The Week That Was, november 22, 2015

     Howard Hughes Corporation has sold Club at Carlton Woods, a venue that’s been described as “the social and residential hub for the elite” at the Woodlands, a huge planned community north of Houston, Texas. HHC reports that the club, which features two 18-hole courses -- one designed by Jack Nicklaus, the other by Tom Fazio -- was a financial drain, as so far this year it’s lost $4.4 million. Nonetheless, the sale enabled the company to book “net cash proceeds of $25.1 million and a pre-tax gain of $29.1 million.” HHC didn’t identify Carlton Woods’ the new owner, and I can’t find any other reports of the transaction on the internets.

     Persistent hard times in Victoria, Australia’s over-saturated golf market may lead to the creation of a “super club” in the world-famous Sandbelt. Three of the Melbourne area’s top golf properties -- Huntingdale Golf Club, Sandhurst Club, and Patterson River Golf Club -- have tentatively agreed to a merger, pending approval by their members. In a press release, Sandhurst’s chairman says that the proposal “brings together the most critical ingredients -- branding, capacity, and capital -- to ensure survival and prosperity in what is a tumultuous period in the golf industry.” Members of the “super club” will have access to 63 golf holes, according to the press release, which means that one of the clubs is going to lose nine of its holes. It’s hard to imagine the 18-hole, Charles Alison-designed course at Huntingdale -- “the Home of the Australian Masters” -- being touched, which suggests that the shrinkage will occur either at Sandhurst, a 36-hole complex that serves as the home of the PGA of Australia, or at Patterson River, which has been looking for merger partners for years and has apparently agreed to a “sale of excess land.” The proposed merger has been called “groundbreaking,” but it really isn’t. Half of the golf clubs in Australia are said to be operating under “financial duress,” and last year the editor of a golf publication in Australia predicted that as many as 20 percent of metropolitan Melbourne’s clubs will close over the next decade. A vote on the merger is expected to take place early next year.

     Turkey has been itching to get into the Ryder Cup conversation for years, and now the president of the nation’s golf federation is taking dead aim on the event’s 2026 edition. “We will be the strongest bidder for 2026,” Ahmet Agaoglu vowed in a comment published by the Scotsman. “I will not die until I have the Ryder Cup played in this country.” Of course, it’s going to be a while before the European Tour and its partners pick a winner for an event that’s still more than a decade away. Come early December, though, the tour will reveal the last nation standing for the 2022 Ryder Cup. The Scotsman appears to be putting its money on Germany.