One resort dominates the rankings of best public-access golf courses in Oregon.
Bandon Dunes Golf Resort dominates the top of the Golfweek’s Best public-access course rankings in Oregon, with layouts designed by Tom Doak (Pacific Dunes, Old Macdonald), Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw (Bandon Trails, Sheep Ranch) and David McLay Kidd (Bandon Dunes). No other destination in the United States offers so many highly ranked layouts as Bandon Dunes.
Golfweek’s Best offers many lists of course rankings, with that of top public-access courses in each state among the most popular. All the courses on this list allow public access in some fashion, be it standard daily green fees, through a resort or by staying at an affiliated hotel. If there’s a will, there’s a tee time.
(m): Modern course, built in or after 1960 (c): Classic course, built before 1960
Note: If there is a number in the parenthesis with the m or c, that indicates where that course ranks among Golfweek’s Best top 200 modern or classic courses.
Mike Keiser, owner of Bandon Dunes Golf Resort, has long been on a mission to introduce American amateur golfers to links golf. Given that goal – and the overwhelming success of his iconic resort on the Oregon coast – it’s a bit surprising that Keiser felt, well, surprise when Bandon Dunes first appeared on the USGA championship schedule as host site of the 2006 Curtis Cup and players raved about the experience. Keiser looked at that week as a trial. Would players want to make the trek? Would they like the venue?
“The contestants wanting to come is quite a pleasant surprise for (recently retired USGA CEO) Mike Davis, the USGA and us,” he said. “We didn’t know that early on.”
Fifteen years later, Bandon Dunes’ dedication to amateur golf aligns even closer with the USGA’s. Golf’s governing body announced Tuesday it will bring 13 of its amateur championships to the iconic resort over the next 24 years. That starts with the U.S. Junior in 2022 and runs through 2045, when Bandon Dunes will again host the U.S. Junior plus the U.S. Girls’ Junior.
The full list looks like this:
2022: U.S. Junior Amateur
2025: U.S. Women’s Amateur
2029: Walker Cup
2032: U.S. Amateur and U.S. Women’s Amateur
2035: U.S. Girls’ Junior
2037: U.S. Amateur Four-Ball and U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball
2038: Curtis Cup
2041: U.S. Amateur and U.S. Women’s Amateur
2045: U.S. Junior Amateur and U.S. Girls’ Junior
Bandon Dunes at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort in Oregon (Courtesy of Evan Schiller)
Since the 2006 Curtis Cup, Bandon Dunes – home to five of the top 10 resort courses in the U.S. – has hosted six other USGA championships, including the 2020 U.S. Amateur. John Bodenhamer, the USGA’s senior managing director of championships, goes back to Keiser’s often-expressed support of USGA amateur championships and his comment that he’d host one every year.
Eventually, Bodenhamer decided to explore that sentiment a little further.
“We came together on a list of championships that were important to him and to us – all of our championships are important but there are some reasons we chose the current rota that we have and it just all came together,” Bodenhamer said.
To announce a single site as host of such a large chunk of championships – and extend that schedule so far into the future – is an unprecedented move by the USGA. The organization did something similar in 2020 by announcing Pinehurst as a U.S. Open anchor site (with championships scheduled for 2029, 2035, 2041 and 2047) and home to a second, smaller USGA headquarters.
The USGA’s big-picture thinking with Bandon Dunes encompassed several elements, not the least of which is player experience. Bodenhamer echoed a thought that has crossed many USGA champions’ lips through the years: It matters where you win your USGA title.
It’s also not a coincidence that Bandon’s long list of championships starts with the U.S. Junior in 2022. It’s the start of a player’s journey through the USGA.
“Jordan Spieth won two Juniors and the next Jordan Spieth, to be able to say that he or she won at Bandon Dunes will be pretty special,” Bodenhamer said. “We think that elevates our relationship with the players.”
Keiser is particularly excited at the prospect of introducing junior players to links golf.
“I think it’s a great opportunity,” he said, calling Bandon an educational tool in this sense.
A venue with all the magic (not to mention the name recognition) of Bandon Dunes and its seaside green complexes, golden gorse and expansive views has the power to elevate a championship that doesn’t end with the word “open.”
After Bandon Dunes appeared on Golf Channel in primetime as host of the 2020 U.S. Amateur, Keiser said resort phones rang off the hook for a month. Keiser hopes to see the junior events as well as future U.S. Amateur and U.S. Women’s Amateur broadcasts treated the same.
Aman Gupta plays his tee shot at the 16th hole during the semifinal round at the 2020 U.S. Amateur at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort in Bandon, Ore. on Saturday, Aug. 15, 2020. (Steven Gibbons/USGA)
Bodenhamer confirmed it’s too early to know what kind of network coverage future championships might receive (on NBC, say, versus Golf Channel in an NBC television contract that runs through 2026). In any event, viewers who remember watching the U.S. Amateur unfold last summer are likely to tune in to see juniors against that same backdrop.
“It will be nice to know that they will be televised with the ocean and the dunes and the links golf story as part of it,” Keiser said.
The upcoming Bandon championship schedule brings the U.S. Amateur back twice and the U.S. Women’s Amateur to the resort three times. Both will be played there in 2032 and 2041. Yet to be determined is whether those championships will run concurrently (as the now-retired U.S. Amateur Public Links and U.S. Women’s Amateur Public Links did in 2011), or back-to-back, as the USGA treated the U.S. Open and U.S. Women’s Open at Pinehurst in 2014. Either way, both demographics are elevated.
“We think that’s a very positive message for the game, men and women being together, boys and girls being together – juniors,” Bodenhamer said. “We’ve done that before and we think this can carry that forward too.”
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For many USGA championship venues, hosting an amateur championship starts a relationship that may eventually lead to a U.S. Open or a U.S. Women’s Open. Chambers Bay hosted the U.S. Amateur in 2010 before the U.S. Open arrived in 2015, and Erin Hills hosted two amateur championships before debuting as an Open venue in 2017.
Bandon Dunes’ remote location presents an entirely unique set of obstacles for the USGA’s largest events, not to mention the fact that Keiser’s priority remains amateur golf.
“I would never say never but I think for the next 25 years, we’re going to be focused on amateur golf,” Bodenhamer said. “The next set of decision makers will talk about Opens.”
For his part, Keiser, 76, doesn’t think it will happen in his lifetime.
Last summer, Bandon Dunes, the resort’s original 18-hole course, shone on a U.S. Amateur broadcast that came at the end of a summer light on televised golf. Bodenhamer expects to see several, if not all, of the other four courses – Pacific Dunes, Old Macdonald, Bandon Trails and Sheep Ranch – used in future championships depending on the demographic of the event. In all, the resorts’ courses are ranked Nos. 1-5 as the best public-access layouts in Oregon, and each of them is in the top 15 on Golfweek’s Best ranking of modern courses built since 1960 in the U.S.
Asked his opinion on which course sets up best for match play, Keiser went right to Bandon Dunes’ closing stretch on the ocean.
“We have to give David Kidd credit for the 16th hole, the drivable par 4, with 15 being a very tough par 3, usually into the wind, being the warm-up,” he said. “You play this really long par 3 and then you have a short par 4 – those two right there, because that’s where most match-play competitions are concluded on the 15th, 16th before they get to the 18th. David Kidd, it’s as if he knew that he would be hosting the U.S. Amateur etc., when he designed the 16th hole.”
But Keiser is confident the Sheep Ranch, the newest course opened in 2020 and one that features nine greens on the ocean, will figure prominently for future championships.
“Have to say it’s a tie which is more photogenic, Sheep Ranch or Bandon Dunes,” Keiser said. “Let’s call it a tie.”
He could also easily call it a can’t-lose.
Sheep Ranch at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort in Oregon (Courtesy of Bandon Dunes)
Mike Keiser, owner of Bandon Dunes Golf Resort, has long been on a mission to introduce American amateur golfers to links golf. Given that goal – and the overwhelming success of his iconic resort on the Oregon coast – it’s a bit surprising that Keiser felt, well, surprise when Bandon Dunes first appeared on the USGA championship schedule as host site of the 2006 Curtis Cup and players raved about the experience. Keiser looked at that week as a trial. Would players want to make the trek? Would they like the venue?
“The contestants wanting to come is quite a pleasant surprise for (recently retired USGA CEO) Mike Davis, the USGA and us,” he said. “We didn’t know that early on.”
Fifteen years later, Bandon Dunes’ dedication to amateur golf aligns even closer with the USGA’s. Golf’s governing body announced Tuesday it will bring 13 of its amateur championships to the iconic resort over the next 24 years. That starts with the U.S. Junior in 2022 and runs through 2045, when Bandon Dunes will again host the U.S. Junior plus the U.S. Girls’ Junior.
The full list looks like this:
2022: U.S. Junior Amateur
2025: U.S. Women’s Amateur
2029: Walker Cup
2032: U.S. Amateur and U.S. Women’s Amateur
2035: U.S. Girls’ Junior
2037: U.S. Amateur Four-Ball and U.S. Women’s Amateur Four-Ball
2038: Curtis Cup
2041: U.S. Amateur and U.S. Women’s Amateur
2045: U.S. Junior Amateur and U.S. Girls’ Junior
Bandon Dunes at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort in Oregon (Courtesy of Evan Schiller)
Since the 2006 Curtis Cup, Bandon Dunes – home to five of the top 10 resort courses in the U.S. – has hosted six other USGA championships, including the 2020 U.S. Amateur. John Bodenhamer, the USGA’s senior managing director of championships, goes back to Keiser’s often-expressed support of USGA amateur championships and his comment that he’d host one every year.
Eventually, Bodenhamer decided to explore that sentiment a little further.
“We came together on a list of championships that were important to him and to us – all of our championships are important but there are some reasons we chose the current rota that we have and it just all came together,” Bodenhamer said.
To announce a single site as host of such a large chunk of championships – and extend that schedule so far into the future – is an unprecedented move by the USGA. The organization did something similar in 2020 by announcing Pinehurst as a U.S. Open anchor site (with championships scheduled for 2029, 2035, 2041 and 2047) and home to a second, smaller USGA headquarters.
The USGA’s big-picture thinking with Bandon Dunes encompassed several elements, not the least of which is player experience. Bodenhamer echoed a thought that has crossed many USGA champions’ lips through the years: It matters where you win your USGA title.
It’s also not a coincidence that Bandon’s long list of championships starts with the U.S. Junior in 2022. It’s the start of a player’s journey through the USGA.
“Jordan Spieth won two Juniors and the next Jordan Spieth, to be able to say that he or she won at Bandon Dunes will be pretty special,” Bodenhamer said. “We think that elevates our relationship with the players.”
Keiser is particularly excited at the prospect of introducing junior players to links golf.
“I think it’s a great opportunity,” he said, calling Bandon an educational tool in this sense.
A venue with all the magic (not to mention the name recognition) of Bandon Dunes and its seaside green complexes, golden gorse and expansive views has the power to elevate a championship that doesn’t end with the word “open.”
After Bandon Dunes appeared on Golf Channel in primetime as host of the 2020 U.S. Amateur, Keiser said resort phones rang off the hook for a month. Keiser hopes to see the junior events as well as future U.S. Amateur and U.S. Women’s Amateur broadcasts treated the same.
Aman Gupta plays his tee shot at the 16th hole during the semifinal round at the 2020 U.S. Amateur at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort in Bandon, Ore. on Saturday, Aug. 15, 2020. (Steven Gibbons/USGA)
Bodenhamer confirmed it’s too early to know what kind of network coverage future championships might receive (on NBC, say, versus Golf Channel in an NBC television contract that runs through 2026). In any event, viewers who remember watching the U.S. Amateur unfold last summer are likely to tune in to see juniors against that same backdrop.
“It will be nice to know that they will be televised with the ocean and the dunes and the links golf story as part of it,” Keiser said.
The upcoming Bandon championship schedule brings the U.S. Amateur back twice and the U.S. Women’s Amateur to the resort three times. Both will be played there in 2032 and 2041. Yet to be determined is whether those championships will run concurrently (as the now-retired U.S. Amateur Public Links and U.S. Women’s Amateur Public Links did in 2011), or back-to-back, as the USGA treated the U.S. Open and U.S. Women’s Open at Pinehurst in 2014. Either way, both demographics are elevated.
“We think that’s a very positive message for the game, men and women being together, boys and girls being together – juniors,” Bodenhamer said. “We’ve done that before and we think this can carry that forward too.”
[vertical-gallery id=778060405]
For many USGA championship venues, hosting an amateur championship starts a relationship that may eventually lead to a U.S. Open or a U.S. Women’s Open. Chambers Bay hosted the U.S. Amateur in 2010 before the U.S. Open arrived in 2015, and Erin Hills hosted two amateur championships before debuting as an Open venue in 2017.
Bandon Dunes’ remote location presents an entirely unique set of obstacles for the USGA’s largest events, not to mention the fact that Keiser’s priority remains amateur golf.
“I would never say never but I think for the next 25 years, we’re going to be focused on amateur golf,” Bodenhamer said. “The next set of decision makers will talk about Opens.”
For his part, Keiser, 76, doesn’t think it will happen in his lifetime.
Last summer, Bandon Dunes, the resort’s original 18-hole course, shone on a U.S. Amateur broadcast that came at the end of a summer light on televised golf. Bodenhamer expects to see several, if not all, of the other four courses – Pacific Dunes, Old Macdonald, Bandon Trails and Sheep Ranch – used in future championships depending on the demographic of the event. In all, the resorts’ courses are ranked Nos. 1-5 as the best public-access layouts in Oregon, and each of them is in the top 15 on Golfweek’s Best ranking of modern courses built since 1960 in the U.S.
Asked his opinion on which course sets up best for match play, Keiser went right to Bandon Dunes’ closing stretch on the ocean.
“We have to give David Kidd credit for the 16th hole, the drivable par 4, with 15 being a very tough par 3, usually into the wind, being the warm-up,” he said. “You play this really long par 3 and then you have a short par 4 – those two right there, because that’s where most match-play competitions are concluded on the 15th, 16th before they get to the 18th. David Kidd, it’s as if he knew that he would be hosting the U.S. Amateur etc., when he designed the 16th hole.”
But Keiser is confident the Sheep Ranch, the newest course opened in 2020 and one that features nine greens on the ocean, will figure prominently for future championships.
“Have to say it’s a tie which is more photogenic, Sheep Ranch or Bandon Dunes,” Keiser said. “Let’s call it a tie.”
He could also easily call it a can’t-lose.
Sheep Ranch at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort in Oregon (Courtesy of Bandon Dunes)
The first albatross in the history of Sheep Ranch at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort has an interesting backstory. Even the pant selection.
The breeze was firm on Wednesday, Willi Sheller remembers. Probably coming in at about a 20 mile-per-hour clip. He had pull-hooked his drive halfway onto an adjacent fairway, one of his first poor tee shots of the afternoon.
Still, with just over 200 yards between him and the 18th green on the sparkling new Sheep Ranch at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort, Sheller couldn’t help but soak in the moment. The Olympia, Washington, native was wrapping up his fifth round on the complex, and stood a solid 3-wood away from a crack at eagle. Whether it came to pass or not, Sheller realized he was almost done with his yearly visit to one of his favorite places on the planet.
And why be upset about one errant tee shot? Sheller and his buddies had stalled and maneuvered through rough weather, even witnessing a rare Bandon lightning strike — “the chances of me getting struck by lightning are probably better than getting an albatross,” he later joked — and now he was about to hit his final approach of the trip.
The ball was below his feet, but he had a clear line to the green. He lined up the shot and let it rip.
Left to right, Jeremy Byrd, Matthew Perry (his wife lent Sheller the pants), Willi Sheller, Ben Dymecki. (Picture by caddie Jason Warble.)
“I gave it swing and caught it so pure,” he said. “Watching that ball fly was glorious.”
It bounced on the green and Sheller heard it hit the stick, as did one of his buddies.
“Did that … ?” his friend said.
“I think so …” Sheller responded.
Since the final hole at Sheep Ranch, a Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw design, has an elevated green, Sheller had to wait until the foursome got up to the putting surface. When they did, he realized the group was one ball shy.
“Lo and behold, it was in,” he said.
Congrats to Willi Sheller from McMinnville, OR on sinking a double eagle on #SheepRanch No. 18 today, a course first! 211 yards out, 2nd shot with a 3-wood into the wind! #GuestPicpic.twitter.com/zsWfkk5rXV
After dancing, jumping and rejoicing, the group got a little bonus tidbit from caddie Jason Warble, who informed them Sheller had just dropped the first albatross in the history of the new course.
“It’s brilliant,” he told Golfweek on Friday, after returning to his home outside Portland, Oregon, where he recently accepted a job at a winery as a cellar master. “I feel like I was so humbled by the course, but I got one of the best rewards you could get. I feel really honored.”
Sheller said he started with the game when his grandmother introduced him at age 5. He played in high school and remembers winning an award for something novel — “I think it was for being the guy most likely to drive it 300 yards and still not make par.” He didn’t play often through college, but has renewed his passion for the game in recent years, playing as many as 100 rounds a year. He plays to an 8.7 handicap and his home course is Michelbook Country Club in McMinnville, just outside Portland.
The scorecard of Willi Sheller, who had the first albatross in the history of Sheep Ranch.
And what about the pants, the ones that have been all the rage on golf Twitter? He borrowed them from a buddy’s wife after days of traipsing around Bandon Dunes in the cold. They’re women’s ski pants, and Sheller feels no shame, even though his photo has brought numerous hilarious responses, dubbing him “Oregon Man” and other nicknames, all while harassing his choice of clothing.
“Hey, whatever,” he said. “I was the toastiest one in the group.”
Watch this golfer make an ace at No. 16 at Bandon Dunes’ Sheep Ranch course.
This week Bandon Dunes Golf Resort on Oregon’s coastline is playing host to the best men’s amateur golfers in the world for the 120th U.S. Amateur.
While all eyes will be on Saturday’s semifinal matches at Bandon Dunes with Tyler Strafaci taking on Aman Gupta and Matthew Sharpstene squaring off against Charles Osborne, there’s more amazing golf being played on the property.
Over at Bandon’s newest feature, the Sheep Ranch course that opened on June 1, Allison Koehnke made an incredible ace on the 16th hole with her putter. There’s no other way to tease it, and frankly no need to. Check it out.
Amazing golf isn't just being played on #BandonDunes in the #USAmateur this week, it's also being played on #SheepRanch. Check out this ace by @the4koehnkes (IG) on No. 16 with her putter! The boys on Bandon may want to take notes on playing the ground game more often. 😉 @USGApic.twitter.com/hvaAuqzn72
Two par-3 holes at the Sheep Ranch share a massive green on 100-foot cliffs above the Pacific Ocean, one of the most dramatic sites in golf
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(Editor’s note: June 1 is the opening of Sheep Ranch, one of the most highly anticipated course openings of the last decade. Golfweek will have additional coverage all day long, including hourly photos on Instagram, and an Instagram Live with Golfweek Travel Editor Jason Lusk. Follow us on Instagram here.)
BANDON, Ore. – There are plenty of cliffside holes to love at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort’s new Sheep Ranch, which opens June 1 and features nine greens on the 100-foot cliffs above the beach and Pacific Ocean below.
But the focal point clearly is the giant, undulating, made-for-selfies double green perched atop Fivemile Point.
One piece of advice: If you’re afraid of heights, don’t look down. Plenty of photos and drone videos show the steepness of that edge of North America, but it feels even more dramatic when you take a break from reading putts to sneak a peek westward.
Jutting toward giant rocks breaking free beyond the water’s edge, the double green built by Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw is the target for Nos. 3 and 16. Both are par 3s, with No. 3 playing a mere 120 yards off the back and the 16th playing 151.
Simple, right? Short little par 3s, flip in a wedge or short iron, maybe make a putt and walk off with a smile? Not so fast. The wind that sometimes howls across Fivemile Point has to be felt to believed – it’s not an exaggeration that some players might discuss a four-club wind with their caddies. Balls that climb high into that breeze could land anywhere. Great fun.
No. 16 plays northward along the cliff to the massive double green atop Fivemile Point at Bandon Dunes’ Sheep Ranch. (Courtesy of Bandon Dunes Golf Resort)
The green is massive, with separate tall dunes blocking the right-side entrances to both holes. No. 3 plays almost directly west from the interior of the course, while No. 16 stretches along the cliff from a tee box set south of the green. The highest portion of the green serves as the front for No. 3 and is not really in play for No. 16. From that high point it’s down, around, over lumps and swales to the lowest portion of the green just a step from the cliff’s edge.
If the surface of the double green has any likeness at the entire resort that features four other highly ranked courses, it might be the Punch Bowl putting green, which isn’t even part of an 18-hole course. The Punch Bowl invites players to sip cocktails and compete against each other on a ridiculously large practice green that falls away from the first tee of the Pacific Dunes course. Likewise, players happily could spend hours tumbling balls across the double green atop Fivemile Point, if only there weren’t another tee box waiting.
Speaking of that next tee: The rear corner of the double green even serves as the par-4 17th’s back tee box, from which strong players can send a ball over the cliffs edge, across the yellow gorse and toward the ancient stumps of trees and fairway beyond.
For years the site was the focal point of the site’s previous 13-hole course, also called Sheep Ranch, that was built by Tom Doak and Jim Urbina. But that routing didn’t host much play, and Fivemile point was mostly a distant dream for players looking north from the No. 7 snack shack on the resort’s Old Macdonald course.
The double green for Nos. 3 and 16 at Bandon Dunes’ Sheep Ranch sits atop 100-foot cliffs above the Pacific Ocean. (courtesy of Bandon Dunes Golf Resort)
Now it’s the new reality, and it will be among the most-talked-about acreage at the resort. Think No. 7 at Pebble Beach or No. 16 at Cabot Cliffs for North American cliffside comparisons – the site is that dramatic, with perhaps only No. 16 at Cypress Point surpassing it for heroics.
“Five Mile Point is a focal point for the whole property, no question about that,” Coore said. “It was that way with the original Sheep Ranch, and it’s the thing people talk about the most. It was the face of the Sheep Ranch property, I guess. It wouldn’t be an overstatement to say it’s the cornerstone. You certainly won’t forget it.”
Bandon Dunes’ new Sheep Ranch golf course by Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw features amazing terrain that dictates strategy
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(Editor’s note: June 1 is the opening of Sheep Ranch, one of the most highly anticipated course openings of the last decade. Golfweek will have additional coverage all day long, including hourly photos on Instagram, and an Instagram Live with Golfweek Travel Editor Jason Lusk. Follow us on Instagram here.)
BANDON, Ore. – The cliffside holes at the new Sheep Ranch – at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort as a whole, really – tend to steal the spotlight. They are stunning, perched 100 feet above the Pacific Ocean on nearly vertical rock walls.
But don’t think the new inland holes fashioned by Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw are any less intriguing. With rolling terrain and wind-sculpted contours that constantly ebb and flow like the waves of the adjacent Pacific Ocean, the inland holes at the Sheep Ranch are stars on their own.
Take Nos. 8 and 11 as examples.
The eighth hole on the new course, which opens June 1, is a dogleg-right par 4 that plays 429 yards off the back tees. There are no trees or sand traps – the entire Sheep Ranch has no traditional bunkers – to protect the dogleg. Instead, it’s native grasses, rolling contours and wind that dictate how best to play the hole.
A large ridge runs down the wide fairway as it curves rightward toward the green. Place your tee shot atop the ridge, and you will be rewarded with a view of the green and a clear approach shot. But if you try to take the shorter route to the right side, you likely will find your ball in a fairway swale with no view of the green and a much tougher approach.
Much of that depends on the wind. On a south wind the hole will play shorter, allowing long hitters to bang their tee shots close enough to the green that an open sightline won’t much matter. But into a north wind, the placement of the tee shot is crucial.
“The goal is to get up on that ridge,” Coore said. “It’s an interesting hole. We hope that people will look at it and try to figure out what they need to do. … The terrain makes all the difference.”
No. 11 is no less interesting. The 529-yard par 5 climbs the tallest hill on the property towards the green, with a scattering of pine trees down the left. An indifferent second shot – either a layup or an attempt to get home in two on a south wind – can sail into a hazard or bluff on the right side, or down a steep embankment to the left from where a player faces a blind wedge shot straight up to the green.
And the approach to that green is the most secluded spot on an otherwise exposed course. If any of the Sheep Ranch’s holes remind a player of the other four highly ranked courses at the resort, No. 11 is it.
The second green at Bandon Dunes’ new Sheep Ranch is perched above the fairway, forcing players to choose from where to best approach the putting surface. (Courtesy of Bandon Dunes Golf Resort)
Nos. 8 and 11 are just two examples of using the contours to shape challenges without bunkers or trees impeding the line of play. The par-4 14th has a dramatic swale along the left side of the fairway, forcing a blind approach shot over a hilltop. The short par-4 second dares players to swing for the fences to get nearer the green with the help of a north wind, but a long tee shot into the left side of the fairway leaves a player with a delicate uphill, downwind pitch that is difficult to control.
It’s all about placement and strategy. And it’s all dictated by the terrain.
“When you get out there walking, you realize, man these contours are just beautiful,” Coore said. “We tried to let those contours and the coastline dictate the type of course. It’s hard to describe in words, but if you’ve seen it, you know.”
Sheep Ranch opens at Bandon Dunes with clever routing, extreme contours and nine greens perched on cliffs above the Pacific Ocean
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BANDON, Ore. – We could see forever on the downhill stroll to the first green at the new Sheep Ranch at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort. The view from that northernmost point of the resort was all Pacific Ocean to the west, while the panorama to the south appeared as exposed land that somehow has taken on the shape of ocean waves, rising and falling at the whims of the wind. Flagsticks dotted the exuberant landscape, dancing in the seaside breezes.
Built upon a mile of jagged coastline, the tract initially looks huge. The ninth green sits at the far southern end, nearly reaching the bluffs at Old Macdonald and the rest of the famed golf resort. On an early preview round before the course’s official June 1 opening, it was a thrill to know we would play from here to there, then back again – we could see almost all the challenges waiting ahead. With few trees to block the sightlines, it looks like one giant playground.
But looks certainly can be deceiving.
The design team led by Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw had to dig deep into its bag of tricks to make this highly anticipated course work on a deceptively small piece of land that is roughly 600 yards across at its widest. With only about 140 acres for the course before the land climbs into trees to the east, Coore and Crenshaw fashioned a genius routing that plays as wide open as the views.
The grand opening of the Sheep Ranch will reveal several differences to the resort’s other courses – all of which rank highly in the Golfweek’s Best ratings of greatest modern golf courses in the United States. Pacific Dunes is ranked No. 2, Old Macdonald is No. 5, Bandon Dunes is No. 8 and Bandon Trails is No. 14.
Greens stretch along the cliffs at the Sheep Ranch at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort (David Davis/Statesman Journal)
The most immediately noticed difference is that the Sheep Ranch’s cliffs are not as linear, with promontories jutting 100 feet above the beach that afforded somewhat surreal opportunities to build several greens and tees almost entirely surrounded by open sky. And second is the ground itself, with little natural foliage to hide the sweeping internal contours.
“For the most part we did what we always try to do,” Coore said. “If you find a site that has a lot of inherent qualities, natural qualities for golf, you just let that guide the process. Certainly at the Sheep Ranch, the site was inherently different than any of the courses there. It definitely had different contours than most of the other courses. It wasn’t sand, wasn’t dunes. It just had such interesting natural contours for golf, amazingly interesting contours. We tried to let those contours and the coastline dictate the type of course.”
A few things to know going in: The Sheep Ranch is a compact course that is much more exposed to sometimes extreme wind than the other tracks at Bandon Dunes. The views are ridiculous. It has nine greens on those incredible, 100-foot Pacific cliffs. The fairways are wide, but that fact alone doesn’t necessarily make it easy to hit them when the wind is howling. For the first time at the resort, players can intentionally hit balls over the cliffs to targets perched on those dramatic promontories instead of just alongside the cliffs.
And there are no traditional sand bunkers. Not one. More on that later.
There are nine greens on the coast at the Sheep Ranch at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort. (Gabe Gudgel/Golfweek)
As for the question I get most after my preview round: No, I won’t call it my favorite of the now five 18-hole courses at the resort, simply because it’s impossible for me to choose. Golfers will gather in McKee’s Pub and around the fire pit to figure out that argument, and they’re all right no matter which course they choose. My favorite at Bandon is always the next one on my schedule.
“I think it was Willie Nelson who said, you just do the best you can – in his case music – and then you throw it out there for everyone to judge,” Coore said. “Somebody will tell you if it’s any good or not. The Sheep Ranch is a little like that in the sense it’s quite different than the other courses at Bandon. We think it’s good, and we’re very pleased with what happened there. How it will be perceived is up to others to determine.”
The fact that the Sheep Ranch is even part of the discussion as the best course at Bandon Dunes involves some sleight of hand that has holes zigging and zagging across the landscape with so many greens perched above the ocean. It’s that intimacy with the cliffs that turn this course into one continuous photo op. That was the goal from the outset for Sheep Ranch co-owners Mike Keiser and Phil Friedmann.
“Mike and Phil are very good natured, but they had a very pointed directive: Try to use every single foot of that coastline. Every foot. And I can’t say it enough, I mean every foot,” Coore said with a laugh. “We all like to have fun with that kind of stuff in conversations, but it’s hard to do. We could have said we’re just going to run some holes along the ocean and along the cliffs, but if you do that, you get very few holes on the ocean.”
The highlight of the cliffside holes – and the focal point for the entire course – is the giant double green for Nos. 3 and 16. Jutting into the ocean atop Fivemile Point, suspended above dark rocks that rise from the water, it was obvious from the outset that this spot was special. It surely will take its place among the best spots for a golf selfie on the planet – the caddies will be busy here, handing off putters in exchange for smartphones for the obligatory shot.
No. 16 green at the Sheep Ranch at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort (Gabe Gudgel/Golfweek)
But much of what makes the Sheep Ranch work was not so obvious. Routing is a common term in golf, frequently used to casually describe a course as a whole. But to a course designer, it’s the nuanced art of fashioning 18 holes into a cohesive experience. And at the Sheep Ranch, the routing is everything.
The new course replaces a 13-hole track on the site that was built by Tom Doak and Jim Urbina and which also was named Sheep Ranch. It was owned independently by Friedmann, who along with Keiser was a co-founder of Recycled Paper Greetings, Inc., in 1971. That version of the Sheep Ranch wasn’t open to standard resort play and didn’t always follow a traditional routing, as the handful of players who experienced it could choose their tees and greens in a golf version of the basketball game Horse.
So how did Coore and Crenshaw approach the task of making 18 holes fit onto the piece of land that previously held just 13?
“The big thing, because of the small size of the property and the effects of the wind out there, we did have some concerns that if we built a bunch of holes that paralleled each other, balls could go anywhere,” Coore said. “Once balls get airborne on that kind of wind, they could go laterally a long way – they can go anywhere. We tried to figure out, the most interesting ground is here along the cliffs and, say, 400 yards inland – how do we best utilize that? But we can’t just line the holes up in a paralleling fashion because we were worried about where some of these tee shots would go on that wind.”
Turns out, the secret is in the clever and shared arrangement of the tee boxes.
No. 7 at the Sheep Ranch at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort (Courtesy of Bandon Dunes)
If a course is built with parallel holes, each tee box consumes a sizeable chunk of land. Then there is all that ground stretching from tee to fairway. Factor in the space to keep the holes far enough apart so that each has its own identity – and so that players are less likely to send tee shots screaming on a crazy wind into other groups – and a designer will have used a lot of land that isn’t even really in play.
Instead, Coore and Crenshaw created several tee boxes that serve as hubs from which multiple fairways radiate outward and away from each other. Consider the spokes on a bicycle wheel: The spokes grow farther apart as they stretch outward from the hub.
Same thing with several of the Sheep Ranch tee boxes and fairways, with key examples being Nos. 2 and 18, Nos. 5 and 15 and Nos. 8 and 10. Placing the tees close together allows the fairways to extend farther apart while consuming less land.
(Routing graphic courtesy of Bandon Dunes Golf Resort; Map by Google Earth)
“Ben and I both agree, if we did anything that was maybe a bit unusual but was actually key to unlocking the routing there, it was combining those tee complexes,” Coore said. “By pulling tee complexes very close together where they almost become common teeing grounds for two different holes, it allowed us to really make it compact in the teeing areas. Then as the holes go away from the tees to the landing areas, they can get wider and wider. That was one of the absolute keys to the routing of the golf course.”
It also creates what can be a fun, communal vibe on the tee shots. Whereas most top courses revel in a sense of isolation, with one group rarely coming in contact with another, players will frequently come face-to-face with others at the Sheep Ranch.
“You’ll see a lot of other folks hitting golf shots, and they’ll be seeing you hitting golf shots too,” Coore said with a laugh. “If it were at a municipal golf course some place, it would be harder to pull this off because you would have to be so aware of which tees you are going to and which way you’re playing. It would be easy to get up there and play down the wrong hole. While we tried to delineate the lines of play very distinctly, it helps that Bandon Dunes has caddies and the vast majority of players choose to use them.”
One thing those caddies won’t need is a rake.
Instead of traditional sand traps, the Sheep Ranch features a wide range of shallow areas dug out like bunkers, but with variations of grass instead of sand. Some are partially mowed, while others have taller and wispier grass. Coore described them as looking like old, abandoned bunkers that have grown over with grass.
One of the main reasons for skipping the sand was the strong winds so prevalent at the Sheep Ranch. Wind over 30 mph – common at all the cliffside holes at the resort and even more so at the Sheep Ranch – can blow sand out of a bunker, making the traps a maintenance headache. And because the Sheep Ranch isn’t built on sandy terrain like the resort’s other courses, instead being laid out over what Coore called “red shot clay,” having sand blow out of the traps would leave hard-pan clay bottoms exposed.
No. 17 at the Sheep Ranch at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort (Courtesy of Bandon Dunes)
For inspiration on how to handle that problem, Coore and Crenshaw looked to a classic golf architecture book, The Links by Robert Hunter that was first published in 1926.
“There’s an old black and white photograph of contours that are just so incredible, and there’s a caption that says one day there will be a site with contours so interesting for golf that bunkers will be unnecessary,” Coore said. “And we thought if we were ever going to build a golf course with no formal bunkers, this is probably the place. Given the weather conditions, given the soil type and given the amazing contours, this is the site. So that was the beginning of the idea.”
Coore said that Keiser, the original developer of Bandon Dunes who has built a network of top courses around North America, got on board quickly. Friedmann, however, needed a little convincing to leave out what is typically one of the most recognizable features of a great course.
“Phil, I guess, was a bit more hesitant, and for good reason,” Coore said. “His comment was that we could build some of the most spectacular bunkers on earth here, and he was absolutely right. We could, and I could see how there would be bunkers looking like waves crashing against green sites. But again, we get back to long-term maintenance, and did we want to do that? Or do we want to try something a bit different?”
Coore expects that the lack of sand bunkers will make the course play easier for mid- and higher-handicapped players.
“But for the best players who can spin a bunker shot and control those shots consistently, I have an idea they will find those grassy bunker-type areas to be more unpredictable and more difficult,” he said. “All those things have been involved in the thought process collectively.”
No. 9 green at the Sheep Ranch, backed by a gorse-covered gorge and hillside (Gabe Gudgel/Golfweek)
The lack of bunkers is just one more example of different being interesting. Coore and Crenshaw didn’t set out to copy Pacific Dunes or Old Macdonald. With the eyes of the golf world on the much-heralded site, they understood that they needed to embrace the differences.
“We knew the expectations would be extreme because of the spectacular nature of the site and the coastline being so different, exposing it differently and play-wise to the ocean than the other courses,” Coore said. “And we knew people would focus on the spectacular potential and not so much on the restrictions of the site. That can be daunting, because people will think that if you can’t build the best course at Bandon on that site, you’ve done something wrong.
“The potential is extreme, but the restrictive nature of it is extreme as well. How do we work these things together? We knew the expectations would be very high, but the downside could be very high too. It’s a site where you can succeed spectacularly, or you can fail miserably. … I will say, we’re thrilled with how it turned out.”
Golfweek’s Best top resorts plan their reopenings in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic.
The top golf resorts in the country have been hit particularly hard by the coronavirus pandemic. With revenues tied to accommodations and food services as well as to their golf courses, even the resorts that have been able to keep their courses operational have sustained more than a month of lost bookings throughout the properties.
Most states have reopened their golf courses – only Vermont, Maryland and Massachusetts have remained closed to golf with no announced plans to reopen. And now that many states are trying to restart businesses, several top resorts have announced reopening dates of at least some non-golf operations as they plan a return to normalcy.
As examples of how resorts around the country are trying to get things started as governors allow businesses to open, we offer the following look at Golfweek’s Best top resort courses and proposed timelines for the full resort operations to open. Each resort has stressed its efforts to provide sanitary playing opportunities with social distancing and other modifications such as leaving the flags in the hole while putting and using modified cups to prevent players from having to reach too deeply into the holes.
No. 1 Pebble Beach Golf Links
The famed course in Pebble Beach, California – host to six U.S. Opens – reopened Monday. Hotel operations are slated to begin June 1. Spyglass Hill at the resort, No. 11 on the Golfweek’s Best list, also reopened Monday. Tee times are typically reserved for resort guests with only limited non-resort public access, but during May the golf courses will be open for public-access bookings with reduced green fees: $495 for Pebble Beach, down from the normal $575, and $325 for Spyglass Hill, down from the normal $415.
