The Week That Was, october 2, 2016

     A British golf consultant has identified some of the world’s hot spots for golf development, and it shouldn’t surprise anyone to hear that Vietnam tops his list. The socialist republic is, after all, where “huge amounts are being ploughed into the game,” according to Paul Dellanzo, a Liverpool, England-based designer, developer, and manager. Dellanzo also sees an upside in Oman, which he believes “has everything to be the next emerging luxury golf destination,” and Indonesia, thanks primarily to its “younger demographics” and “a very healthy ratio of quality, demand, and price.” He also cites Canada and Russia, though without making a persuasive case, as well as France and Italy, but only because they’re upcoming host nations for Ryder Cup competitions. Of course, there’s been a chill in the development air for many years, and Dellanzo continues to feel it in Dubai (“a chaotic and expensive city” where “most rounds are actually played by expatriates”), Japan (it’s “suffering for now from an older population and one of the highest national debts in the world”), Great Britain (“it is often cheaper for the British to fly to southern Europe to play for a short holiday”), and the United States (“still in a tailspin”).

     Thinking about taking a golf vacation in Tasmania? Well, the biggest booster club for Australia’s golf industry is gushing about Ocean Dunes, the new waterfront links on King Island. Golf Australia says that Ocean Dunes’ Graeme Grant-designed track, which has been laid out upon “one of the most impressive seaside locations for golf on the planet,” is “as strategically layered as it is visually mesmerizing” and “a triumph for those who agree that the game is far more interesting when the ball is on the ground rather than in the air.” To be sure, the group’s reviewer makes the inevitable comparison to nearby Cape Wickham Links, a track already regarded as being among the world’s elites, but, naturally, declines to pick a winner. “Both are ingenious designs on stunningly beautiful ground, both utilize their vast natural assets with aplomb, yet each owns characteristics the other doesn’t,” the reviewer has concluded. “They make a great double act.” Other reviewers will no doubt concur. King Island is on a fast-growing number of bucket lists.

     Before the end of the year, FLC Group expects to unveil the second 18-hole course at FLC Quy Nhơn Golf Links, a venue that serves as the centerpiece of what’s said to be a “seven-star” resort community outside Quy Nhơn, in Bình Định Province. Both of Quy Nhơn’s courses were designed by internationally known U.S. firms, and both took shape in hardly any time at all. The builder, Flagstick Golf Course Construction Management, claims that the community’s Oceanside course, by Nicklaus Design, emerged in just five months. It opened in March. Flagstick tried to finish the forthcoming Mountain track, by Brian Curley of Schmidt-Curley Design, in only four months, but it may end up taking six. Quy Nhơn is FLC Group’s second golf property (the first, FLC Sầm Sơn Golf Links in Thanh Hóa Province, opened last year), and within a few months the publicly traded company also figures to open an 18-hole layout at FLC Hạ Long Bay Golf Club & Resort in Quảng Ninh Province. In addition, FLC Group has enlisted Curley to design the first two courses at FLC Đồng Hới Golf Links, a 7,500-acre spread in Quảng Bình Province that’s been master-planned for 10 courses. If you’re wondering where FLC Group goes from there, the company aims to have 20 courses in its portfolio by 2020.

     The original version of the preceding post first appeared in the September 2016 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.

     For just the fourth time in 33 years, the Golf Course Superintendents Association of America is giving its top award to a golf course superintendent. He is Paul Latshaw, who over a 38-year career worked at some of our nation’s most celebrated venues, among them Augusta National Golf Club, Oakmont Country Club, Congressional Country Club, Riviera Country Club, and Winged Foot Golf Club. Along the way, he prepared courses for nine major championships. “I was a farm boy from central Pennsylvania who became a golf course superintendent,” Latshaw joked in a press release. “It sure was better than bailing hay and feeding chickens.” Previous winners of the GCSAA’s Old Tom Morris Award include Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus, Pete Dye, Byron Nelson, Annika Sorenstam, Bob Hope, and Dinah Shore.

     Jack Nicklaus has earned many accolades during his brilliant career, but he’s never been known as a defender of the free world. That may soon change, however, because South Korea’s Ministry of National Defense wants to deploy U.S. missiles on one of his golf courses.