The post Gil Hanse Q&A: Renowned course architect talks the U.S. Amateur, his favorite hole at Ridgewood and more appeared first on Golf.

The post Gil Hanse Q&A: Renowned course architect talks the U.S. Amateur, his favorite hole at Ridgewood and more appeared first on Golf.

PARAMUS, N.J. — Gil Hanse is a busy man.

The 59-year-old is one of the foremost golf-course architects in the world, and his fingerprints are everywhere in the game. From Olympic Club to Southern Hills to The Country Club (among many others), Hanse has left his mark.

Travel

This week’s U.S. Amateur host, Ridgewood Country Club, is no exception. Hanse led a restoration of the classic A.W. Tillinghast design back in the 90s, and three decades later, the course is as good as ever.

And despite the U.S. Amateur being one of the most hectic weeks in golf, Hanse made sure to carve out some time in his schedule to pop over to Ridgewood this week to take in a little of the action. On Wednesday, we found him following along early in the evening as Gordon Sargent and Ford Clegg battled into extra holes.

Hanse might be the busiest man in golf, but he was gracious enough to take a few minutes to chat about his favorite hole on property, the challenges of restoring classic courses and more.

Zephyr Melton: How do you feel the course is holding up so far this week?

Gil Hanse: It’s great so far. I think it’s presenting a really great challenge for these guys — the rough is thick and you’ve got to hit it straight. And I think for a U.S. Amateur that’s a great test. I think the thing that’s been interesting is that these greens have so much slope in them, that not only from a putting standpoint, but also from an approach standpoint, you’ve got to hit the ball to certain spots to get it to feed to where you want it to go. That’s been interesting to watch. The subtleties of the greens have been a challenge I’m sure.

ZM: Do you ever get nervous watching players compete on courses that you’ve had a hand in shaping?

GH: Not in this format, because it’s match play. No one is focused on what they shot — it’s just whoever wins, wins and you’ve got to get the ball in the hole. That’s a lot easier on the architect, because when you put score into the equation, then not only do you have your own expectations, but also the expectations of the members and if they think it’s playing too easy or too hard.

ZM: What’s your favorite hole out here on this championship routing?

GH: Well I always get the composite numbers wrong, but I’d say it’s No. 13, the par-5. I love that hole. Every once in a while, you’ll get a magazine or a book ask you, “If there was a hole that you didn’t design that you wish you had, which would it be?” I’ve picked that hole a couple times. Just because of the beauty of it, the way the cross hazard comes into play. The mounds and the way they diagonally set. And with your second shot, if you play it close to the boundary, you open up the angle into the green, but if you play away from the trouble, you’ve got to come into the green with trouble. And the green in that little bowl I think is a beautiful setting. I’d definitely say that’s my favorite.

ZM: What are the challenges with restorations in keeping the essence of a course while also challenging the modern player?

GH: I think a lot of what challenges these guys is baked into the original design. It’s greens and contours of slopes and rough, of course. But I think where we have to reposition fairway bunkers, we would tend to do that if the topography allows us to shift them downrange to challenge the modern player. And with tees, we’ll extend them too, but not in a way that we would perceive as disconnecting holes — like if you had to walk 90 yards back and then walk the same 90 yards back to the fairway. That takes away the essence of these great old golf courses.

But one of the things that Jim Wagner and I have learned, is that if we trust Tillinghast and Donald Ross and George Thomas, 99 percent of the time, they got it right, and it’s still relevant to today’s player. So we try to keep as much of that as we can.

ZM: What makes a great golf hole?

GH: It’s having options. What makes a great golf hole in strategy is that the level of precision required to just go play is fairly low, with wide fairways and generous landing areas. But the level of precision required to score — meaning accessing hole locations and getting close and making birdies — means that you’re relying on angles and hazards and there’s a thought process to that. And that’s not easy to do, but it’s what we try to accomplish.

ZM: Last question — what’s harder: playing golf, or designing golf courses?

GH: Playing golf. (laughs) I seldom get frustrated designing golf courses, but I definitely get frustrated when playing.

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The post Iconic Holes: Pinehurst No. 4, Hole 13 appeared first on Golf.

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This par five over water is recognized as one of the most visually stunning holes in all of Pinehurst. GOLF Editors Jessica Marksbury and Zephyr Melton strategically play No. 4’s 13th hole from each tee box, while taking in the spectacular views.

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The post Walk a golf course with designer Gil Hanse and you’ll see the game differently appeared first on Golf.

The post Walk a golf course with designer Gil Hanse and you’ll see the game differently appeared first on Golf.

If you’re into golf-course architecture — and who among us is not? — this won’t be news: this Gil Hanse is everywhere. Last year’s U.S. Open at Winged Foot? Resto’ by Hanse. This year’s U.S. Open (women’s edition) at Olympic? Another Hanse joint. Southern Hills, where the 2022 PGA will be played, and The Country Club, site of the 2022 U.S. Open? G. Hanse, G. Hanse. The Yale course redo? The Merion East nip-and-tuck? The Pinehurst No. 4 reinvention? Yada. Yada. Yada.

So you can imagine our collective surprise when we, a handful of a Redan-o-philes, learned, during an on-site Ryder Cup walk with Hanse as our shepherd, that the man was making his first trip to Whistling Straits, the must-see American golf resort, pricey and spectacular. Oceanside golf in Wisconsin, even if the body of water along its shore is technically a mere lake. Redan, you may know, is a term of war and also a term of golf-course architecture. It’s a meaty word though I can’t say I’ve ever really understood it. The word came up more than once, as we walked the course.

Travel

“Never been here before,” Hanse said. “But I did play with Pete once, at Hilton Head. He carried his own bag, played fast and played great.” Hanse’s Pete was the late Pete Dye, who built Whistling Straits, the Harbour Town Golf Links (aka Hilton Head) and loads of other courses. In manner, Hanse (reserved) and Dye (outrageous) were opposites. As architects, ditto. But Hanse’s reverence for Dye, over the course of our walk, became obvious.

One member of our group, a style writer and golf blogger named Michael Williams, was wearing a golf hat of his own design with one word stenciled across its brim: redan. The first letter was lower case and there was a period after the n — and those things made all the difference.

Also in the group was a slender young gent named Ben Boskovich, an editor at Esquire, the stylish magazine that coined the phrase “Man at his Best.” Boskovich was wearing a hat bearing the name Aimé Leon Dore. You know, the New York-based street-meets-club fashion brand. OK, yes: I looked it up. But I can tell you something about Jos. A Bank fall collection.

To keep the theme going here, Hanse was wearing a Southern Hills baseball cap, various Peter Millar golf duds and, on his wrist, a heavy Rolex. That was not a coincidence. Our little walk was organized by Rolex.

When I first met Hanse, nearly 30 years ago, he was wearing dungarees and L.L. Bean boots and he came off a bulldozer to say hello. Today, Hanse and his work colleagues use a name that descends, in its way, from Man at this Best: Caveman Construction. It’s the push-the-dirt side of Hanse Golf Design.

“Wearing a Rolex and a golf hat at the same time, it’s a nice sweet spot,” Boskovich told me later, when I asked him to size-up Hanse’s style sensibilities. “It speaks to where the game of golf is right now. I’ve golfed with guys wearing jeans shorts, and I’ve golfed with guys dressed like Tour pros. We all love the game.”

It’s always neat, getting a fresh perspective on anything, and that was one. Golf needs more players in jean shorts, and more people who use golf as a verb. As for the hoodie in golf, that’s not even a question anymore. You likely saw the American players wearing them at Whistling Straits. Wearing, not rocking. Please. That’s so 1996. Collin Morikawa wasn’t even born.

I first met Hanse in 1992, when he was starting out in the biz and working for Tom Doak. Doak, when he was starting out, worked for Dye. There’s a lot of that in golf-course architecture, a lot of Mungo begat Old Tom and Old Tom begat D. Ross and D. Ross begat — just about everybody.

Six degrees, golf-style.

And as Gil Hanse once golfed with Dye, Dye golfed (take it up with my editor) with Donald Ross. And as Dye made a study of the great Scottish courses, Hanse did the same. In passing, Hanse talked about Dye’s use of railroad ties, a common way to hold up bunker walls in the Motherland, and easy to find over there. The wooden ties were lying about, detritus from the railway lines in coastal Scotland. A lot of trucks once roamed the Straits course, in its embryonic stages. At Whistling Straits, the railroad ties were trucked in. Hanse’s thing is to use, as best he can, what Mother Nature provides him. Dye’s thing was something else.

News

Hanse told us something I should have known but didn’t: When Dye and Herb Kohler, the plumbing-fixtures magnate and golf nut, started talking about a golf course on the shore of Lake Michigan in rural central Wisconsin, the entire tract was dead-flat farmland. All known evidence of that origin story is gone. Hanse talked about a small mountain Dye built at the end of the Whistling Straits property, beyond the 5th hole, to block out the view of the neighboring flatlands and farmland. That made an impression on Boskovich, both what Dye did and Hanse’s description of it. Boskovich’s interpretation of it made an impression on me.

“When Dye put that mound there, it was his way of saying, ‘You’re on the course now, and you don’t want to be anywhere else.’” That comment made me think of Augusta National as a golfing oasis. For a lucky few, you get beyond chaotic Washington Road, past the club’s imposing wall, and then you’re in a golfing dreamscape.

The Old Course, come to think of it, is like that, too, but in a different way. You start in town. You leave town. You finish in town.

There are many ways, to the heart of golf. They’re all good. Still, there’s a reason why the Grand Slam events are almost never played on courses lined with homes. There’s not a single home on the Straits course. Golf is, among other things, a form of escape.

If you think of Whistling Straits as an American version of Scottish linksland, you likely have transported yourself to the West Coast of Scotland, where the land heaves, and not the East, where it does not. Hanse said that Whistling Straits might look like a true links course, but it doesn’t play like one. The ball doesn’t roll out. It doesn’t tumble. Hanse, tall and measured, was standing on a manmade hill, looking at a manmade course, Lake Michigan shimmering (literally) beyond it.

Hanse imagined a course that he might have built there, a course with a much lower profile. No towering anything. Hanse is a minimalist. Dye was a maximalist. The old Scottish architects often talked about the hand of God at work on the great courses. Dye was an archetype American course designer, as Hanse described him. A golf-course builder, really. Hanse said he considered himself a builder, too, but his aesthetic is totally different.

As we walked the course Hanse chatted about this and that. He started out as a history major in college (he went to the University of Denver) and switched to landscape architecture. But history is always tugging at him. He said that, in his experience, Merion and Yale had the best archival materials about their courses, and he goes back to them again and again. He cited Ben Crenshaw and Geoff Ogilvy as two elite players who were world-class in their knowledge of golf-course design, and golf-course history. The two go hand-in-hand, to a point.

Dye died last year, and this year was some tribute to him. Justin Thomas won the Players at TPC Sawgrass, a Dye course. Phil Mickelson won the PGA Championship at Kiawah, a Dye course. Stewart Cink won at Hilton Head. The U.S. won the Ryder Cup at Whistling Straits. Next year will be a good one for Hanse, if you’re talking about main-stage golf. Of course, there’s way more to golf than that. Dye’s landmark courses are ones you might play once in your life. That’s not where Hanse goes.

“Listening to Gil, you could hear how the architects want to innovate, they compete with each other, and that’s good for the game,” Boskovich told me. “They’re artists. They’re innovators. That’s why not all golf courses look the same.” An excellent insight and observation. 

The walk was about 90 minutes or so, and then lunch was served. You can imagine the scene: red wine or white, your choice. Tom Watson, holding court. Before going in, Hanse, his wife, Tracey, alongside him, looked at a large electronic leaderboard. “We’re up in three, down in one,” he said. The U.S. win was coming.

Kohler wanted a destination golf course and he hired Dye to build him one. They got what they wanted. The Ryder Cup was at Whistling Straits. Gil Hanse was taking it in.

Michael Bamberger welcomes your comments at Michael.Bamberger@golf.com.

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The post Rio’s controversial Olympic Course was supposed to grow the game in Brazil. Has it? appeared first on Golf.

The post Rio’s controversial Olympic Course was supposed to grow the game in Brazil. Has it? appeared first on Golf.

A tropical storm is stirring over Japan, threatening parts of the country with strong winds and heavy rain just as the men’s Olympic golf competition gets underway at Kasumigaseki Country Club, just north of Tokyo.

But let’s keep things in perspective.

The forecast is nowhere near as gloomy as it was five years ago, the last time Olympic golf was played.

Remember all the grumbling? It was hard to ignore in advance of the 2016 Summer Games in Rio de Janeiro, where golf made its much-ballyhooed return to the Olympics following more than a century’s absence.

“Certain things do not belong at the Olympics,” Michael Rosenberg wrote in Sports Illustrated, crystalizing a widely held view. “Performance-enhancing drugs, green water in the diving pool, Vladimir Putin and men’s golf.”

From the skeptical perspective, staging golf in the Games was silly enough, given that the sport already ran on a wraparound schedule packed with major international events. Even more absurd, critics complained, was that a new venue was being constructed for just that purpose on an ecologically sensitive site in — of all places! — Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Lovely city, sure. Postcard-pretty. But also a poster-child for income disparity, in a country rife with government corruption.

“Golf for whom?” became the rallying cry of protestors, who saw the project as little more than cover for a real-estate play, earmarked for one-percenters.

They didn’t buy the promise, put forth by golf industry bigwigs and Olympic organizers alike, that the course would live on beyond the Games as an outlet for public recreation and a potential draw for getting newbies into golf.

At best, they figured, the grounds would be abandoned soon after the Olympics, or, more likely, transformed into luxury condos, a boondoggle doubling as environmental blight.

So, what became of this disaster-in-the-making?

“It’s doing incredibly well,” says Vicky Whyte, a past president of the Rio de Janeiro Golf Federation who is heavily involved in junior golf in Brazil. “Most people thought that building a new course would be a waste of money. But the opposite is true. It’s the best example we have of the successful legacy of Rio 2016.”

As a prominent golf booster, Whyte is biased. But she also has the facts on her side. Like so many other former Olympic host cities, Rio spent lavishly on the Games, pouring tens of billions of dollars into a range of infrastructure, including nine new arenas for such sports as basketball, judo and tae kwan do. A swim center was constructed, at an estimated price of $50 million, as was a canoeing venue, for roughly that same sum. What those projects have in common is that nearly all are now closed.

The Olympic Golf Course, which cost roughly $19 million, is one of the rare venues built for the 2016 Games that is still being put to use.

Not that it never faced uncertainty.

In the immediate aftermath of the Olympics, where Justin Rose and Inbee Park won gold, the Gil Hanse-Amy Alcott-designed layout did indeed shutter, but only briefly, as the Brazilian Golf Federation searched for an operator to assume the lease. It was up and running again within a few months.

Its operator today is Carlos Favoreto, a businessman with an environmental bent who has done more than keep the course afloat. He has kept it fine condition. Achieving the former depended on the latter.

“(Favoreto) recognized that to get people to play here, he need to keep it well-maintained,” says Marcelo Stallone, a Rio native who played collegiate golf at Oklahoma State and who volunteers on the board of directors for the Olympic Course. “Is it as impeccable as it was for the Olympics? No. But it’s in excellent shape, and it’s a beautiful place to play.”

As for that play, before the pandemic, the course was logging roughly 5,000 rounds a month, Favoreto says. Since tourists accounted for 60 percent of those tee times (for out-of-towners, green fees are roughly $100; locals pay about half that), business took a hit when lockdowns started and international travel ground to a halt. But unlike the other two courses within Rio’s city limits, both of which are private, the Olympic Course was never forced to close during Covid, and it saw a surge in local play from golfers who were shut out of their usual spots.

Though rounds have not yet returned to pre-pandemic levels, the course bolsters its bottom line with a restaurant and a bar, and by hosting weddings, concerts and other events.

Before the Games, supporters hailed the course as a potential tool for growing the game. It was an optimistic pitch that brought with it the burden of high expectations and intense scrutiny. No municipal course in the world has likely ever opened with more eyes upon it, or with a weightier mandate.

Today, golf is not the most popular in Brazil. Or the second-most. Or the third. Or fourth. Or fifth. The favelas do not brim with aspiring Tour pros. It seems naive to think that was ever going to happen.

But the Olympic Course is doing its part to encourage participation. In January 2017, five young golfers were enrolled in its junior program; that number is now 35, and Favoreto says he plans to have it up to a 100-plus once the pandemic loosens its grip on Brazil. A number of offerings have been rolled out as incentives to attract first-timers. In addition to giving three free lessons to beginners, the course is home base for such social outreach programs the Olympic Legacy Maintainers project, which provides instruction and financial support to kids 18 and under, along with training for jobs in golf course operations and other trades. The course also runs a weekly clinic for children with physical disabilities.

“In short,” Whyte says, “it’s wonderful.”

The Rio forecast for later this week calls for sunshine, with light winds and temperatures in the mid-60s. Sounds like better weather for golf than for the beach.

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The post Why Gil Hanse’s new risk-reward Texas course is Ryder Cup-ready (even if it hasn’t landed one yet) appeared first on Golf.

The post Why Gil Hanse’s new risk-reward Texas course is Ryder Cup-ready (even if it hasn’t landed one yet) appeared first on Golf.

FRISCO, Texas — During a recent visit to his sprawling new project at PGA Frisco, architect Gil Hanse reviewed the former North Texas farmland he is transforming into the East Course here and reflected on what it will mean both for the game and him personally when the site officially opens in 2022 as the new home of the PGA of America.

“It’s a cherished opportunity,” Hanse said. “There are not many of them out there.”

Or any — at least, not opportunities quite like this one.

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Never before has a U.S. course had more than 20 professional and amateur golf events — including two PGA Championships (the first in 2027) and two Senior PGA Championships (the first in 2023) — destined for its fairways while it’s still under construction. All course work will be done later this fall, giving the site a year and a half to grow in and mature.

The property also will feature a second course, the West Course, designed by Beau Welling; a practice area and a 10-hole short course; an Omni resort; and PGA headquarters buildings.

One event presumed to be headed to PGA Frisco but which has not yet been officially announced is the most anticipated: a future Ryder Cup. It would represent the first-ever Ryder Cup in North Texas and only the second in the Lone Star State. The next available date is 2041, but that hasn’t stopped the planning or dreaming.

PGA of America COO Darrell Crall, who knows the 600-acre property about as well as anybody, said there is a path to a PGA Frisco Ryder Cup, but the PGA of America first wants to ensure the course is primed for such a big event. “We certainly feel like it will be,” he said. Crall said the association also wants to see how the local community interacts with the other tournaments planned for PGA Frisco.

Hanse says his design will be tailor-made for match play and “fireworks” down the stretch of tight contests.

“If you look at most past Ryder Cups, a lot of matches end on holes 15 or 16,” he said. “So if you have a drivable par 4 on 15 [340 yards from the back tees], a long 16th [506-yard par-4], plus a short par-3 17th [150 yards], we feel like we’re creating drama here.”

Hanse, who has walked the site dozens of times and has a full-time crew of 200 working daily on property, said one of the goals for him and his associate Jim Wagner was to create more chances for scoring and success than punishment and failure.

“We want to set up the course where players have a chance to win with positive shots, not lose with negative ones,” Hanse said.

To that end, he has a drivable par-4 on each nine — No. 7 is 330 yards from the back tees — and plenty of risks and rewards, including a creek that protects the left side of the par-3 13th and another creek that golfers must cross on the par-5 18th.

“Two of the pleasant surprises when we walked this facility was the elevation change we found here and the way Panther Creek comes into play on several of the holes,” Hanse said.

Hanse has set up the course for maximum flexibility, because while pros will compete in big-time events here, the majority of the rounds will be played by the general public.

“We designed a long ribbon of tee boxes to give the PGA flexibility on a day-to-day basis,” Hanse said. “With the NorthRidge bermuda grass we’re using on the fairways, you can cut it to make it really wide or very narrow. That’s something we learned when we designed the Rio (Olympic) course for both men and women, pros and amateur.”

Frisco, 40 minutes north of downtown Dallas, will own the two courses, while the PGA of America has a long-term contract as the operator.

“Our expectations were super-high, but Gil and his team have exceeded them,” Crall said. “They have made a legacy play.”

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The post The 5 most crucial shots at Winged Foot, according to Gil Hanse appeared first on Golf.

The post The 5 most crucial shots at Winged Foot, according to Gil Hanse appeared first on Golf.

What shots at Winged Foot have the ability to make or break a U.S. Open contender’s championship (and maybe his heart in the process)? We asked Gil Hanse to choose his top five.

1. THE THIRD PUTT ON THE 1ST GREEN

Because the first green is, arguably, the most treacherous, it’s important to keep the train on the tracks early. “If you’ve got a tough third putt, your mind could be scrambled and you could miss it,” Hanse says. “But if you get out of there with three putts, you’re fine — you’ve taken your medicine and you can still get your round started.”

2. THE DRIVE ON NO. 6

With so few birdie opportunities on the scorecard, players will come to the West Course’s shortest par 4 looking to make a 3. “This is a real boom-or-bust tee shot, and it comes with that extra mental strain,” Hanse says. “You can get a look at birdie, but if you get too aggressive and bring five into play, you’ll walk off shaking your head.”

3. THE TEE SHOT ON THE PAR-3 10TH

This is among the most photographed spots on the course and with good reason: right at Winged Foot’s turn a huge turning point. “It’s a difficult green to hold and it can just be such a critical shot in your round,” Hanse says.

4. THE SECOND SHOT ON NO. 14

Hanse admits this is a selfish selection, because he’s hoping the restoration will add significant intrigue to the run-up area at No. 14. If players miss the fairway, they’ll have to run up their approach and risk getting snatched by the bunker some 25 yards short of the green. Long-carry bunker shot over a false front to a tucked pin? No thanks.

5. THE DRIVE ON NO. 18

If it feels obvious to call 18 a pivotal hole at a U.S. Open, it’s fitting, because there’s nothing subtle about this finisher. Find the fairway, first of all. “Maybe the second shot at 18, too,” Hanse muses, thinking about a player’s need to carry his approach past the false front. “Maybe your second putt, too,” he adds. “Because what if it’s a four-footer with a foot of break to win the Open? What then?” Exactly. What then? Here’s hoping we’ll find out.

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The post Welcome to Winged Foot: Gil Hanse’s hole-by-hole tour of this week’s U.S. Open venue appeared first on Golf.

The post Welcome to Winged Foot: Gil Hanse’s hole-by-hole tour of this week’s U.S. Open venue appeared first on Golf.

Only a handful of host courses in the United States can match the aura of our national championship. Think Shinnecock. Oakmont. Pebble. Pinehurst No. 2. Like those masterpieces, Winged Foot Golf Club is a dreamscape.

When the U.S. Open takes place there this week, we’ll be awed by the skills of the game’s best, but even more so by the fabled, 97-year-old club, so mythic yet still so mysterious to golf fans.

Now it’s back — as in way back. Seven years ago, club execs hired Gil Hanse to adapt to the modern game the original 1923 stylings and strategies of A.W. Tillinghast’s West and East courses. Hanse is overly modest about his effort and that of his brilliant restoration team, which in this case included design partner Jim Wagner and Steve Rabideau, Winged Foot’s tireless director of golf courses.

“My biggest hope is that our work is an authentic response to what was already there,” Hanse says, nodding to Tillinghast’s justifiably revered creations. In fact, he insists that his name should barely be mentioned in descriptions of Winged Foot’s West Course, the venue for this year’s Open.

“It’s Tillinghast,” Hanse says. Full stop.

Regardless of who gets credit, what remains is the magnificent playing surface. Hanse was so pleased by the work, he agreed to walk GOLF through the West’s full routing, breaking down the charm and treachery — and history — the pros will face. Get ready to take flight.

No. 1 — “Genesis” Par 4 / 451 yards

HANSE: “Traditionally, No. 1 is the most difficult green on the golf course. Welcome to Winged Foot, indeed. In the past, because of its contours, they’ve had to keep the green slower on the Stimpmeter. For our work, we looked at a lot of old photos of the green to restore ridges and ‘flat spots’ so we could find a few more hole locations.”

No. 2 — “Elm” Par 4 / 484 yards

“On the second, we shifted the left-hand fairway bunker downrange to get it a bit more in play for the way these guys are hitting it. Although, after watching Bryson recently, I’m not sure that even now it’s in play! The green itself has one of the few remaining iconic elms on property, and that’s the lasting image of this hole — that tree overhanging the green.”

No. 3 — “Pinnacle” Par 3 / 243 yards

“When Billy Casper won the U.S. Open here in the ’50s, he intentionally hit it short all four days, just to avoid getting out of position. And he got up-and-down all four days. That tells you about the severity of the green. In this era of swashbuckling, go-for-it play, it will be interesting to see how they go after it. ‘Pinnacle’ is the perfect name, since this is the highest point on the West Course.”

No. 4 — “Sound View” Par 4 / 467 yards

“This will be a very different golf hole from what they played in the Open in 2006. There’s going to be a huge premium in hitting the fairway, with bunkers both left and right. And to be honest, at Winged Foot players will prefer the fairway bunkers to the rough. Then you’re playing to the far corner of the property, to a smallish but, actually, one of the more benign greens.”

No. 5 — “Long Lane” Par 4 / 502 yards

“This will play 500-plus yards, and it’s a dogleg-left, but the fairway slopes right, so it plays narrower than it looks. It will favor a draw off the tee. The green had bunkers in front, guarding it as a par 5 [which is how the members play it], but now as a par 4, we restored the opening on the left side of the green so you can run the ball up into it.”

No. 6 — “El” Par 4 / 321 yards

“A short but dangerous par 4. I’m curious to see how the pros attack it. We removed the left greenside bunker, which, visually, makes it more appealing to take a rip at the green. But it may actually be more dangerous, with long rough now replacing the bunker. Plus, there’s a creek lurking long off the green, and that might come more into play.”

No. 7 — “Babe-In-The-Woods” Par 3 / 162 yards

“This is the shortest par 3 on the golf course, but with a severe green propped up and bunkers all around. It’s just such a hard target to hit. It’s a tricky hole to figure out what the wind is doing, because there are enough trees to shelter you and give you a very different feel than what the wind might actually be doing. This is a real challenge.”

No. 8 — “Arena” Par 4 / 490 yards

“This is probably one of the hardest holes on the course. It can look nondescript at first, but it’s just a sneaky-good golf hole. You have to really shape your tee shot. There’s deadly rough down the left and some large trees down the right that are significant hazards. Green expansion has just made things more interesting and given the USGA more setup options.”

No. 9 — “Meadow” Par 5 / 565 yards

“Here’s our first par 5 of the championship, and it’s going to typically play into the wind. But there’s enough of an opening in the front that someone could sneak one up there in two. The green itself is really receptive to a wedge for guys who have to lay up, and it has contours that separate it into greens within the green and really reward precision.”

No. 10 — “Pulpit” Par 3 / 214 yards

“Hogan called this ‘a 3-iron into some guy’s bedroom.’ We wanted to lengthen it about 30 yards, so guys would have a mid- to long-iron in. I hate the word ‘iconic,’ but this is one of the most recognizable par 3s ever created, in the way that it sits up on that landform. It’s such a good hole.”

No. 11 — “Billow” Par 4 / 384 yards

“This is another shorter, positional par 4. We thought about moving the bunkers downrange but ended up leaving them because, like with No. 6, you want to create temptation to thread one in there, not just force a layup. We added a couple of pin positions, too, so this hole has a lot of flexibility in its setup.”

No. 12 — “Cape” Par 5 / 633 yards

“It’s safe to call this a true three-shot par 5. Some guys who hit the fairway will try flying something over the trees, but that comes with risk. The shared fairway bunkers between 12 and 17 come into play. Do you lay up short of them? Cozy up to them? Try to fly them? On the green, check out the back pin—that’s the most treacherous spot.”

No. 13 — “White Mule” Par 3 / 212 yards

“One of my favorite holes on the course, because check out the green complex — it’s phenomenal. When we did little stuff here — expanding the green, showing off the rolls on the edges, restoring the bunkers — the entire thing just jumped out of the group and popped out of the landscape. It just has so much character.”

No. 14 — “Shamrock” Par 4 / 452 yards

“This was probably our biggest change. We moved the bunkers downrange, so they should be in play off the tee. We looked at original design photos and saw a three-lobe shamrock green, so we restored it and added a false front. Then we added bunkers in the approach — 20, 30 yards short of the green. It’s counterintuitive, but expanding the green and moving the bunkers back made the hole more difficult.”

No. 15 — “Pyramids” Par 4 / 426 yards

“If you want to push the advantage off the tee, you have to really be precise, but you can get rewarded with a shorter approach. Putting a premium on that short-iron shot forces players into a big decision off the tee that they didn’t have in the past. Then we made a significant green expansion, with major undulations and a big, dramatic backboard. You’ll need to get to the right portion of this green.”

No. 16 — “Hells Bells” Par 4 / 498 yards

“The members play this as a par 5. It’s critical to find the narrow fairway because guys are going to have mid- or long-irons coming in, and it’s tough to find these greens from the rough. Also, the left side is guarded by trees all the way down. Hit it in the left rough? Good luck.”

No. 17 — “Well-Well” Par 4 / 504 yards

“That spot where [eventual winner] Geoff Ogilvy chipped in in 2006? That’s green now. One of the critical things you’ll see is the expanded greens didn’t all yield new pin locations. Tillinghast wanted these severe slopes to be part of the challenge but then also to be opportunities for recovery. Backboards, funnels, right sides, wrong sides — this green has got a ton of character.”

No. 18 — “Revelations” Par 4 / 469 yards

“The 18th has all the elements you could want. It has scuttled the chances of so many great players. There are plenty of trees, which loom larger with 18th-hole pressure. And we’ve restored a big false front to the green, which begins this effect of a staircase up to the clubhouse. The entire course builds toward this crescendo. It’s just a really fantastic and fitting finish.”

The post Welcome to Winged Foot: Gil Hanse’s hole-by-hole tour of this week’s U.S. Open venue appeared first on Golf.

The post Course Rater Confidential: What are New England’s best inland and coastal courses? appeared first on Golf.

The post Course Rater Confidential: What are New England’s best inland and coastal courses? appeared first on Golf.

GOLF’s Top 100 course panelists are among the most respected and well-traveled course evaluators in the game. They’re also keen to share their opinions. In this GOLF.com series, we’ll unlock their unvarnished views on all questions course-related. The goal is not only to entertain you but also to give you a better understanding of how to understand and appreciate golf course architecture. You can see GOLF’s latest Top 100 Courses in the World ranking here, and meet all of our Top 100 panelists here.

With the FedEx Cup Playoffs underway this week at TPC Boston, now seems like a good time to talk about golf in New England. In past roundtables, we’ve discussed the best private, public and sleeper courses in the region. So that’s out. Let’s look at New England golf in another way. What, in your opinion, are the two best New England courses with water views, and what are the region’s two best inland courses?

Michael Pelliccione (panelist since 2020; has played 60 of the World Top 100): Some would argue that the wicked best golf in North America can be found within New England. The region stretches as far as Maine down to the tip of Connecticut. With the abundance of mountains, ocean and grassland, there is no shortage of new and classic golf courses you can play. So this is no easy task!

When thinking about the best courses with water views the first that comes to mind is Prouts Neck Country Club in Scarborough, Maine. I can’t think of a course that flies under the radar as much as this Wayne Stiles masterpiece. Not much has been written about the place and nor will it appear on any Top 100 list. But it should! This piece of land is just flat-out perfect. Tucked on a small peninsula just a few miles south of Portland, this course has it all. The round takes you on an adventure carving in and out of the woods with endless water views. Don’t let the length fool you. What the course lacks in distance it makes up for on the greens.

The Kittansett Club in Marion, Mass., gets my second nod as the best course in New England with water views. The name Kittansett comes from the Native American words “near the sea.” Frederic C. Hood was the founding member and the one who actually constructed the course while William Flynn provided the routing plan. The course starts and finishes at the tip of a peninsula jutting out into Buzzards Bay, which can be seen on almost every hole. The bulk of the property navigates you through the woods with treacherous greens and wonderful angles to come in from. If you catch it on a blustery day the course is everything you could ask for. Kittansett is about as pure of a golf experience as you can get.

Moving inland, the possibilities are endless. But you would be remiss without making a stop at Cape Arundel Golf Club in Kennebunkport, Maine. It’s no surprise former President George H.W. Bush vacationed here. This Walter Travis design is about as fun to play as any golf course around. Just a few yards shy of 5,900 (from the back tees) this place has everything. The variety of holes is endless. Travis was known for one thing and that’s his green complexes — and Cape Arundel’s greens don’t disappoint. It’s the true defense of this property and some could even argue it’s his best 18-hole collection.

Rounding out the best two inland courses, it’s hard not to go with Yale Golf Course in New Haven, Conn. This C.B. Macdonald/Seth Raynor collaboration is truly one of golf’s national treasures. The second you step foot on property you instantly feel like you step back in time. The topography is perfect for them to lay out their canvas of template golf holes. The fairways are wide and rolling, the greens are treacherous and the bunkers are strategically placed. There are so many blind shots and elevation changes that even the scratch golfer can be challenged. Any golf architecture enthusiast must play and study Yale. It’s truly one of the game’s greats.

Steve Lapper (panelist since 2009; has played 84 of the World Top 100): This is a no-brainer for me. Eastward Ho is the walk-off home run, even rivaling a Big Papi poke at Fenway’s mighty Green Wall. It’s a private yet warm and inviting club and rivals far more famous links found throughout the U.S. Its terrain, on a spit of land on Cape Cod alongside an Atlantic bay, is an adventurous, tactfully routed rollercoaster of joy that weaves between waterside and woods. This finest work of Herbert Fowler (on this side of the pond), and renovated by Keith Foster in 2004, is pure genius, complete with a built-in wind tunnel and nary a flat lie to be found anywhere ahead of any teeing ground. The stealthy under-the-radar and out-of-the-way nature of this place eludes even the ardent of golf course aficionados. Find a way, anyway (try the charity outing route?), to get a ticket to the first tee. You won’t be disappointed.

On the public side, and near the shadow of its famous neighbor, Fishers Island GC, Donald Ross’ Shennecossett GC sits in Groton, Conn. It’s an easily accessible municipal, rich in history, that will neither beat up an average golfer, nor concede much to a scratch player on any windy day. Technically on the tip of the Thames River, it has views that extend out to the L.I. Sound. On any typical day, it’ll yield sightings of the sleek silhouettes of the U.S. Nuclear Submarine fleet, schooners from the 1800s, the Fishers Island ferry and hundreds of sport fishing boats. Play here is swift and courteous, with good conditioning, and it’s more than reasonably priced. Make this under-the-radar muni a must-play when you find yourself with a few hours to spare.

Inland golf in New England is steeped in great golf course architecture and has dozens and dozens of viable candidates. Well-known names like The Country Club, Ekwanok, Taconic, Yale, Essex County, Hooper, Salem, Boston Golf Club, Shelter Harbor, Cape Arundel, Wannamoisett, Crumpin-Fox, Wintonbury Hills, The Orchards all qualify.

Courses

Yet nowhere else in New England, let alone the U.S., does a gem like Myopia Hunt Club exist. Its name stems from the commonality of its early founders all wearing glasses. They may have needed them for other sports, but the vision here was crystal clear. Just up the hill from its fox-hunting polo fields and steeped in golf history, this club was founded in 1882 and holds the distinction of the highest winning score(s) in the U.S. Open. Playing here today still feels like a trip back in time, and it’s a rip-roaring one at that.

The course probably has the most charming, quirky, and often penal 6,500 yards of golf existent on this side of the Atlantic. Never boring, nor predictable, it presents a wide spectrum from rustic beauty to stern test. Starting off with a short par-4, it’s ultimately followed by a well-guarded 253-yard par-3 beast and finishes off the front nine with a beautiful 136-yard par-3 over a mini Thoreau-like pond with a studio apartment-sized green. The course has a mix of exhilarating short and long par-4s and reachable par-5s, all defended by dastardly placed bunkers and tilted and crowned greens. Scoring here shouldn’t be about numbers, but instead about the experience of appealing to every intangible sensory perception any golfer could ask for. A dozen rounds later, I can still remember nearly every shot and spot on the course. Myopia Hunt is quite private, but occasionally available through various charitable outings.

Where Myopia is wonderfully historic, Old Sandwich, a Coore/Crenshaw design in Plymouth, Mass., is a brilliant representation of modern minimalism brought to New England. Set in a rolling mix of forest, field and bog, this big course takes you through a trip up, down and all over with large-scale features (wide fairways and large bunkers and greens). The nines feel interchangeable but never seem tedious or uninteresting. You need every club in your bag to tackle these holes. Hardly a walk for the meek or infirm, it’s an athletic course and although eminently playable, very tough to score on. That said, the genius of Bill and Ben doesn’t sacrifice beauty for brawn. Nor does it abuse the average mid-handicapper. The club is private and permissibly aloof, however it’s clearly a modern gem.

One quick note: Try your hardest to time any visit to New England from mid-September through the end of October. Most courses present fast and firm conditions, and once amidst the fall foliage season they combine to create an ecstatic assault on one’s senses.

Travel

Paul Rudovsky (panelist since 2015; has played 100 of the World Top 100): I think the prime reason that New England (and most of NYS) is such a fertile ground for golf has to do primarily with the glacial activity during the last Ice Age, which brought down huge rock outcroppings from Canada and created wonderfully rolling and heaving landforms. While I am not as familiar with the geological history of the Midwest, my bet is the encroaching glaciers had a lot to do with the wonderful land for golf in Wisconsin, Minnesota and Michigan as well.

My two favorite water-view courses in New England are both in Massachusetts: Eastward Ho! (fabulous example of “heaving landforms” and wonderfully fun; and Kittansett (so much improved by Gil Hanse). For courses without water views, also both in Massachusetts: The Country Club, as the Championship/Composite course is now both big and fun, a very tough combo to achieve (full disclosure — that is our club up here); and Essex County, which was hugely improved by Tom Doak and Bruce Hepner’s tree-clearing recommendations and the guts of the club’s leadership in carrying them through.

For under the radar water views: Edgartown in Massachusetts — a proud, delightful nine-holer on Martha’s Vineyard, and Cape Arundel, the easygoing home club of the Bush clan. No water: Charles River (Mass.) with its devilish greens, Ekwanok (Vt.) for sheer beauty and tranquility, and Tamarack (Conn.) for interesting fun.

Hal Phillips (panelist since 1997, has played 71 of the World Top 100): As my colleagues have so ably covered the private realm, I felt compelled to detail New England courses one can more readily pay to play. When it comes to accessible ocean views, Farm Neck on Martha’s Vineyard is tops in my book: superb terrain, mint conditions and all sorts of holes that play along (or in plain view of) the Atlantic (and Sengekontacket Pond, the saltwater inlet where the shark nearly devours Michael, the sheriff’s son, in the movie “Jaws”).

There are a half dozen nine-holers that dot the Maine coast, but none of them are that great really. Blink Bonnie Golf Links in Sorrento, just north of Bar Harbor, is the best of the lot. There are 18-holes at The Samoset Resort in Rockland; they offer great views of the Gulf of Maine but not particularly great golf. The more salient point when seeking seaside public golf in New England is not “where” but “when.” They don’t advertise the fact but even more private clubs (seaside and otherwise) are accessible in “the shoulder season,” which generally means “after Labor Day.” This is particularly relevant in summer tourist areas like Cape Cod, which, you may have noticed, is surrounded by salt water. There are dozens of coastal privates to explore in this tactical fashion, so don’t be shy.

That said, if you get a game at Prouts Neck, just south of Portland, Maine, do it. Same for the underrated Wentworth by the Sea routing southeast of Portsmouth, N.H. Inland, there are far more worthy public options. I’m headed to Western Massachusetts this weekend, so I’ll go with Wahconah CC in Dalton, just east of Pittsfield, a stellar Wayne Stiles nine coupled with one nearly as good from Geoffrey Cornish. A bit north of there, in Williamstown, Taconic GC has always been top notch. It was once ranked among the U.S. Top 100, if I’m not mistaken, and a fellow named Gil Hanse renovated this Stiles design in 2009. Closer to this week’s PGA Tour stop, TPC of Boston, check out Red Tail GC, a super-inventive Brian Silva design on stunning terrain (read: multiple former sand pits), or maybe George Wright GC, a muni whose Ross routing has always been magnificent but, following a renovation from Mark Mungeam, has never been in such good nick.

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The post Gil Hanse’s favorite 10 courses in the world reflect his creativity, reverence for tradition appeared first on Golf.

The post Gil Hanse’s favorite 10 courses in the world reflect his creativity, reverence for tradition appeared first on Golf.

Gil Hanse is an earth-mover with an Ivy League pedigree. Hanse, who received his masters in landscape architecture from Cornell University, is entrenched as one of golf’s foremost 21st-century course architects. From Winged Foot to Sleepy Hollow and Pinehurst to Rio de Janeiro (where Hanse designed the first Olympic golf course in more than a century), Hanse has built a career shaping many of the game’s finest tracks.

Hanse’s top 10 courses list (or rather, top 2 courses, with eight runners-up) reflect decades of experience as a mover-and-shaker in the golf design industry. From golden age to modern-day, few architects unite creativity with tradition better.

Travel

Gil Hanse’s top 10 courses in the world

1. The Old Course at St. Andrews – St. Andrews, Scotland

2. National Golf Links of America – Southampton, N.Y.

(Remainder are in alphabetical order)

Chicago Golf Club – Wheaton, Ill.

Cypress Point Club – Pebble Beach, Calif.

Los Angeles Country Club, North Course – Los Angeles, Calif.

Merion Golf Club, East Course – Ardmore, Pa.

Muirfield Golf Club – Muirfield, Scotland

Pine Valley Golf Club – Pine Valley, N.J.

Royal County Down – Newcastle, United Kingdom

Royal Melbourne, West Course – Melbourne, Australia

Editor’s Picks

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The post Field guide: Exploring Gil Hanse-designed French Creek Golf Club appeared first on Golf.

The post Field guide: Exploring Gil Hanse-designed French Creek Golf Club appeared first on Golf.

Ed. note: As GOLF’s chief photographer and visual editor, Christian Hafer visits some of the most gorgeous and exclusive golf courses and properties in the world. Here, in his Field Guide, he’ll take you along for the ride. Lucky for us, Christian never leaves home without his camera. Follow Christian Hafer on Instagram here.

With popular designs like Streamsong’s Black Course or the overhaul of Pinehurst No. 4 — to name just a few — Gil Hanse is everywhere these days. But before the Olympic course in Rio or the high-on-my-list-to-see Ohoopee Match Club in Georgia, Gil and his crew tossed dirt around in Central Pennsylvania.

Across the street from Stonewall, where the 2016 U.S. Mid-Am was contested, sits a member’s club that is straight-forward golf. Carved into the hillside of Amish country, French Creek, which opened in 2003, weaves around the property to create countless intriguing golf holes.

The 1st gently moves uphill while the 2nd is a wild ride back down with a massive swale in front of the green. There is no let up from there. French Creek may have some quirky property to navigate, but Hanse did a wonderful job of transporting the golfer into another realm.

The 9th is a split fairway par-4 that uses an elevated and blind green into a semi-punchbowl. Its quirks, like on this hole, elevate the experience. The 16th, 17th and 18th stretch is one of my favorites I’ve played. It has all the old-world charm of a classic Scottish course with a few modern tweaks.

French Creek is often overshadowed by its neighbor, but that’s probably fine. This early Hanse clearly shows his roots in design and construction, and I’d assume members are just fine keeping it to themselves.

So, if you ever find yourself near Elverson, Pa., find a member, make the call and enjoy the round. For a few hours you’ll be transported to a far away golfscape that will leave you wanting more quirk in your life. Also, they have golf boards, and I am here for it.

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