mauritius TPL’s Next Confection
A sugar company in Mauritius has inked Thomson Perrett & Lobb to what may eventually be a sweet design commission.
Andrew Goosen, who works out of TPL’s office in Cape Town, South Africa, is drawing plans for an 18-hole, daily-fee course in Rivière du Rempart, a town in the northeastern part of the island nation. After a site visit in May, Goosen posted an online report saying that the course will likely be flanked by houses, a shopping village, and a golf academy.
The property, a former dairy farm, has an air strip that serves as a base of operations for Skydive Austral, a skydiving center that will continue to operate while the community takes shape. The site is just a short drive from Belle Mare Plage Golf Club, one of more than a dozen golf properties in Mauritius.
TPL hasn’t yet identified its client, but I believe it’s Mon Loisir Sugar.
Sugar production once represented as much as 25 percent of Mauritius’ gross national product, but the business is declining and many sugar companies are trying to diversify.
The original version of this post first appeared in the July 2012 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
wales Enjoying the Ryder
The Ryder Cup isn’t just boffo box office and an eyeball-grabber in Televisionland. It can also give a shot in the arm to a nation’s tourism business.
Take Wales, which hosted the Ryder Cup matches in 2010. According to a tourism group, in 2002 Wales attracted 30,000 foreign golfers who opened their wallets to the tune of $8.97 million. Last year, however, Wales attracted 200,000 foreign golfers who pumped almost $51.3 million into its economy.
Wales may not be a foreign golfer’s first choice in golf destinations -- in the United Kingdom alone, Scotland and Ireland rank higher -- but the Ryder Cup has clearly paid welcome dividends.
Here’s the curious part: While golf tourism in Wales may be up, the nation’s overall tourism is down. Earlier this year, tourism officials reported that the number of nights spent in Wales by international travelers fell from 989,000 in 2009 to 878,000 in 2011.
When it comes to tourism, at least, the Ryder Cup’s impact is limited.
canada Tsawwassen Springs: Locked & Loaded
Ted Locke’s makeover of Tsawwassen Springs Golf Club is complete, and a reviewer in British Columbia has deemed it “light years ahead of its predecessor in both length and course condition.”
Ron Toigo's Shato Holdings bought the 46-year-old course three years ago, with an eye toward making it the centerpiece of a community in suburban Vancouver called Tsawwassen Springs. The original, 4,276-yard track, says Mark Hood of the North Shore News, was “short, mosquito-infested, and fairly easy.” Locke has stretched the course to 5,439 yards, and Hood believes it’s “a vast improvement over what existed before and has some serious game.”
Toigo is a celebrity in Vancouver, and not just because he owns a chain of donut shops. He owns the Vancouver Giants, the city’s most prominent junior hockey team, in partnership with hockey legend Gordie Howe, long-time NHL coach Pat Quinn, and crooner Michael Bublé, who was born in British Columbia. Bublé and Quinn are also minority partners in the Tsawwassen Springs venture, along with Ross Clouston, the president of the home-building group that’s putting 496 houses and condos next to the course.
Locke, who apprenticed with Graham Cooke, has designed several golf courses in British Columbia (including Redwoods Golf Course in Langley) and in the United States (Willows Run Golf Course in Redmond, Washington). Hood says that he “has a knack for updating existing courses and bringing them in line with playing experiences demanded by today's golfers.”
The developers have broken ground on a 32,000-square-foot clubhouse that could open next year. My guess is that it’ll likewise be a far cry from the 1,500-square-foot building it replaces.
Some information in the preceding post originally appeared in the September 2010 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
talking points Jack Nicklaus: Where’s the Fun?
Do you know why Jack Nicklaus has time to campaign for change in the White House? Because nowadays he hardly plays the game that made him rich and famous.
“I play it once a month, if I have to,” Nicklaus told an audience in Southern Pines, North Carolina. “I stopped climbing the mountain. I love the game of golf, but golf was my vehicle to competition. When I lost my vehicle to competition and lost my golf game and my ability to play, I didn’t really miss golf.”
I can’t decide what’s worse, Nicklaus acknowledging that he doesn’t “miss” golf or the gratuitous “if I have to.” How are we supposed to grow the game if our biggest stars aren’t willing to play purely for the fun of it?
wild card click Lately I've been looking for a reason to move to Baltimore. This may be it.
Sunday, September 30, 2012
Friday, September 28, 2012
The Pulse, september 28, 2012
Jack Nicklaus hit the campaign trail in Ohio this week, lending his considerable clout to Mitt Romney’s rapidly fading presidential prospects. “We are too late to change recent history,” the Ohio-born golf legend told a group of likely Republican voters, “but we can write a better future for ourselves, for our children and for their
children, beginning by putting Mitt Romney in the White House.” It’s hard to measure the value of such endorsements, but this much is certain: With the election looming ever larger on the horizon, Romney can use all the help he can get. Lee Schmidt has been changing history of late, as he’s completed what a press release calls a “complete course transformation” of Nanlihu International Golf Club on Hainan Island in China. The club’s original layout, soon to be a distant memory, was designed by Wang Zong Qian, a Taiwanese architect. The freshly created 7,000-plus yard track, Schmidt told his press agent, is now “a stern, picturesque test for all to enjoy.” Funny, but those are the words I was going to use to describe this year’s presidential campaign. One of Romney’s most vocal supporters is scaring the bejesus out of some residents of the Bronx. The New York Daily News reports that “high levels of explosive methane gas” are routinely detected in the working-class neighborhoods adjacent to the golf course that Donald Trump is building in Ferry Point Park. The fear, of course, is that someone will light a cigarette and blow up a house. And here’s my favorite part of the story: The state, according to the Daily News, “has decided not to shut down construction but to increase the frequency of monitoring.” Your government at work. Andrew Yau is also campaigning these days, but his prize is the Fota Island golf resort outside Cork, in southern Ireland. Yau may not be a household name in the United States, but he’s a heavyweight in international golf circles, with an investment portfolio nearly as big as Romney’s. Unlike Romney, however, Yau loves golf, and he has a trio of high-profile venues to prove it: Spring City Golf & Lake Resort in Kunming, China, which features courses designed by Nicklaus and Robert Trent Jones, Jr.; Amata Spring Country Club in suburban Bangkok, the home of the Thailand Golf Championship; and Ria Bintan Golf Club, which features one of the top tracks in Indonesia. If Yau can close on the deal for Fota Island -- he’s said to have challengers -- his collection of golf properties would grow to include one that hosted the Irish Open in 2001 and 2002. In what might serve as a preview of a Romney presidency, 17 union workers on the grounds crew at Calabasas Country Club in California have been replaced by non-union employees. “This whole situation is about the quality of the workforce,” the club’s general manager told a local newspaper. The GM also pointed out that the majority of the country club’s members support this change in the course’s history. But that really isn’t a surprise, is it?
children, beginning by putting Mitt Romney in the White House.” It’s hard to measure the value of such endorsements, but this much is certain: With the election looming ever larger on the horizon, Romney can use all the help he can get. Lee Schmidt has been changing history of late, as he’s completed what a press release calls a “complete course transformation” of Nanlihu International Golf Club on Hainan Island in China. The club’s original layout, soon to be a distant memory, was designed by Wang Zong Qian, a Taiwanese architect. The freshly created 7,000-plus yard track, Schmidt told his press agent, is now “a stern, picturesque test for all to enjoy.” Funny, but those are the words I was going to use to describe this year’s presidential campaign. One of Romney’s most vocal supporters is scaring the bejesus out of some residents of the Bronx. The New York Daily News reports that “high levels of explosive methane gas” are routinely detected in the working-class neighborhoods adjacent to the golf course that Donald Trump is building in Ferry Point Park. The fear, of course, is that someone will light a cigarette and blow up a house. And here’s my favorite part of the story: The state, according to the Daily News, “has decided not to shut down construction but to increase the frequency of monitoring.” Your government at work. Andrew Yau is also campaigning these days, but his prize is the Fota Island golf resort outside Cork, in southern Ireland. Yau may not be a household name in the United States, but he’s a heavyweight in international golf circles, with an investment portfolio nearly as big as Romney’s. Unlike Romney, however, Yau loves golf, and he has a trio of high-profile venues to prove it: Spring City Golf & Lake Resort in Kunming, China, which features courses designed by Nicklaus and Robert Trent Jones, Jr.; Amata Spring Country Club in suburban Bangkok, the home of the Thailand Golf Championship; and Ria Bintan Golf Club, which features one of the top tracks in Indonesia. If Yau can close on the deal for Fota Island -- he’s said to have challengers -- his collection of golf properties would grow to include one that hosted the Irish Open in 2001 and 2002. In what might serve as a preview of a Romney presidency, 17 union workers on the grounds crew at Calabasas Country Club in California have been replaced by non-union employees. “This whole situation is about the quality of the workforce,” the club’s general manager told a local newspaper. The GM also pointed out that the majority of the country club’s members support this change in the course’s history. But that really isn’t a surprise, is it?
Wednesday, September 26, 2012
china Tianjin’s Piece of the Rose Rock
A U.S. company with investment funds potentially worth $2 billion is looking to build at least three golf courses in China.
Rose Rock Capital, a firm controlled by Stephen Rockefeller, is already involved in two projects in Tianjin, the nation’s sixth-largest city: a golf course to be designed by Gil Hanse and a 150-story skyscraper whose design was reportedly inspired by Rockefeller Center in New York City. These days the firm is working with a Chinese entity, Tianjin Finance Investment Company, to raise as much as $2 billion that would be used for real estate development in Tianjin and other cities in the People’s Republic.
Rose Rock’s first golf course, an 18-hole track capable of hosting professional tournaments, will be the centerpiece of a 100-house community at East Port, on Tianjin’s rapidly growing waterfront. The community will occupy just a small sliver of East Port, which is emerging on more than 7,400 acres of reclaimed land around China’s largest port. Sometime in the not too distant future, the place will be full of houses, hotels, shopping and entertainment areas, a marina, and many other attractions, including a performing arts center that will be built with design assistance from New York’s Lincoln Center. The area currently has what’s been called “a marginal population,” but within 10 years it’s expected to swell to 150,000.
Rose Rock is developing its course with the property’s owner, Binhai Landmark. The partners hope to break ground on the golf course this year, but the moratorium on golf construction in China, for which there seems to be no end in sight, will likely delay construction.
While Rose Rock awaits the green light at East Port, it’s exploring other options. The firm hopes to develop at least two more golf properties in China, and Wayne Morrison, the head of the firm’s sports and leisure group, says a site in Dalian (in Liaoning Province) has already been eye-balled.
“We’d like to do more in Tianjin,” says Morrison, “but we also want to diversify into other areas, maybe with other development groups.”
It’s possible that Hanse will be involved in the design of the other courses, although Rose Rock may work with other architects as well.
Hanse’s to-do list includes one other course in China, an 18-hole layout for TPC Beijing. Of course, these days most of his attention is focused on Rio de Janeiro, where next month he starts construction on the golf course that will serve as the venue for the golf competition at the 2016 Olympics.
The original version of the preceding post first appeared in the July 2012 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
Rose Rock Capital, a firm controlled by Stephen Rockefeller, is already involved in two projects in Tianjin, the nation’s sixth-largest city: a golf course to be designed by Gil Hanse and a 150-story skyscraper whose design was reportedly inspired by Rockefeller Center in New York City. These days the firm is working with a Chinese entity, Tianjin Finance Investment Company, to raise as much as $2 billion that would be used for real estate development in Tianjin and other cities in the People’s Republic.
Rose Rock’s first golf course, an 18-hole track capable of hosting professional tournaments, will be the centerpiece of a 100-house community at East Port, on Tianjin’s rapidly growing waterfront. The community will occupy just a small sliver of East Port, which is emerging on more than 7,400 acres of reclaimed land around China’s largest port. Sometime in the not too distant future, the place will be full of houses, hotels, shopping and entertainment areas, a marina, and many other attractions, including a performing arts center that will be built with design assistance from New York’s Lincoln Center. The area currently has what’s been called “a marginal population,” but within 10 years it’s expected to swell to 150,000.
Rose Rock is developing its course with the property’s owner, Binhai Landmark. The partners hope to break ground on the golf course this year, but the moratorium on golf construction in China, for which there seems to be no end in sight, will likely delay construction.
While Rose Rock awaits the green light at East Port, it’s exploring other options. The firm hopes to develop at least two more golf properties in China, and Wayne Morrison, the head of the firm’s sports and leisure group, says a site in Dalian (in Liaoning Province) has already been eye-balled.
“We’d like to do more in Tianjin,” says Morrison, “but we also want to diversify into other areas, maybe with other development groups.”
It’s possible that Hanse will be involved in the design of the other courses, although Rose Rock may work with other architects as well.
Hanse’s to-do list includes one other course in China, an 18-hole layout for TPC Beijing. Of course, these days most of his attention is focused on Rio de Janeiro, where next month he starts construction on the golf course that will serve as the venue for the golf competition at the 2016 Olympics.
The original version of the preceding post first appeared in the July 2012 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
Sunday, September 23, 2012
The Week That Was, september 23, 2012
china Countdown to a Minimalist Debut
And now, finally, for something completely different: A links-style, rustic-looking golf course on China’s Hainan Island, where the current offerings are more comforting, more traditional layouts.
The course has been co-designed by Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw, and it’ll be the centerpiece of Shanqin Bay, a community (including 2,000 houses and a hotel) emerging near Bo’ao, on the island’s eastern coast. Darius Oliver of Australian Golf Digest has already declared the track to be “the best golf course in China right now,” although he fears that it’ll be “a tough course to swallow” for many of the nation’s golfers.
But if a “minimalist” course is alien to Chinese eyes, that’s the effect its developer, Wang Jun, is trying to achieve. While he was the chairman of CITIC, Wang build a handful of courses on the mainland. For Shanqin Bay, he personally selected a site with more drama and rougher edges. “He’s walked out on a limb with us,” says Coore, who acknowledges that the 6,887-yard layout will serve as “a departure from what thus far has been the norm for golf architecture in China.”
Will the course be too much, too soon for Hainan’s vacationing golfers? The verdict will be rendered in December, when the course opens.
The preceding post originally appeared in the September 2012 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
united states Hawaii Taps Chinese Golfers
For years, Chinese golfers have been vacationing on Hainan Island, which bills itself as the nation’s “Hawaiian island.” Now a Chinese developer wants to send some of those golfers to the real Hawaii.
Pacific Links International has launched a club-type program that it believes will attract as many as 25,000 Chinese golfers annually. The golfers will play on Pacific Links’ four courses on Oahu, along with two on Maui that the company is currently trying to buy. Those who wish to see a little more of the United States will have the option of playing two Pacific Links-owned courses in Las Vegas and one in West Virginia.
Greg Norman, who’s signed on as Pacific Links’ pitch man and occasional course re-designer, recently touted the program’s benefits to a Hawaiian business group.
“Once this thing fully matures, with 25,000 members -- think about 25,000 new golfers coming into Hawaii,” he said in comments recorded by the Honolulu Star-Advertiser. “It will be a huge economic impact, because they’re not coming for just one day, they’re coming for multiple days.”
One added bonus: Chinese travelers are said to be the biggest spenders in Hawaii. They each spend $407 a day, on average.
Pacific Links is owned by Du Sha, who’s been identified by Forbes as one of China’s richest people. (Estimated net worth: $655 million.) Du began to lay the foundation for his vacation club in the fall of 2010, when he began a buying spree on Oahu. In short order, he bought Kapolei Golf Course, the Makaha Valley and Makaha West tracks, and Olomana Golf Links. Today he’s reportedly negotiating for the Royal Ka’anapali and Ka’anapali Kai tracks on Maui.
The Star-Advertiser says that Du tested his idea with 300 wealthy Chinese prospects. I’m willing to bet that a large number of them are wishing that they’d thought of it first.
talking points A Land Rush in Florida?
A couple of weeks ago, while driving through Las Vegas, I saw something that nearly made me drive off the interstate: new houses under construction.
Yes, the housing market in Las Vegas has bottomed out and has begun to rebound. And while a full recovery may still be years away, residential development has begun to perk up in other cities across the nation as well.
“The rush is on,” proclaims a story in Gulf Coast Business Review, a Sarasota, Florida-based publication.
The housing market is now largely disconnected from golf development, of course, but a resurgence of home building indicates that the fundamentals of the U.S. economy, as John McCain once called them, are getting stronger. It may be that land and houses are selling for a song, but at least they’re selling. This is good news for golf, if only because home building creates many jobs and the purchase of a home is a vote of confidence in the future.
Here’s part of what Gulf Coast Business Review recently said about residential development in Southwest Florida:
It’s little wonder that builders are trying to secure land today. That’s because the new-home supply in the region is dwindling.
“Southwest Florida is beginning to come back, and the large builders are starting to understand that,” says Michael Rosen, a longtime homebuilding executive. . . .
According to Metrostudy, which tracks home sales and lot inventory in master-planned communities, the supply of vacant developed lots and homes is dwindling. For example, the supply of finished, vacant new homes in Collier County has fallen 11 percent in the past year and is down to just 159 homes. This compares with nearly 900 homes in 2007.
“Everybody’s expecting that trend to continue as long as the general economy doesn’t have a double dip,” says Patrick Utter, vice president of real estate and club operations with Collier Enterprises. “Naples is an early indicator of the market.”
[Ross McIntosh, a land broker in Collier County], says builders started to worry about the decline in inventories last year.
“Suddenly, there was an awareness that there were no longer any finished lots left,” McIntosh says. “There seemed like a lifetime supply, and then it was gone.”
wild card click Last night, I went to a wedding. This morning, I heard a sermon.
And now, finally, for something completely different: A links-style, rustic-looking golf course on China’s Hainan Island, where the current offerings are more comforting, more traditional layouts.
The course has been co-designed by Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw, and it’ll be the centerpiece of Shanqin Bay, a community (including 2,000 houses and a hotel) emerging near Bo’ao, on the island’s eastern coast. Darius Oliver of Australian Golf Digest has already declared the track to be “the best golf course in China right now,” although he fears that it’ll be “a tough course to swallow” for many of the nation’s golfers.
But if a “minimalist” course is alien to Chinese eyes, that’s the effect its developer, Wang Jun, is trying to achieve. While he was the chairman of CITIC, Wang build a handful of courses on the mainland. For Shanqin Bay, he personally selected a site with more drama and rougher edges. “He’s walked out on a limb with us,” says Coore, who acknowledges that the 6,887-yard layout will serve as “a departure from what thus far has been the norm for golf architecture in China.”
Will the course be too much, too soon for Hainan’s vacationing golfers? The verdict will be rendered in December, when the course opens.
The preceding post originally appeared in the September 2012 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
united states Hawaii Taps Chinese Golfers
For years, Chinese golfers have been vacationing on Hainan Island, which bills itself as the nation’s “Hawaiian island.” Now a Chinese developer wants to send some of those golfers to the real Hawaii.
Pacific Links International has launched a club-type program that it believes will attract as many as 25,000 Chinese golfers annually. The golfers will play on Pacific Links’ four courses on Oahu, along with two on Maui that the company is currently trying to buy. Those who wish to see a little more of the United States will have the option of playing two Pacific Links-owned courses in Las Vegas and one in West Virginia.
Greg Norman, who’s signed on as Pacific Links’ pitch man and occasional course re-designer, recently touted the program’s benefits to a Hawaiian business group.
“Once this thing fully matures, with 25,000 members -- think about 25,000 new golfers coming into Hawaii,” he said in comments recorded by the Honolulu Star-Advertiser. “It will be a huge economic impact, because they’re not coming for just one day, they’re coming for multiple days.”
One added bonus: Chinese travelers are said to be the biggest spenders in Hawaii. They each spend $407 a day, on average.
Pacific Links is owned by Du Sha, who’s been identified by Forbes as one of China’s richest people. (Estimated net worth: $655 million.) Du began to lay the foundation for his vacation club in the fall of 2010, when he began a buying spree on Oahu. In short order, he bought Kapolei Golf Course, the Makaha Valley and Makaha West tracks, and Olomana Golf Links. Today he’s reportedly negotiating for the Royal Ka’anapali and Ka’anapali Kai tracks on Maui.
The Star-Advertiser says that Du tested his idea with 300 wealthy Chinese prospects. I’m willing to bet that a large number of them are wishing that they’d thought of it first.
talking points A Land Rush in Florida?
A couple of weeks ago, while driving through Las Vegas, I saw something that nearly made me drive off the interstate: new houses under construction.
Yes, the housing market in Las Vegas has bottomed out and has begun to rebound. And while a full recovery may still be years away, residential development has begun to perk up in other cities across the nation as well.
“The rush is on,” proclaims a story in Gulf Coast Business Review, a Sarasota, Florida-based publication.
The housing market is now largely disconnected from golf development, of course, but a resurgence of home building indicates that the fundamentals of the U.S. economy, as John McCain once called them, are getting stronger. It may be that land and houses are selling for a song, but at least they’re selling. This is good news for golf, if only because home building creates many jobs and the purchase of a home is a vote of confidence in the future.
Here’s part of what Gulf Coast Business Review recently said about residential development in Southwest Florida:
It’s little wonder that builders are trying to secure land today. That’s because the new-home supply in the region is dwindling.
“Southwest Florida is beginning to come back, and the large builders are starting to understand that,” says Michael Rosen, a longtime homebuilding executive. . . .
According to Metrostudy, which tracks home sales and lot inventory in master-planned communities, the supply of vacant developed lots and homes is dwindling. For example, the supply of finished, vacant new homes in Collier County has fallen 11 percent in the past year and is down to just 159 homes. This compares with nearly 900 homes in 2007.
“Everybody’s expecting that trend to continue as long as the general economy doesn’t have a double dip,” says Patrick Utter, vice president of real estate and club operations with Collier Enterprises. “Naples is an early indicator of the market.”
[Ross McIntosh, a land broker in Collier County], says builders started to worry about the decline in inventories last year.
“Suddenly, there was an awareness that there were no longer any finished lots left,” McIntosh says. “There seemed like a lifetime supply, and then it was gone.”
wild card click Last night, I went to a wedding. This morning, I heard a sermon.
Friday, September 21, 2012
The Pipeline, september 2012
china Last month, Ross Perrett took a two-week swing through Thailand and China, checking on the progress of at least seven projects in various stages of construction. The Melbourne, Australia-based architect is especially busy in China, despite the nation’s increasingly phony-looking moratorium, where he has courses under construction or about to open in five cities: Hong Kong, Nanning, Xian, Shanghai, and Dalian. And there may be more where that came from, because Perrett also met with prospects in Beijing and Singapore. “We have a good book of active projects and a strong pipeline of future work,” he noted in a news post at his firm’s website, “so there is still plenty of work to do.”
england David McLay Kidd is used to doing things his way, so I was surprised to learn that he’ll be co-designing his forthcoming golf course in suburban London with Tom Watson. These days the partners are
drawing up plans for an 18-hole track that Longshot, Ltd. aims to build at Cherkley Court in Surrey, and Kidd reports that things are proceeding without friction. “My passion is for golf that’s played through nature and its idiosyncrasies,” he explains, “and Tom approaches and understands those idiosyncrasies better than most.”
The original version of the preceding post first appeared in the September 2012 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
kazakhstan Sometime next year, Kazakhstan’s oil barons will finally begin moving into pricey second homes around a Colin Montgomerie “signature” golf course at Ak-bulak Golf & Country Club. The course, which has been under construction for four years, will be outrageously long -- it’s expected to stretch to 8,000 yards or more -- and it’s going to perplex even accomplished players. “It’s the most deceptive site I’ve ever been on,” says Brit Stenson of IMG, the course’s “ghost” architect. “There are shots that appear to be downhill but are really uphill, and vice versa. People are going to have the wrong club in their hands on half of the holes.”
The original version of the preceding post first appeared in the May 2012 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
malaysia The full 18 at 99 East Golf Club was supposed to debut this spring, but Asian Golf Travel Nation reports that construction of the course’s second nine won’t begin until the middle of 2013. The club is the centerpiece of a resort community (it’s in Jalan Bukit Malut, on Pulau Langkawi) that will eventually be surrounded by villas and bungalows, boutique hotels, restaurants, and a residence for Malaysia’s head of state. The course’s designer, Ross Watson, has previously designed three courses in suburban Kuala Lumpur (including one of Malaysia’a premier courses, at Kota Permai Golf & Country Club) and another in suburban Johor Baharu (Horizon Hills Golf Club).
Some information in the preceding post originally appeared in the December 2011 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
united states Construction has wrapped up on Tom Doak’s course at Dismal River Club in Mullen, Nebraska. The question on many minds today is how the recently seeded track will compare with the club’s Jack Nicklaus “signature” course, a layout that Bradley S. Klein believes is “close to a top-100” layout and “certainly a top-200 Modern course.” A verdict will likely be rendered sometime next year. “I am sure there will be plenty of opportunity to hit balls around next summer and fall,” Doak wrote in a post at Golf Club Atlas, “but my guess on when the course is really in top condition for opening would be pretty conservative ... because you can’t push fescue too hard, and because the weather in the Sand Hills is so capricious.”
england David McLay Kidd is used to doing things his way, so I was surprised to learn that he’ll be co-designing his forthcoming golf course in suburban London with Tom Watson. These days the partners are
drawing up plans for an 18-hole track that Longshot, Ltd. aims to build at Cherkley Court in Surrey, and Kidd reports that things are proceeding without friction. “My passion is for golf that’s played through nature and its idiosyncrasies,” he explains, “and Tom approaches and understands those idiosyncrasies better than most.”
The original version of the preceding post first appeared in the September 2012 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
kazakhstan Sometime next year, Kazakhstan’s oil barons will finally begin moving into pricey second homes around a Colin Montgomerie “signature” golf course at Ak-bulak Golf & Country Club. The course, which has been under construction for four years, will be outrageously long -- it’s expected to stretch to 8,000 yards or more -- and it’s going to perplex even accomplished players. “It’s the most deceptive site I’ve ever been on,” says Brit Stenson of IMG, the course’s “ghost” architect. “There are shots that appear to be downhill but are really uphill, and vice versa. People are going to have the wrong club in their hands on half of the holes.”
The original version of the preceding post first appeared in the May 2012 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
malaysia The full 18 at 99 East Golf Club was supposed to debut this spring, but Asian Golf Travel Nation reports that construction of the course’s second nine won’t begin until the middle of 2013. The club is the centerpiece of a resort community (it’s in Jalan Bukit Malut, on Pulau Langkawi) that will eventually be surrounded by villas and bungalows, boutique hotels, restaurants, and a residence for Malaysia’s head of state. The course’s designer, Ross Watson, has previously designed three courses in suburban Kuala Lumpur (including one of Malaysia’a premier courses, at Kota Permai Golf & Country Club) and another in suburban Johor Baharu (Horizon Hills Golf Club).
Some information in the preceding post originally appeared in the December 2011 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
united states Construction has wrapped up on Tom Doak’s course at Dismal River Club in Mullen, Nebraska. The question on many minds today is how the recently seeded track will compare with the club’s Jack Nicklaus “signature” course, a layout that Bradley S. Klein believes is “close to a top-100” layout and “certainly a top-200 Modern course.” A verdict will likely be rendered sometime next year. “I am sure there will be plenty of opportunity to hit balls around next summer and fall,” Doak wrote in a post at Golf Club Atlas, “but my guess on when the course is really in top condition for opening would be pretty conservative ... because you can’t push fescue too hard, and because the weather in the Sand Hills is so capricious.”
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