The GolfCourseHome Life

Greg Norman: Still a Champ & Competing, But On a Larger Golf Landscape

Jupiter Country Club course: one of Norman's many.

Residential Golf Course Architects, Part VII

Many stars retire from golf competition and begin an awkward search for golf-related business opportunities. Greg Norman was different--he had always been looking ahead to his future as an entrepreneur.

Norman’s successful foray into course design (one of many enterprises in which he has excelled) is marked by an artful, inspired visual style coupled with a keen sense of the difficulty factor most players can handle.

FLORIDA: Jupiter Country Club

The 2008 British Open—where Norman nearly went wire-to-wire as a surprise 53-year-old champion—testified to the athleticism and pure golf feel that made Greg Norman such a great player for so long. In addition to being the No. 1 golfer worldwide for 331 consecutive weeks, he won two major championships and finished second in a handful of others.

From Norman’s U.S. base right on Jupiter Island, the trip to Jupiter Country Club was the shortest of rides. This “home-field advantage” for the project gave Norman the chance to make many visits and provide ongoing design input. The result is a course of great design integrity with a special rhythm to the holes.

SOUTH CAROLINA: Barefoot Resort & Golf 

Norman entered the course-design field knowing that his charismatic personality and reputation for bold, at times high-risk shotmaking preceded him. Always a bit of a showman, he knew he could use course architecture to express those elements of his personality. That said, in cases where his client desired a subtle, more cerebral routing, Norman has complied. But where a more heroic style has been called for, the famed Aussie sportsman has been eager to comply.

The Norman Course at Barefoot Resort & Golf in the vacation mecca of Myrtle Beach makes use of a flowing, no-transition technique Norman likes to employ. The layout’s fairways at certain points run directly into sand, at other points into scrubby native-vegetation areas, without buffers or demarcations. This means that aggressive shots have no light rough or other border-type surface to keep them out of the hazards. The technique also adds visual drama, an attribute Norman strongly favors.

TENNESSEE: Tennessee National

Medalist Development, a joint venture between Great White Shark Enterprises and Macquarie Bank of Australia, represents the Norman technique of forming partnerships that provide greater creative control of his work and more equity in the resulting asset. It was under the Medalist umbrella that the 1,450-acre Tennessee National came into being.

The golf course site Tennessee National developers set aside had a bumps-and-hollows movement to it that Norman found ideal. Covering 260 acres, the course features stacked sod-wall bunkers, an unusual temperate-zone mix of Bermuda and bent grasses, plus native stone bulkhead walls and spillways. There are 13 man-made lakes on the course and water comes into play on 11 holes.

SOUTH CAROLINA: Oldfield

Never one to do things halfway, Norman seized the issue of sustainable golf development when, in 2004, he signed on as a Trustee of the Environmental Institute for Golf, a philanthropic organization governed by the Golf Course Superintendents Association of America. As part of his appointment, Greg agreed to chair the institute’s advisory council, which has given shape to, funded and developed many important initiatives.

Working with his clients at Oldfield, Norman’s design team moved earth and cleared the native trees very selectively. The result is a Lowcountry championship course that prowls through rippled, oak-shaded terrain and dares a player to hit toward unforgiving marshland on a short-cut path to the target.

FLORIDA: BellaTrae at Champions Gate

Norman was extended the opportunity to double his efforts at the new BellaTrae at Champions Gate, FL, and the result was the National and International. Golfers enjoy a comprehensive tour of the 1,200-acre private and gated community on the 36 holes which weave through woodlands, wetlands, and orange groves. The community is additionally enhanced by being the world headquarters of the David Leadbetter Golf Academy. It further proves that Norman the showman and gritty golfer can share a stage with anyone and still look great.

Golf Architects Officially Add Pace of Play to Golf Course Design

World Golf Village, FL: Two courses, Hall of Fame & more.

One of the oft-heard remarks about playing 18 holes of golf is
that it takes too long--four hours or more. In today's fast-
paced, always connected world that can be a lifetime. The
members of the American Society of Golf Course Architects
(ASGCA) know this fact well and while the golfers themselves
are part of the equation, the course designers can help them
along with design strategies aimed at speeding up play.

“A properly designed, well-drained course with ample playable
areas, properly placed bunkers, visible water hazards and
smaller greens usually plays fastest,” explains ASGCA
President Steve Forrest. “ASGCA architects work with
developers to design courses that are challenging but not
overwhelming. This keeps play moving without detracting
from the player’s overall experience.”

Courses offering faster play usually benefit from a
combination of factors including quality professional
management, and the cooperation both of those playing and
those directing play.

However, according to Forrest, faster play also results from
course designs that pay special attention to routing designs
and tactical layouts of tees, greens and fairways.

“Common sense tells us that shorter, wider courses will play
faster than longer, narrow ones, particularly for the average
and beginning players,” notes Forrest. “But, other design
elements should also be taken into account.”

When you are investigating a master-planned community's golf
course, here are other design elements which, considered
along with the myriad other design issues, can work to speed
up your play and get you off to the tennis court, marina or
other activity more quickly. And, of course, you can always
play just nine holes.

Multiple tees: Another common sense element—but one that
must be considered in conjunction with how tee placement
and length affect proper shot alignment—is the number and
placement of multiple tees.

Flatter, Smaller Greens: When greens have fewer severe
undulations, three putt frequency is reduced. Smaller greens
also lessen the number of three putts, and reduce the time
spent lining up putts.

Strategic Fairway Mounding: Fairways can be designed to
contain slightly errant shots by strategic mound placement.

Easily-Visible Yardage Marking: Vertical yardage markers, or
markers that are otherwise quickly identifiable, with accurate
yardage information will speed play.

The ASGCA has a number of publications that address design
considerations. For a list of free publications on golf course
remodeling, development, master planning and golf course
architect selection, contact ASGCA at 262-786-5960 or
info@asgca.org. To see the list of more than 75 golf course
architects that have designed for GolfCourseHome
communities and a list of their course, click here.

Golf Architect Pete Dye: Lifelong Innovator (Part-Time Intimidator)

PGA Village, FL: A Dye course and famous golf school.

Pete Dye: Lifelong Innovator
(Part-Time Intimidator)

Welcome to the seventh installment in an ongoing series of
articles on golf course designers and the style and value they
bring to a golf community. Past installments have focused on
Jack Nicklaus, Tom Fazio, Arnold Palmer, Arthur Hills,
Robert Trent Jones II, Bob Cupp and Tom Jackson.

Forget railroad ties, island greens and “Dye-abolical” course
layouts that all the “experts” cite in summing up Pete Dye’s
mark on golf course design. Dye’s career makes sense only
if you understand that in the late 1960s and ‘70s  he
re-introduced the strategic subtleties of British links golf into
American golf course design, and in doing so, changed
American golf forever.

Now in his 80's and still designing, Dye grew up playing a nine-
hole course on his family’s farm in Urbana, Ohio. He won the
Ohio State High School Championship and continued to
compete in amateur events for decades.

FLORIDA: Harbour Ridge Yacht & Country Club

The architect’s life and career changed in 1963, when he took
his first trip to Scotland. That visit freed Pete Dye to bring a
sense of mystery and natural, free-form randomness to the
fairways and greens he would build.

Dye had none other than Jack Nicklaus along as a rookie
assistant designer when he built the world-famous Harbour
Town Golf Links within Sea Pines Plantation on HIlton Head
Island. Site of an annual PGA Tour event, the Harbour Town
course was Dye’s first visible statement of how British
linksland design elements would influence him from that
point on.

GEORGIA: Marina Cottages at The Ford Plantation

Almost every type of terrain has golf potential, in Dye’s view,
but he is particularly fond of Carolina Lowcountry marsh.
Colleton River Plantation, where a bold and fast-running Dye
layout complements a Nicklaus-designed course, is an
excellent example of the “ground movement” Dye creates.

One Pete Dye golf course that the game’s top players have
always felt confident on is the River Course at Kingsmill on
the James, in historic Williamsburg, VA. With Michelob as a
title sponsor, both the PGA Tour and the LPGA Tour have
staged exciting tournaments on Dye’s smooth fairways and
carefully perched greens.

 Despite the long association between Dye’s designs and tour-
level competition, Pete is just as pleased and challenged to
design a purely recreational course. His 18-hole, championship
golf course at Hampton Hall, SC, is a case study in hole
variety, switching its requirements from power to positioning
and back again.

Dye is known for staying on site over long stretches and even
operating the shaping machinery himself. By being so hands-
on, he was able to master an eco-friendly approach that
controlled water use and made it possible to work in sensitive
environments. The courses he built at Amelia Island
Plantation, FL, in the 1970s with Bobby Weed are prominent
early examples.

One of Dye’s design ideas is that private courses should have
hard-to-read features that baffle a newcomer but become like
quirky old friends to the golfers who encounter them time and
again. At the Southern Hills Plantation Club outside Tampa,
FL, we can see that sleight-of-hand in the form of boomerang-
shaped mounding that hides steep-faced bunkers.

It is particularly tempting to course developers who are
building large, multi-course properties to include the work of
Pete Dye in the golf amenity. Barefoot Resort & Golf, a
landmark community on the Myrtle Beach Grand Strand,
features a star-studded design marquee that includes Greg
Norman, Davis Love III, Tom Fazio and a 7.343-yard Dye
Course. It’s a visually captivating layout whose so-called
safe areas are sometimes more tricky to play from than the
hazards one is trying to avoid.

FLORIDA: Ranch Colony

Likewise, the Dye reputation for presenting a stiff challenge
naturally leads a community like PGA Village, FL, to include
one of Pete’s courses in its 54-hole golf complex. Known for
providing one of America’s leading resort-style golf
academies—the famed PGA Learning Center—this community
turns its ever-improving golfers loose on two Tom Fazio 18s
and one by Dye.

Other Articles in the Golf Architect Series

I. The No. 1 Real-Estate Enhancer: Jack Nicklaus - Find out
why this golf course architect adds the most value to the real
estate surrounding the golf courses he designs.

II. Tom Fazio: Elevating Course Design--and Home Values

III. Arnold Palmer: His Brilliant Second Career

IV. Arthur Hills: Value-Adding Visionary

V. Robert Trent Jones II: Continuing the Legacy

VI.  Bob Cupp and Tom Jackson: Veterans with Prime Portfolios