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Whether it be hitting the road to cover pro events, visiting a new course opening or just playing on our own time, our staffers get around. But no one can get everywhere. Here are eight courses on our staff’s wish list for 2022. Scroll down and take notes — maybe one of your next tee times will be at one of these gems too.

9 courses our staff can’t wait to play in 2022

Alan Bastable, executive editor: Only two of Seth Raynor’s designs are true daily-fee courses. One, at Thousand Island CC, is in upstate New York — like, way upstate, 100 miles north of Syracuse. The other, at Rock Spring GC, is 30 minutes north of my central New Jersey home, in West Orange. Despite its proximity to me, I’d never heard of Rock Spring until a year or two ago, partly because of the abundance of top-shelf courses in my area and partly because for most of its nearly 100-year existence Rock Spring was private. No invite, no access. That changed in 2019 when the town — urged on by residents who wanted to protect the green space — bought the club off its then-owner, nearby Montclair Golf Club, and hired management company KemperSports to convert it into a daily fee. Now, anyone can enjoy the Raynor design — complete with all his signature template touches, including a Redan green at the 3rd — for as little as $40. Sign me up!

Courses

Sean Zak, senior editor: I’d like to keep this realistic, but still implausible. I wanna play Shoreacres in 2022, the private club just north of Chicago. As a new resident in the Windy City (who has been lucky enough to play Chicago Club), that one seems next on the list.

Dylan Dethier, senior writer: Gold Mountain. As the curator of Muni Mondays and the only member of our company who lives in the Pacific Northwest, I consider it abject failure that I haven’t yet made the trek to Bremerton, Wash., to play one of the nation’s preeminent municipal facilities. Gold (Jerry, Gold!) Mountain is No. 1 on my bucket list and if we get to this same column this time next year and I still haven’t played it, I’ll have nobody to blame but myself.

Tim Reilly, director of social media: The Palm Beach Par-3 course is on my radar for 2022. That’s right, a par-3 course. Why? Because I love par-3 courses. Some of my most fun golf experiences have occurred on pitch and putts. But this isn’t your normal pitch and putt. Holes range from 81 to 211 yards, and the course runs between the Atlantic Ocean and Florida’s beautiful Intracoastal waterway. My father and I take an annual trip to Mets spring training in Port St. Lucie. This year, we need to make the short drive over to Palm Beach from the airport. (Oh, and like always, Fishers Island remains atop my private-club bucket list. Gotta dream, right?)

Josh Berhow, managing editor: I spent most of 2021 playing golf in Minnesota, but in 2022 I need to venture west to Nebraska. Reason No. 1: I like road trips. There’s something peaceful about your own car driving down the highway en route to somewhere special. Reason No. 2: I really want to play The Prairie Club and Wild Horse, two public Nebraska spots that offer awesome linksy, rolling Great Plains golf. The Prairie Club has two courses plus a 10-hole short course (with no tee boxes!) and Wild Horse, at under $70, is one of the best values around. Or at least it’s said to be. Hopefully in 2022 I find out for myself.

Zephyr Melton, assistant editor: The Loop at Forest Dunes is on my radar for 2022. Northern Michigan has tons of great golf options, but The Loop intrigues me the most thanks to its unique design. One day, you play the course in one direction while the following, the routing is flipped. I’ve heard nothing but great things about it from my coworkers, and in 2022 I’m going to check it out for myself.

James Colgan, assistant editor: My TRUE bucket list courses for 2022 lie on Long Island, where I grew up peering over the fences (literally) into many of the greatest golf courses on earth. But for the sake of choosing a location that’s accessible to the general public, I’ll cross the country for a radically different selection: Chambers Bay. The much-maligned U.S. Open host has fallen into favor among course-design types in the years since its unfortunate debut, and, from what I understand, on a sunny afternoon, it might well be the world’s most underrated muni. I’ve spoken to plenty of people who have played Chambers over the years, and none have anything other than deeply held admiration for Robert Trent Jones Jr.’s work. I’ve also never been to Seattle, and have been longing to make a trip to my first Kraken game. Why not cross both off the bucket list?

Nick Piastowski, senior editor: I’m a fall-temps player (think 50s and 60s), but there’s always been one problem — in the places I’ve lived, I’ve caught that for just about a month, and it’s winter. I think I’ve found an answer. The spot includes the weather I’m looking for, one of the world’s most iconic courses, rates in the vicinity of half off(!) from peak season — and a brewery nearby. I’m very much eyeing a late-year trip to Pinehurst. Thirty-six in late November or early December, with a brew or two afterward, feels like a great way to end the 2022 golf year.

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The post Six years after controversial U.S. Open, Chambers Bay is ready for another appeared first on Golf.

The post Six years after controversial U.S. Open, Chambers Bay is ready for another appeared first on Golf.

Early this week, the best male golfers in the world convened on a municipally-owned course, a triumphant past U.S. Open host that sits on a dramatic strip of coastline overlooking the Pacific Ocean. Phil Mickelson was on site early. So, too, was Bryson DeChambeau.

Up the coast some 1,200 miles, another municipally-owned past U.S. Open site was open for public play. There were no Tour pros present. Rain threatened a full afternoon tee sheet. A dramatic sheet of fog rolled across the inlet; Chambers Bay isn’t quite on the open ocean but feels that way. A group of Seattleites sent their tee shots down the first fairway and trudged gamely into the drizzle.

There are a handful of big-picture similarities between Torrey Pines and Chambers Bay. They’re the only two West Coast munis to host the U.S. Open. They each produced big-time champions in unforgettable fashion. In non-tournament times, residents of each course’s respective county can play for a relatively modest greens fee. And they’ve been part of a two-decade mission from the USGA to highlight more accessible golf courses at its highest-profile championship.

But their differences are at least as important.

Torrey Pines sets up like a traditional U.S. Open; we don’t have to wait for Thursday this week to know we’ll be watching pros navigate thin fairways, thick rough and tricky greens. The course is familiar to avid golf fans, too; in addition to the 2008 U.S. Open, we see Torrey on the PGA Tour schedule every year for the Farmers Insurance Open. Tiger Woods has won the Farmers seven times, and it’s impossible to overstate just how important that is to the health and perception of the tournament venue. Torrey’s lone stint as major host went well for the same simple reason: Tiger Woods won the event in wild, dramatic fashion.

Features

Chambers Bay, on the other hand, has always been intentionally non-traditional. Wide fairways provide ample space off the tee. The rough is sparse, where it exists. Gorse and waste bunkers are the order of the day; they guard the holes’ perimeters. When Chambers hosted the 2015 U.S. Open, a terrific champion (Jordan Spieth) held off a worthy challenger (Dustin Johnson) while shooting a satisfying U.S. Open score (five under) for four days. Great news, right?

Not completely. Deserved or not, a few vocal dissenters, a balky Fox broadcast, a challenging spectator experience and a sketchy 18th-hole three-putt from would-be winner Dustin Johnson carried the day. The tournament hiccups became synonymous with the course itself. Oh, and Woods played poorly, missing the weekend. That’s always bad for business.

In the golf world, major championships serve as markers of time. But they can also remind us how time bends in our minds. Last month, we all squawked about how Rory McIlroy’s 2012 win at Kiawah felt like yesterday. But Chambers Bay is beginning to feel an entire generation removed. After all, it’s not clear the game’s very best will ever be back.

A lot has changed in six years. Jordan Spieth has lived an entire career since then, complete with dips and valleys, triumphs and and pseudo-slumps.

Johnson left Chambers still without a major, but now he has two — plus the World No. 1 rank.

Woods’ golf future looked decidedly uncertain at Chambers; the tournament’s enduring imagery includes at least one shot of him sitting defeated in the dunegrass. He has three victories since then, including a Masters — and he’s surpassed that number in major surgeries since then, too.

It’s not just the players that have changed. Chambers marked Fox’s championship golf debut. In the years that followed the network got much better, cycled through talent, upped its strategy and ultimately tapped out. Fox is now out of the golf coverage game completely. And while a majority of change-resistant fans may not miss them, they probably should. Fox was dismissed as weird, but it brought something different to the table and pulled the entire product of televised golf into the modern era. Chambers can relate.

Courses

The course is different now, too. The greens, which were brown and speckled in 2015, have been completely redone. Rather than continue to fight off invasive poa annua, which contributed to the bumpiness of the fescue putting surfaces, Chambers embraced the poa and replaced all 18 greens. They’ve received rave reviews.

The entire place is a different color now, too. Part of the confusion in 2015 was that U.S. Opens are traditionally lush and green, while Chambers was a browned-out neo-links course with shocking slopes. It’s never meant to look like the bottle-green of Augusta National, but it’s far greener now than it was.

Regionally, Chambers Bay always garnered plenty of respect. Locals blame anything from bad luck to bad weather to USGA stubbornness for the issues with the greens in 2015, but the general consensus is that the course is spectacular, regardless of what the TV audience thought. Weekend tee times at Chambers remain hot commodities. There’s no golf experience like it anywhere else in the region.

I teed off on Sunday afternoon at 4:10 p.m. with a mixed, excited foursome. There was my friend Pat, who lives in Seattle, my cousin’s friend Dave, who happened to be in town for a wedding, and another guy named Dave, of Dave & Matt Vans, who was dropping off the big rig I’d be using for my subsequent trek to Torrey Pines. Neither Dave had played the course before, and they got the entire range of weather. Drizzle. Dramatic fog. Heavy rain.

The greens were somehow puddling but also faster than they looked. The fairways, which are sand-based and drain well, continued to roll out. Despite plenty of errant shots, we didn’t lose many balls. Despite potentially miserable conditions, we didn’t lose morale, either. Chambers Bay is fun to play.

The course ebbs and flows in a particularly satisfying way; even though the entire place is on one piece of connected property, each hole is easily distinguishable from all the others.

No. 1 plays down toward the water, yielding an early scoring opportunity (unlike the pros, civilians play it as a par-5). No. 4 charges back up the hill, demanding a heroic carry uphill over a mass of sand. No. 5 delivers a dramatic view. No. 8 plays along the uppermost ridge. No. 10 slithers up a chute, framed by dunes that loom on either side. No. 13 boomerangs you along the perimeter of the property before No. 15 delivers you back to the water’s edge, where you’ll spend the next three holes. There’s some inefficiency in a couple of the green-to-tee walks, but the experience of the course itself keeps you on your toes.

The rain stopped completely — and mercifully — as we played that closing stretch. Streaks of sun bounced off the bay. A train came rumbling past as we putted out on 17. Dusk set in as we stood on the 18th tee, admiring the massive cement structures that sit, ruin-like, along the right side, remnants of Chambers’ past as a rock quarry and gravel mine. We were soggy but happy.

The USGA hasn’t abandoned Chambers; quite the opposite. The U.S. Amateur Four-Ball was there just last month, and the U.S. Women’s Am is slated for 2022. There are rumblings that a U.S. Women’s Open could follow. The men’s Open schedule has filled up for most of the next decade, though. If the powers-that-be are plotting a return trip to University Place, they’re playing it pretty cool.

Despite its time in the limelight this week, Torrey Pines faces a similarly murky U.S. Open future. The USGA loves the ratings boost that comes with a West Coast major, but the “anchor sites” that constitute the tournament’s regular rotation don’t allow for much flexibility going forward.

As we putted out on 18 I returned to the site of Johnson’s three-putt demise. The green is an entirely different color now. Greener. Less speckled. Slower, too. And smoother. The pin was in the front left part of the green, so Johnson’s hole location (back left) required some imagination. In my mind, I drained the putt and claimed the U.S. Open title.

Post-round we performed one of golf’s most satisfying rituals — changing out of soggy clothes — and then took a peek from the upper parking lot out onto the ninth tee. The rest of the course stretched out beyond, empty and spectacular. A fiery, concentrated sunset bounced off the water. I was struck with the realization that this must happen nearly every evening in the summer.

Chambers Bay will be just fine.

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The post Our staff’s 14 favorite public courses we played for the first time in 2020 appeared first on Golf.

The post Our staff’s 14 favorite public courses we played for the first time in 2020 appeared first on Golf.

From Bandon Ore., to Farmingdale, N.Y. From Nekoosa, Wis., to Scottsdale, Ariz. Left to right. Up and down. 

Golfers, according to National Golf Foundation reports, didn’t just play golf in 2020. They played golf. Our staff included. We played our old favorites. And, as the hefty numbers might suggest, we played some new favorites. 

Below are our staff’s 14 favorite public courses we played for the first time in 2020: 

Michael Bamberger: Jeffersonville, a muni in Jeffersonville, Pa., on the outskirts of Norristown, in the far reaches of Philadelphia. A Ross. Inexpensive. Great people. Easy to walk. Interesting greens. No pretense. Come as you are. Pure golf.

Alan Bastable: I gotta cheat, because I didn’t play any new public courses in 2020 (lean year!), but I did gain a new appreciation for one: the par-3 course at Ash Brook GC, the muni up the road from my central New Jersey home. There’s nothing fancy about this pint-sized nine-holer. The tee boxes are hitting mats, the greens tend to run either shaggy or worn, and a dilapidated starter’s shed overlooks the 1st tee. But here’s the thing: Like a reliable friend, it’s always there for you. That hasn’t been the case with many golf courses during our coast-to-coast quarantine, when golf suddenly became the cool kid with whom everyone wanted to hang. As the game’s popularity surged, tee times became to golfers what Hamilton tickets were to theatergoers: really hard to score. During the spring, summer and fall, the regulation course at Ash Brook was jammed, no doubt just as the munis and public courses in your own towns were.

But the AB Par-3? It was available (no booking required!), and, for the price of a sleeve of ProV1s, always happy to have you. When the mood struck, I’d grab three clubs, jump in the car and less than 10 minutes later, I was on the tee, knocking a wedge toward the 1st green. That my 8-year-old was usually by my side made it all the sweeter. An hour later, we’d be back in the car, with somewhere around 30 or 40 swings and strokes under our belts — and considerably more than that on the occasions when we had the place to ourselves. Fun, fast, unfussy. The best kind of golf.    

Josh Berhow: I played Troon North’s Monument Course in Scottsdale, Ariz., for the first time way back in January, and I can’t wait to go back. It’s desert target golf full of elevation changes and strategic choices. Tee shots are intimidating, but don’t let that fool you — there’s more room out there than it looks. It’s a great layout with big greens and some fun, short par-4s. It also has one of the coolest photo ops you’ll find, because architects Tom Weiskopf and Jay Morrish simply couldn’t get the gigantic 25-foot boulder out of the way. It’s now in the middle of the par-5 3rd fairway. Don’t hit it.

James Colgan: In October, a few buddies and I scheduled our first-ever golf weekend to New York’s capital region. The first day, we played Saratoga National — a cheeky, TOUGH course set in gorgeous fall scenery. But on day 2, we stumbled into my favorite round of the year. With the help of professional golfer and GOLF senior writer Dylan Dethier, we drove over the Massachusetts border into Williamstown for a tee time at Taconic Golf Club. The course is loaded with history (in perfect New England brashness, a sign out front reads: “No preferred lies, we play golf here”), but I couldn’t get over the golf. Quirky, impeccable and undulating, Taconic is everything great about golf, without any of the manufactured pretension. I can’t wait to get back.

Kevin Cunningham: Marine Park Golf Course in Brooklyn, N.Y. I played Marine Park for the first time in 2020, and I instantly fell in love. As a resident of New York City, it’s often easy to forget you’re living in a beach town. Not so at MPGC. The windswept, linksy course may not be directly on the ocean, but an ocean channel runs along several holes, and you can hear, feel and taste the Atlantic on every hole, with NYC’s most popular beaches waiting just down the road. Pair that with a fun layout, challenging raised greens and views of the NYC skyline, and you can see there is much to love. I must have played MPGC more than a dozen times in the last few months of the year, and I plan to beat that number next year.

Dylan Dethier: I’ve dreamt of playing Chambers Bay for a half-decade, ever since its polarizing appearance as 2015 U.S. Open host threw the golf world into a tizzy, and I got a couple chances this fall to explore that beautiful golf moonscape for myself. Now I just can’t wait to go back. I played a good bit of public golf this year, though, so I should mention that Erin Hills is even better than you’d think, the Golden Horseshoe’s Gold Course in Williamsburg, Va., was my most pleasant surprise, and the University of Georgia course in Athens was the best value I saw all year. 

Luke Kerr-Dineen: Halfway through the year, I made a resolution to play more courses around Connecticut, which is where I live, so one Friday, me and a friend drove up to Simsbury Farms Golf Course just west of Hartford. For $40, we breezed right on without any delay and walked around in under four hours. It’s a short course but undulating, which means you can hit lots of drivers with some room for forgiveness, but you’re duly punished for the really bad ones. It fulfilled all of my three criteria for whether I like a golf course — fun, authentic, not stupid — and I’d play it again in a heartbeat. 

Jessica Marksbury: My little boy was born in March — a true pandemic baby! — so my time for golf has been extremely limited this year. But I did have the opportunity to sneak away for a quick 18 when my parents were in town back in October, and we played the Arizona Biltmore’s Links Course, just 20 minutes from my home in Phoenix. It was the perfect re-entry to the game after a long layoff, with hard-to-miss fairways, and was highlighted by a showstopping view of downtown Phoenix on the signature par-3 15th. 

Zephyr Melton: Bethpage Black in Farmingdale, N.Y. The Black was the site of the first-ever golf tournament I attended (2009 U.S. Open), and I did so with my grandpa, who inspired my love of the game. I’d always wanted to play the course, and getting to finally test my mettle at one of the toughest courses in the world was a treat. My grandpa is long gone now, but there was something special about sharing that walk with him — even if only in spirit. It helped that I played pretty well, too. Only 80 blows to get around that brute. Not bad for a first-timer. 

Nick Piastowski: Pound Ridge Golf Club in Pound Ridge, N.Y. This is a tough task. Starting at the end of June, I tried to play a different public course every week or so, including quite a few for the first time. Courses in northeast Ohio were great, and Green Mountain National in Vermont was great. But Pound Ridge was the greatest. It was playable — not too hard, not too easy. It was in fantastic condition. It was incredibly scenic. It was memorable. I’ll be back in 2021. 

Tim Reilly: Christman’s Mountain Course in Windham, N.Y. After spending the first two months of quarantine barely stepping foot outside of my NYC studio apartment, the trip to Windham was my first reprieve. The Mountain Course was the first course I stretched my legs on, and the crisp, mountain air was all the more refreshing because of it. It was quiet, shaggy in the best way possible and had just enough twist, turns and elevation changes to keep you on your toes. I literally felt like I was alone on a mountain out there. 

Also, I have to include its sister nine-hole course just across the street: Valley Family Course. I played nine holes nearly every day after work for a week there with my girlfriend, who is just learning the game. I couldn’t recommend it enough for beginners and anyone looking to not take the game too seriously for a little over an hour. 

Josh Sens: I’ve been sidelined with a shoulder injury for six months so I haven’t gotten in much golf this year. But I did make it up to Sheep Ranch in Oregon in May, and it did not disappoint. A mile of coastline. Nine greens on the bluffs. Not a single sand bunker, but all the character and eye candy you could ask for. It was so good, it almost makes up for all the other golf I didn’t play in 2020. Almost.

Alan Shipnuck: Has to be Sheep Ranch, which feels like it could have been airlifted from Ireland and is as much fun as you can have in pleated pants. But a strong honorable mention to Forest Dunes and the Loop — what a spectacular spot and well worth the pilgrimage.

Andrew Tursky: Fun fact about me: I love par-3 and executive courses. I think they’re the perfect way to get out and play some golf without eating up the whole day. They can really help sharpen your short game and iron play. That being said, I played one of my favorite par-3 courses I’ve ever played this year: Mountain Shadows in Arizona. Wow. Great views and some really entertaining/difficult holes to keep you engaged the entire 18. It’s in great shape and really offers a country club vibe. I highly recommend it if you’re ever in the Phoenix/Scottsdale area. 

Sean Zak: Mammoth Dunes at Sand Valley in Wisconsin. The fairways are wide, but you can still miss them. The greens are mammoth, but you don’t want these 70-foot two-putts. There are a number of holes where you’re thinking off the tee: “Is it driver, 3-wood or long iron?” It has probably the best forced-carry par-3 without a water hazard that I’ve ever seen (No. 13). Can’t wait to play it again. 

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The post Dream 18: The best 18 holes built in the last 44 years appeared first on Golf.

The post Dream 18: The best 18 holes built in the last 44 years appeared first on Golf.

Published in 1976, The World Atlas of Golf should be a cornerstone of any golf architecture library, and maybe its finest feature is contributing editor Pat Ward-Thomas’s article, “Elements of Greatness: A Classic Course.”

Remaining true to each actual hole number (a No. 1 had to stay a No. 1, a No. 2 a No. 2 and so on), Ward-Thomas created an ideal 18, picking one hole from famous courses worldwide.

“Many may disagree with the composition of the course,” he wrote, “but nobody could fairly dispute that it would call upon a golfer to demonstrate skill in every part of the game; that it embraces the quality of exceptional design, and much of the beauty with which golf is blessed; that it would command respect from the mighty and be a great deal of fun for anyone to play.”

Mission accomplished, and brilliantly so: Ward-Thomas rightly focused on the quality of each hole as well as how those holes would relate to one another. It was an eye-opening read the first time and remains just as entertaining the hundredth time. Still, the book was published back in 1976—what about all the brilliant layouts built since?

Many people, myself included, believe that we’re living in a second Golden Age of course design, so it seemed only fitting that my homage to “Elements of Greatness” stick to places built post-World Atlas of Golf. As it’s meant to be a celebration of modern design, this list is restricted to one entry per architect, to acknowledge as many leaders in the field as possible. Also worth noting: 14 of these 18 holes are accessible to the paying public, a telling sign of progress.

Hole No. 1: Wolf Point

Port Lavaca, Texas — Par 4, 320 Yards

Architects: Mike Nuzzo with Don Mahaffey

Why it’s great: A wide but strategic fairway provides the perfect getaway for an opening hole.

Overview: Ask four golfers why they like a hole and you’ll often get four different answers, but every (sane) golfer agrees that a wide fairway is the ideal way to start a round. Old Tom Morris taught us this lesson at St. Andrews; at Royal Melbourne, Alister MacKenzie perfected the notion of gaining advantage from a particular spot in a sea of short grass.

America’s widest first fairway, and one of its smartest, resides at Wolf Point, a course originally built for one man on his East Texas ranch that has developed a cult following among design aficionados since its 2007 opening.

A lake sits off to the left, the rest of Texas is to the right and the golfer finds himself staring at a fairway 240 yards wide. To miss it would bring shame, and yet, sure enough, the more you position the drive toward the trouble left, the better the angle of approach to most hole locations given the green’s predominant right-to-left cant.

Hole No. 2: Kingsley Club

Kingsley, Mich. — Par 3, 150 Yards

Architect: Mike DeVries

Why it’s great: An ultra-precise par-3 shot is the perfect follow-up to a wide-open starter.

Overview: People who study golf’s pace of play—yes, there are such people—pooh-pooh the idea of a reachable par-5 or a par-3 early on either side, holding forth that such holes cause play to back up. My experience says that the opposite holds true, that both hole types invariably spread out play.

Regardless, Mike DeVries routed this one-shotter along the top of a ridge, with the narrow green naturally falling off on both sides toward either deep bunkers or, worse still, thick fescue grass. The green, at 38 yards, is much deeper than it is wide (just nine yards at the front).

Yard for yard, this may well be the hardest hole on this entire Dream Course. More important, the juxtaposition of its intense call for precision against the freewheeling, spacious opening hole is simply too delicious to pass up.  

Hole No. 3: Ocean Course at Kiawah Island

Kiawah Island, S.C. — Par 4, 365 Yards

Architect: Pete Dye

Why it’s great: Green complexes this good don’t need bunkering.

Overview: Pete Dye did the game a huge favor when he reestablished the popularity of the short par-4. A 1963 trip to Scotland cemented his fondness for such holes, and this one might well be his finest. The fairway offers plenty of width; when the pin is front-left, the golfer aims right off the tee and vice versa. The merciless, bunkerless green is nothing more than a knuckle perched some five to seven feet above its surroundings, and its relative flatness provides no help in stopping approach shots.

Notably, when the breeze is off the Atlantic and into the player, the 3rd plays easier than when the wind blows offshore and the hole is downwind, as the already small, 3,920-square-foot green becomes even more elusive. Golf is more interesting to more people when accuracy and finesse trump brute strength, and it’s fascinating how a short hole with a tame putting surface can do just that.

Hole No. 4: Tobacco Road

Sanford, N.C. — Par 5, 535 Yards

Architect: Mike Strantz

Why it’s great: A great hazard you can challenge but recover from if you miss.

Overview: The dearly, too-early departed Mike Strantz left behind a small portfolio of nine original works that range from intimate to muscular. His designs resisted stereotyping except for one feature: He adored the button-hook par 5, meaning a hole that swings around a great hazard. Tobacco Road in fact features two such holes, this one and No. 11.

The latter plays around the deepest hazard in North Carolina, but the 4th was chosen for the grace with which the fairway tumbles and connects to the green. Also, the great hazard being more human in scale, at six feet deep, tempts golfers into greedier tactics than the hazard at 11, which is three times deeper. Hazards from which you can recover are more enticing, and therefore interesting, to challenge than water features like lakes and ponds, which are overly penal with no hope of recovery.

Hole No. 5: The Cove Club at Cabo Del Sol

Cabo San Lucas, Mexico — Par 4, 470 Yards

Architect: Jack Nicklaus

Why it’s great: A study in keeping the foreground “quiet” so the background can sing.

Overview: Standing on this elevated tee, with the distant flag flapping against the Sea of Cortez, it’s easy to understand why Jack Nicklaus maintains that golf is best appreciated played downhill. A lateral hazard runs the length of the hole along the right, while a shoulder from the hill protrudes in from the left. The closer the golfer hugs the lateral hazard, the better the optics for the approach shot to a green intensely connected to the sea. The putting surface starts off glued to the ground front left but gradually rises as it angles away to the right. Brave is the player who chases after back-right flags, as the short grass surrounding the green is only too happy to whisk balls away. No bunkers required, and at high tide the water can get as close as 15 yards from the green—the light touch of salt spray can make even the most concentrated golfer back away from a putt.

No. 6: South Cape Owners Club

Namhae Island, South Korea — Par 3, 235 Yards

Architect: Kyle Phillips

Why it’s great: Every course needs a “heroic” moment.

Overview: One sacrosanct rule in architecture: There are no rules. It’s easy to wax poetic about the ground game, as witness our prior hole; sometimes, though, it’s mighty rewarding when the architect demands that the player simply hit the damn shot needed. Such exemplars—think, No. 12 at Augusta National or No. 16 at Cypress Point—create the sport’s most thrilling, indelible memories.

This South Korean beauty replicates the latter’s heart-pounding excitement of launching a long iron off a cliff and over the pounding surf. The jagged cliff-line proved ideal for Kyle Phillips, who routed three of the course’s one-shot holes along it. He artfully arranged the tees here to make the shot palatable for as many skill sets as possible, but most players can’t help but have a crack from the tips, so compelling is the heroic carry. Though the setting steals the show, the rolling green itself is also full of character.

Hole No. 7: Ardfin

Isle of Jura, Scotland — Par 4, 460 Yards

Architect: Bob Harrison

Why it’s great: There’s an obvious shortcut off the tee—but is it the right answer?

Overview: Should there be a set way to master a hole or many? The 7th at Ardfin, opened in 2016 and criminally under the radar, is an example of posing a conundrum not easily solved. The straight line from tee to green traverses broken ground; the crescent-shaped fairway is an inverted C to the right. Logic suggests hugging the inside of the curve to reduce the distance for the approach…yet that route often yields a blind shot. From the outside of the fairway, more is revealed but the shot is longer.

One rub for the downhill approach: The green follows the slope of the surrounding land, i.e., the putting surface cascades from front to back. Trying to get the ball to behave and stop on the correct part of the green—even on a rare calm day in the Inner Hebrides—is among the more exasperating yet thrilling tests this Dream Course poses.

Hole No. 8: Congaree

Ridgeland, S.C. — Par 5, 545 Yards

Architect: Tom Fazio

Why it’s great: An old-school nod to “using the ground.”

Overview: For golf architects as for rock bands, the early work often remains the most original. To Tom Fazio’s credit, three decades after his designs at Wild Dunes and Wade Hampton reestablished that the sport should be about fun, he was producing top-notch courses like Congaree and Gozzer Ranch.

Much of Congaree’s playing season occurs when its Bermuda fairways are dormant—and blazingly quick. This golf-for-golfers club doesn’t color or overseed the fairways: Ownership appreciates the ground game and understands that the new Bermuda grasses aid this approach. Fazio imbued this design with numerous cases whereby you hit to X to end up at Y, none so dramatic as here, where the thrilling challenge is to hit left of the green, avoiding all the trouble on the right and allow the 30-yard-long kicker slope to feed the ball down and onto the open green—a shot to savor for the thinking golfer. 

Hole No. 9: Askernish

Askernish, Scotland — Par 4, 340 Yards

Architect: Martin Ebert

Why it’s great: It proves that super greens don’t have to be superfast.

Overview: Situated in the Outer Hebrides, Askernish has the distinction of being built this century over ground once occupied by a 19th-century course designed by titans Old Tom Morris and Horace Hutchinson. Course owner Ralph Thompson got the idea in 2005 to maximize the wondrous dunescape here on the Isle of South Uist and called in architect Martin Ebert and greenkeeper Gordon Irvine to carry out his vision.

The course has only four formalized bunkers, and that’s plenty given the rollicking land. Just four people maintain the course, and the greens don’t play as intended if they Stimp much above 8. Never mind: As a set, the green complexes represent one of the game’s finest collections, headlined by the 9th, where the putting surface is set at a 45-degree angle to play. A deep depression in front and a deeper one in back confound the golfer, making this wee two-shotter a position hole with teeth.
Old Tom and Horace would be proud.

Hole No. 10: Gamble Sands

Brewster, Wash. — Par 3, 140 Yards

Architect: David McLay Kidd

Why it’s great: Challenges the notion that the target must fit the shot.

Overview: You hear it all the time: The target should fit the shot. A short hole? The green should be small. While that can be true, a small target has the sometimes unwanted effect of focusing a golfer’s concentration. As Nos. 9 and 10 at The Old Course have demonstrated forever, large greens at short holes make getting a pitch close bizarrely vexing.

Leave it to the Scotsman David McLay Kidd to pick up on such a design cue. Though the green measures a whopping 13,119 square feet, its interior contours are superb and the desired birdie often proves elusive. Even more maddening is when a bogey surfaces because the golfer got out of position on this position hole. For such a short hole, the massive green provides an uncommon amount of hole locations, be it back left atop a plateau or to the right in a bowl guarded by a bunker. That’s called flexibility, people.

Hole No. 11: Cabot Links

Inverness, Nova Scotia — Par 5, 540 Yards

Architect: Rod Whitman

Why it’s great: A par-5 that keeps its foot on the pedal.

Overview: Too many par-5s lack merit by tolerating loose play. Either the drive or layup is a nonevent, or the pitch to the green uninteresting. Here, each shot builds off the prior’s success. Finding the sloping fairway off the tee is paramount as Rod Whitman routed the hole such that the second shot must scale a 30-foot bank or else you’re likely headed for a regrettable sequence of events.

The 72-yard-wide, thought-provoking landing area for the second is actually wider than the driving zone, debunking the myth that a classic three-shotter must progressively narrow. As the hole is uphill and generally into the wind, Whitman extends an olive branch with the high left side of the green complex maintained as tight fescue, so that players can deaden their approach and watch the ball trickle off the slope and drift toward the hole. Both Mike Keiser and Ben Crenshaw consider this among the best par 5s they’ve seen. Enough said.

Hole No. 12: Erin Hills

Erin, Wis. — Par 4, 435 Yards

Architects: Dana Fry, Michael Hurdzan and Ron Whitten

Why it’s great: The glories of natural topography.

Overview: Recent restoration work at several Golden Age designs, including Eastward Ho!, Moraine and West Bend, has highlighted how thrilling golf over glacial landforms can be. Same here with the 12th at Erin Hills, which captures the sensation of playing across tumbling landforms even when more than 1,000 miles from the nearest coastline. Its fairway heaves and plunges, and architects Dana Fry, Michael Hurdzan and Ron Whitten did well to leave the landforms alone and keep the machinery away. The world’s most distinctive holes are the ones that follow nature’s lead, as unlike man, nature doesn’t repeat herself.

I once wrote of No. 12, “This is a prime example of what people mean when they write about a well-routed hole over great land. Courses over more mundane land can’t compete with drama so deeply rooted in nature.”

Dare I say, those words still hold true.

Hole No. 13: Pacific Dunes

Bandon, Ore. — Par 4, 444 Yards

Architect: Tom Doak

Why it’s great: Aesthetic pleasure is a key part of golf’s appeal.

Overview: This hole was a no-brainer selection: Just look at the thing! With the coastline left, a stunning blowout dune right and skyline green ahead, it epitomizes the allure of golf at Bandon Dunes Resort. Really, what more do you want? What most players don’t realize, though, is that this picture-perfect hole was a late addition to Tom Doak’s routing. As he explains in his new book on routing courses, Getting to 18, Doak originally had several holes routed on land that ultimately was used by David McLay Kidd for the Bandon Dunes layout. Thankfully, owner Mike Keiser kept gobbling up land to the north and presented Doak with the opportunity to include the parcel that houses the 13th into the final Pacific Dunes routing. 

Unlucky 13

Built in 1988 in Northern Michigan, Tom Doak’s first design, High Pointe, now lies fallow, but those lucky enough to play it won’t forget the experience. The 430-yard, par-4 13th was as good as it gets: a downhill two-shotter to a green that fell away to the back left. Capping off a grand hole with a bland green in the name of “fairness” proved flawed thinking whose time would soon pass, thanks in part to Doak, who went on to earn fabulous sites and build even better courses but arguably has yet to build a hole that clearly surpasses this marvel.

Hole No. 14: Chambers Bay

University Place, Wash. — Par 4, 495 Yards

Architects: Robert Trent Jones Jr. with Bruce Charlton and Jay Blasi

Why it’s great: A dogleg that tempts — as it should.

Overview: At the heart of great architecture lies the temptation to attempt something to gain an advantage for the next shot. The dogleg is among the most time-honored of the myriad ways to present such a puzzle, and this one is among the best.

From an elevated tee, the golfer can readily grasp the risks and rewards of hugging or even cutting off the dogleg by carrying as much of the sandy waste as possible. A small central hazard of the sort far too infrequently found in modern architecture must be avoided as the hole elbows from right to left. The golfer then faces a hugely appealing approach thanks to the fescue fairways, whereby a low bullet draw can run forever toward a bank along the green’s right that helps feed the ball toward the hole. A sprawling bunker complex runs tee to green along the left and exemplifies Robert Trent Jones Jr.’s artistry—no surprise from a man who takes pride in composing poetry.

Hole No. 15: Bandon Trails

Bandon, Ore. — Par 4, 405 yards

Architects: Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw

Why it’s great: A truly sublime and thoughtful green complex.

Overview: Every course has a shortfall, and so does every Dream Course. Yes, it’s criminal that no hole from Sand Hills nor Friar’s Head appears in this compilation. Blame Coore & Crenshaw, not me: They’ve provided too many dazzlers from which to choose!

A diagonal cross bunker 130 yards from the green makes this a nervy drive; getting your drive close to, but not in, is a simple objective—except for the uncertainty of stopping a ball on these fescue fairways. What truly makes the hole is its fabulous found green site. Nestled in an amphitheater of dunes, the green appears as an extension of the fairway, climbing a false front and then rising to the rear: a postcard-perfect green complex with handsome bunkers carefully teased from the surrounding dunescape. Many people judge a course by the strength of its two-shotters, and one thing is without question—you have just played four straight sterling ones.  

Hole No. 16: Ballybunion Cashen

Ballybunion, Ireland — Par 3, 160 yards

Architect: Robert Trent Jones Sr.

Why it’s great: A short par-3 with never-ending shot demands.

Overview: The Jones family patriarch, Robert Trent Jones Sr., acted as a bridge between the Golden Age and modern architecture. His reach of more than 500 courses is staggering considering his career mostly unfolded before air travel became routine. Many of his works were built on heavier-soil sites, so what a thrill it must have been to receive this commission in the early 1980s.

Not reliant on length, the 16th is prickly. Depending on the wind’s strength and direction, the tee shot may well have to be shaped and the trajectory definitely controlled. That’s what great golf is about, prompting better players to display the full arsenal of their shot repertoire. In this case, that takes place in one of the game’s most magical settings, with southwest Ireland’s fabulously massive sand dunes stretching up the coast and the sight and roar of the Atlantic just left adding to the drama.

Hole No. 17: Carnegie Links at Skibo Castle

Dornoch, Scotland — Par 4, 305 yards

Architects: Donald Steel with Tom Mackenzie

Why it’s great: An impactful, drivable par-4.

Overview: In the first Masters, the nines were reversed, so the current Nos. 12, 13 and 15 lived on the first nine. Unimaginable! Where a hole falls in a round impacts its influence. Many thrilling short two-shotters come so early (including No. 3 at Augusta) as to limit their sway, but such is lay-of-the-land design.

Drivable short par 4s are the darling of modern architecture, and among the best late-round versions lives at Skibo. Situated at the end of a peninsula that juts into the Dornoch Firth, the 17th’s setting is impossibly gorgeous. Four deep pot bunkers litter the fairway; an angled green best accepts shots from the left, meaning that a tee shot needs to be aimed toward the firth and danger in order to open up the spine of the green for one’s approach. This teaser sealed the fate of the 1996 Shell’s Wonderful World of Golf match between Fred Couples (birdie) and Greg Norman (bogey).

Hole No. 18: Castle Stuart

Inverness, Scotland — Par 5, 595 Yards

Architects: Gil Hanse and Mike Parsinen

Why it’s great: An exciting closer that makes you want to return to No. 1.

Overview: A home hole has two prerequisite duties: pose interesting questions to suitably conclude a match, and make you itch to play again. Plenty of long par-4s do that (Harbour Town, Winged Foot’s West), but a half-par hole to the easier side (Pebble Beach, St. Andrews) does a better job drawing a player back.

Few perform their functions as well as the closer at Castle Stuart. Watching Scottish Opens here have been fascinating. One day, this hole is driver, wood, mid-iron; the next day, driver, mid-iron! Such elasticity doesn’t come by chance. The fairway cascades downhill, and its artful contours make a huge difference in where a tee ball finally ends. Under favorable conditions, golfers relish a crack at the green in two over broken ground and past bunkers. Otherwise, the fairway left of such trouble provides the safe passage—and lends the hole the coveted virtue of playing well for all players in all conditions.

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The New England dish is a staple in grill rooms across the country but learn why the best chowder comes from Washington.

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How Chambers Bay and Erin Hills saw their rankings change due to their performance as major venues.

How Chambers Bay and Erin Hills saw their rankings change due to their performance as major venues.

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The post Chambers Bay and John Ladenburg: He Built It, They’re Coming appeared first on Golf.

The post Chambers Bay and John Ladenburg: He Built It, They’re Coming appeared first on Golf.

John Ladenburg stops on the 18th fairway at Chambers Bay Golf Course near a bunker tunneled into the fairway, a trap so deep it’s called Chambers Basement. With stairs needed to reach the bottom, it more resembles a meteor crash site, or a wine cellar, or the safest place in University Place, Wash., to take cover during a tornado.

Of course, it’s unlikely a cyclone will ever rip through western Washington; in fact, it’s about as likely as the grand vision Ladenburg conceived more than a decade ago, when he proposed that University Place (pop. 32,000) build a championship-caliber, links-style golf course atop an abandoned gravel mine.

University Place—U.P.—is a suburb of Tacoma, and Tacoma is known for many things: the “Tacoma aroma” that envelops commuters as they pass through on Interstate 5, wide swaths of suburbia, industry, the port, nearby military bases and the Tacoma Dome, site of my high school graduation and home mostly to minor league sports in a minor league city. Tacoma will forever be in the shadow of Seattle, the overlooked half of Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. Except when it comes to golf.

“Nobody saw this,” Ladenburg says with a laugh. “I had to break a few legs and twist a few arms.”

He chips onto the 18th green. The Olympic Mountains form a spectacular backdrop beyond the train tracks and the blue waters of the Puget Sound and the waterfront homes on Fox Island. Later this month the world’s best golfers will descend upon University Place, and the trains will rumble by, and a bald eagle may drop in, and an international television audience will see U.P. for the first time. That’s because a golf course once labeled Ladenburg’s Folly will host the U.S. Open. Yes, that U.S. Open.

Ladenburg putts out, then retires to the clubhouse restaurant, which sits high above the course, the best views in Tacoma spread below. He orders a Chambers Bay Ale and begins to tell another unlikely success story—his own. For years Ladenburg, 65, worked as a federal prosecutor. He tried criminals for sexual abuse, gang violence and racketeering. In his spare time he traveled the country playing slo-pitch softball. Ladenburg is the third oldest of 16 children, and his family tree was stocked with so many softball enthusiasts it yielded two teams. Everyone wore the same jersey, with Ladenburg stitched across the back. The clan was even featured in SI.

At 48, Ladenburg quit softball and took up golf. In 2000, he was elected Pierce County Executive. And that’s how a trial lawyer and a recreational third baseman came to be interested in creating a golf course now nicknamed America’s St. Andrews.

Chambers Bay buzzes with construction. The merchandise pavilion is mostly assembled. The corporate tents are in various stages. The Open, the crown jewel of the U.S. Golf Association, is taking shape.

It will be an Open of firsts: the first held in the Pacific Northwest, on fine fescue grass, with the potential to be played at more than 7,900 yards, contested on a course that opened a mere eight years ago.

The first Open in my hometown.

Ladenburg finishes his beer. He can picture it: Tiger Woods on 18, near the cement holding pens that resemble a Northwest Stonehenge; Rory McIlroy on 15, next to a forsaken fir, the only tree on the course; Jordan Spieth taking suggestions from a caddie who only a few years ago was teaching math to sixth-graders down the street from Chambers Bay.

A U.S. Open. In University Place. Who’d have thought?

 

“For all of us, the initial reaction was, It’s a pipe dream,” says Tipton. “It’s just not going to happen.”

Everything is different now, and yet the memories remain vivid. I drive past the restaurant where I downed 25 ribs to impress the father of my high school girlfriend … past the Jack in the Box where everyone gathered after football games … past the apartment complex my mother moved to after she and my father divorced … past the cemetery where we buried my childhood friend Shane.

And then … a golf course.

A golf course? That’s the last thing anyone could have expected.

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Before Chambers Bay became Chambers Bay, it housed lumber companies, a paper mill, a railroad operation and a succession of companies that mined more than 250 million tons of gravel over more than a century. The gravel was used to build freeways and highways and roads. The abundant sand was used in part to construct area courses.

In 1992, Pierce County purchased most of the 650-acre tract of land and its scrub trees and gravel mounds and shallow drainage pounds for $33 million. It needed a site for a wastewater treatment plant; the land and the views remained hidden beyond a barbed-wire fence. On the rare occasions it snowed, my friends and I would hop that fence and slide down the slopes.

Though he grew up in South Tacoma, Ladenburg was only vaguely aware of the gravel mine. But shortly after he took office, he went to view the property, and what he saw—a vast expanse of land with two miles of western exposure perched on a beach—startled him. Grandview Drive wound along the top of the property, and although the view below lived up to the name, no one, save for those who worked at the mine, actually saw it.

In the early 2000s, U.P. added a trail and sidewalks along Grandview. The enhancement wasn’t seen as simply an assist to walkers and joggers. Rather, Ladenburg wanted to broaden the county’s vision of what was possible for the gravel mine. To sell it, though, he believed the locals needed to see what lay below. Then, maybe, his idea wouldn’t sound so far-fetched.

Ladenburg’s grand plan: He wanted to build a golf course that was strong enough to host the U.S. Open multiple times.

O.K., it was a crazy idea. But perhaps, with the trail, less so.

Inspired by a book about Bethpage Black, the layout on Long Island that is by most accounts the first public course to host a U.S. Open, Ladenburg set his sights on the golf course. The county had a 50-year plan for the property, but he whittled that vision down to eight years. “Everyone thought I was crazy,” Ladenburg says. “I mean, we had to remove 1.4 million cubic tons of sand.” He hired consultants, one of whom told him, “This is as good as Pebble Beach, maybe better.” More than 70 firms applied to design the course.

Most decisions pointed toward making the venue U.S. Open–worthy. The state-of-the-art water treatment system. The open areas with room for tens of thousands of spectators. A ridge above the property that provides views of every hole. Stadium golf, Ladenburg calls it. Still, Tony Tipton, the director of the county’s Parks and Recreation Department, recalls, “For all of us, the initial reaction was, It’s a pipe dream. It’s just not going to happen.”

The plan required a $24 million commitment and the approval of three city councils. Robert Trent Jones Jr. was one of five design finalists to accommodate the county’s request for a 27-hole layout, but his company also included plans for an 18-hole routing. Building two nines made more sense, particularly for marquee tournaments, because it opened up more space between holes. That cemented the county’s decision to go with Jones. When the bid was submitted, his team passed out metal bag tags. They read: CHAMBERS CREEK GOLF COURSE—U.S. OPEN 2030.

Josh Lewis has an office that feels more like a bunker: concrete and windowless, shelves lined with books about agronomy and soil and golf architecture and a pamphlet titled Noxious Weeds of Washington State. An NCAA basketball tournament bracket sits near his computer. The tournament starts on this March morning, and then the Masters will be played and Floyd Mayweather Jr. will fight Manny Pacquiao. And then the sports world will turn its attention toward Chambers Bay and the U.S. Open.

As course superintendent Lewis is charged with maintaining championship conditions. Appropriately, his Twitter handle is @turfyoda. He walks the course on this day with a pair of Walkie Talkies clipped to his belt, a gunslinger agronomist ready to draw. Yellow signs dot some fairways. They read: GROUND UNDER CONSTRUCTION. Hammers nail. Cranes beep. The symphony of construction plays vigorously.

A whiteboard in the maintenance break room says simply: 87 DAYS.

Jones’s team passed out bag tags. They read: CHAMBERS CREEK GOLF COURSE—U.S. OPEN 2030.

Lewis, 32, oversees a staff of about 45, 28 of whom work strictly on the course. At a meeting that morning Lewis tells his troops to stay focused on the finished product, to not overthink the task ahead. Some good news: Thanks to a mild winter and reduced traffic on the course, they are a month ahead of schedule.

A native of Coos Bay, Ore., Lewis started in course maintenance—the art of making grass grow—at 16, mostly to fund his golf habit. These days he rarely plays. Along the Oregon coast he helped turn a forest into Bandon Trails in 18 months. The 72 holes at Bandon Dunes are similar in style to those at Chambers Bay, with native grasses, plants and animals (eagles, osprey, rabbits and coyotes). Lewis wants to promote a style of golf unique to three regions: New Zealand, Great Britain and the Pacific Northwest. Links golf. Pure golf. “Everything doesn’t have to be perfectly edged and manicured,” he says. “We build golf courses that fit into the terrain. I want to showcase golf played that way.”

[pagebreak]

Chambers Bay is a links course, in the tradition of St. Andrews. No water hazards. The solitary tree. Sandy soil. It drains as well as any course in the world, which means the greens can get firm and fast, almost like concrete.

All the grass is fescue, mowed to varying lengths. It is more friendly to the environment, requiring less nitrogen, less maintenance, less water. “I call it old-world greenkeeping,” says Larry Gilhuly, the USGA’s agronomic adviser for the northwest region. “Everyone throws around ‘sustainable’ now, but it is a sustainable turf type.”

Fescue can wear easily, though, like the baseline at Wimbledon in the tournament’s second week. To that end Matt Allen, the general manager at Chambers Bay, monitored the number of rounds played. Last October, the course opened three days each week, and as spring approached, a fourth day was added in April.

Lewis considers all this as he stands on the 10th fairway, while several workers sew patches of grass together as if they are crafting a quilt. He scans the view from the office, the rolling terrain, the water, the mountains. “We’re getting close,” he says.

Jones first surveyed the property in 2003 using Google Earth, and there it was: sand and sea and the possibility of pure links—in the United States. He has designed or built or remodeled more than 300 courses, but he says, “Every once in a while you get the sense that you can do something special.”

As his design took shape, Jones sought to develop an unusual challenge. “The best players in the world tend to be artillery officers shooting from up high,” he says. “This requires more than that. It integrates the ground game with the aerial game. You need both.”

Jones sees Chambers Bay as a tactical course, with great flexibility built in. A “ricochet romance,” he calls it. Depending on the setup, six of the par-4s are drivable, and seven holes can be stretched beyond 490 yards. The course can play anywhere from 6,200 to 7,900 yards. The fairways are 100 yards wide in some spots and as narrow as 10 yards in others; 17 holes are studded with bunkers. “The U.S. Open has never been held at a course like it,” says Danny Sink, the USGA’s championship director.

Chambers Bay opened in 2007. Then the economy tanked. Yet there was this picturesque, expensive, temple of a golf course, saddled with debt payments until 2046. The number of rounds played fell from 40,000 in ’07 to below the number the course required to make its debt payment (roughly 32,000 rounds).

Nevertheless, the wheels to host the Open were set in motion early on. Ladenburg first heard about the possibility when he got a call from Mike Davis, then the USGA’s senior director of rules and competition. Davis, Ladenburg recalls, told him that Winged Foot Golf Club in Mamaroneck, N.Y., which had hosted the Open most recently in 2006, had voted not to bid on the ’15 Open. He then asked Ladenburg to immediately send the USGA a letter on behalf of Chambers Bay. Ladenburg went a step further, also overnighting letters to the members of the selection committee. On Feb. 8, 2008, the USGA announced it was awarding the Open as well as the ’10 U.S. Amateur to Chambers Bay.

The litmus test for whether Chambers Bay could host a major championship came in 2010, at the Amateur. The players struggled with the course, and changes ensued. A tee box was added at the 3rd hole, the 1st, 7th and 13th greens were rebuilt, and the 16th tee was moved perilously close to the train tracks, raising concerns from railroad officials. But the Amateur also showcased how adaptable the course is. Number 9 will play both uphill and downhill at the Open—a 100-foot drop one day, perhaps a 200-foot climb the next. Number 18 will flip between a long but drivable par-4 and a par-5.

“This is everything I know about the game and then some,” says Jones, 75. “I’ve gone to Opens since I was 10 years old, and the history of the Open is embedded in these holes. It’s Royal Dornoch Golf Club in Scotland. It’s the Olympic Club. It’s Ben Hogan with the 1-iron on 18 at Merion in 1950.”

In mid-May, I had dinner with my father. I mentioned that I had driven by our old house during one of my visits to Chambers Bay, how it had been landscaped and repainted, that I had knocked on the front door but no one answered. It has been 17 years since I left, but it still vaguely felt like home.

We both have read the complaints about Chambers Bay: from Tour players who criticized the course and residents who said they were forced out of their homes. My father wondered: How can U.P. pull something like this off?

“He was a visionary,” Davis says of Ladenburg. “I was taken aback by the scale of the site, by the beauty of it.”

That assignment falls to various entities but especially to Sink, a man who has a job that is among the most unusual in sports. Every two to three years he moves to a city ahead of a U.S. Open, rents a house and moves in his wife and two young kids. His office is filled with the treasures of his travels: mini NFL helmets from every city in which he has lived, a decanter from Pebble Beach, a bronze putter from Pinehurst, a menu from the White House (West Wing Burger included).

He also has a series of site maps that show how dramatically Chambers Bay has changed from even four years ago. He says that he and other officials will go through around 55 variations, all the way up until about two weeks out.

This marks Sink’s 16th U.S. Open, and his team oversees everything from the course layout to corporate hospitality to volunteers to ticket sales to merchandise staging. Three years of work culminates in a single week. “We always joke about how great it would be to run an NFL stadium,” Sink says. “You already have everything mapped out. You have parking lots, concessions. Your job is so easy.” He laughs.

Since he arrived, Sink has spoken to more than 200 civic groups and associations. He has planned for how to handle the crush of 35,000 daily spectators. He arranged parking lots up and down I-5, from as far as 40 minutes away, to accommodate some 17,000 cars. He has lined up 290 buses to shuttle fans back and forth.

Still, because of the logistical concerns, some wondered if the USGA would ultimately move the Open. But Tipton, the parks director, says he never had any doubts. “I’ve never woken up in the morning and thought the USGA was going somewhere else,” he says.

[pagebreak]

Back in the restaurant my father posed a question I didn’t know the answer to.

“Do you think it will all be worth it?”

Michael Greller attended the first Chambers Bay caddies meeting in 2007. He had moved to the area and accepted a teaching position at Narrows View Intermediate School because he wanted to be close to the course. “I’d be out there, working as a caddie, and my students would be lined on the bluff, yelling down at me,” he says. His goal: to caddie in the Open.

At the 2010 Amateur, Greller carried for Justin Thomas, and later Thomas introduced him to Jordan Spieth, another budding star, who turned pro in 2012. Greller worked for Spieth occasionally and was eventually offered the job full time. Greller vacillated. Then one day Greller’s wife, Ellie, asked him a question. “If Jordan is in the mix at Chambers Bay, will you be with him? Or will you be wondering why you didn’t pursue that?” So he gave up his teaching gig for a golf bag. With Greller at his side, Spieth went on a meteoric rise, and in April, at 21 he won the Masters in record-breaking fashion.

“People in my life were concerned,” Greller says. “But we’re headed home now.”

He can already see the impact: in the golfers who travel to Chambers Bay from around the world to play a bucket-list Open course; in the sale of Open tickets, which were snapped up faster than ever before, so fast, in fact, that demand crashed the servers; in the volunteer lists, which, pocked with his former students and colleagues, filled up overnight. One caddie, Beau Brushert, says that in the last two years play steadily increased, and he has met golfers from as far away as Shanghai.

Imagine that. U.P. as a destination.

University Place is so different now than when Greller arrived, or when I attended school there, or before Ladenburg had this crazy idea to build a championship golf course atop an abandoned gravel mine. Ziegler says U.P. may change its name to Chambers Bay, after the course that now defines a suburb. Tipton says the economic impact of the Open could be between $100 million and $140 million.

But it’s more than that. It’s a signature moment, a signature event, for a city with a little-brother complex. “I have a lot of friends in Tacoma,” Jones says. “Tacoma was always an industrial town, a labor town, and Seattle got all the clips and blips. Tacoma is coming into its own.”

Locals hope so. Chambers Bay is more than a golf course; there’s a three-mile trail and two meadows, a place for joggers and dog-walkers and bird-watchers. “We’re probably there twice a week,” says Michael Putnam, a Tour player who lives down the street from the course. “For years, this is something I passed, and I didn’t have any idea what was going on. Now they’re hosting a U.S. Open. If I qualify, it would be the highlight of my career.”

Davis first visited Chambers Bay about 10 years ago, back when it was nothing more than dust and sand and gravel mounds. That’s when he met John Ladenburg. “He was a true visionary,” Davis says. “I was taken aback by the scale of the site, by the beauty of it. He saw that before anyone else did.”

When I went to Syracuse for college, I told people I was from Seattle. It was easier to explain, even if it wasn’t exactly true. Chambers Bay provides a new reference point, and a destination, and a reason to return, as little old University Place readies for its close-up.

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