Just as every tournament has a story, so does every tournament course. Consider, for instance, Trinity Forest Golf Club in Dallas, site of this week’s U.S. Junior Amateur. Situated within a nationally protected forest of the same name, the course cuts the profile of an inland links, shaped by natural forces. In fact, it is the outgrowth of a thoughtful transformation that turned a degraded landscape into a pristine playground while creating opportunities for underserved kids.
With the championship finals set to unfold on Saturday, here are five things to know about the host course.
Early looks were deceiving
At first glance, club founder and developer Jonas Woods thought he was looking at an unspoiled meadow. On closer inspection, though, he caught glimpses of old tires, metal scraps and other construction debris poking through the ground. This site was not a virgin canvas, awaiting a modern-minimalist course. It was an illegal landfill that the city of Dallas had taken over.
Poor upkeep helped create great golf land
Most great sites for golf have natural shaping. Trinity Forest’s acreage was an exception. The site owed its intriguing wrinkles to improper maintenance of the landfill, which had eroded and settled over time beneath a layer of clay that had been put down to blanket the debris. Call it a rare case where bad upkeep was good for golf. Before the course was built, the rumpled land was recapped with 75,000 cubic yards (the rough equivalent of 7,500 dump-truck loads) of sandy loam, providing it with a layer fertile enough to sustain soil but not sturdy enough to sustain trees. True to its name, Trinity Forest is surrounded by, well, forest, but there are no trees on the course itself because tree roots would risk compromising the integrity of the cap.
The course designers had their hands full
Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw made their reputations as designers on natural sites in remote locations. Trinity Forest checked neither of those boxes. But Coore was captivated by the land itself, which, he said, looked like it “needed to be ironed.” Actually, it needed much more than that, complicated by environmental restrictions and the sensitivities of the cap itself. Excavating compelling features was a no-no, because breaking the cap was not allowed. Everything had to be built up, not down. It was the first job Coore and Crenshaw had ever done on a landfill. And it was such a doozy that Coore has since promised it would also be the duo’s last.
It was a short-lived PGA Tour stop
In 2018, the AT&T Bryson Nelson moved to Trinity Forest. After just three years, though, it moved away. The property’s short stint as a PGA Tour stop had myriad explanations, including lack of shade, a scarcity of off-course hospitality venues and a paucity of A-list pros. Mixed reactions from players to the layout’s quirky features may have also been a factor. Then again, when Tour pros grouse about design, it is often a sign that the course stands to delight architecture buffs. Sure enough, Trinity Forest ranks 96th in GOLF Magazine’s roster of Top 100 Courses in the U.S.
It’s a springboard for kids and a collegiate training ground
In addition to staging elite competitions, Trinity Forest is a base for the First Tee-Greater Dallas, which has a learning center, practice range and short course on-site. The club is also the home course for the SMU men’s and women’s golf teams.
