re going to host a tournament that’s going to be on TV in January. Andrew, with his skill set, he’s going to have that place dialed in.”

A Sand Pro used to finish greens during the restoration of Kapalua’s Plantation Course (Courtesy of Keith Rhebb)

Rhebb said several of the greens had developed slopes of as much as 4 or 5 degrees in areas, rendering them unpinnable as the surfaces approached Tour speeds because balls wouldn’t stop rolling. Those slopes were the result of nearly 30 years of top-dressing with sand and other common maintenance procedures that buried some contours and steepened others. The green contours also no longer properly flowed into the contours outside the greens.

The crew utilized laser scanning and 3D computer modeling before starting work, then recreated slopes of around 3 degrees that extended playable green surfaces and opened up new hole locations.

“When we cored out those greens, it was almost like the rings of a tree. You could see the years of buildup,” Rhebb said. “What should be about 18 inches at most of the green surface mix, there was in spots two feet or more of mix in the greens. With almost 30 years of top-dressing, it was just time to come back and renovate these greens.”