Palm Springs Life / Desert Guide / September 2010 / Designer Challenges

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Designer Challenges

Luminaries of the game lay out jaw-dropping designs that invite golfers to test their skills

Fifty years ago, the wealth of golfers devoted as much attention to who designed the crafted turf beneath their spikes as they did to ball washers or green repair tools. In recent decades, often to as golf’s “postmodern era” of architecture, the appreciation of experiencing a celebrated designer’s work has ascended in tune with the sport’s rise in popularity around the globe.

Today’s age of the celebrity designer has renewed celebration and intrigue on the grounds shaped by the likes of Donald Ross, A.W. Tillinghast, and Alister MacKenzie. Namely fueled by the career of living design luminary Pete Dye, today’s golfer experiences a finely crafted course in the same way one approaches a celebrated work of art — with the beautiful exception that the courses are pieces of living, active canvas.

Like few places in the world, the Coachella Valley offers a communal gallery of these artists’ offerings. You’ll note that some of their respective portfolios may hold a private club listing; however, each designer offers an experience that’s open to all.

The brush is in your hand. Just don’t spray the paint too far off the frame.

PETE DYE
La Quinta Resort — Mountain Course
50200 Avenida Vista Bonita, La Quinta, CA 92253; 760-564-7610, www.laquintaresort.com

Among the nine courses at La Quinta Resort and PGA West are four Pete Dye designs, with three open to public play. While each offers a round (and challenge) wholly unique, experience the Mountain Course, listed as Golf Magazine’s No. 70 “Best Public” course in the country.

“Pete Dye likes natural golf courses,” says Michael Kelly, executive director at PGA West. “I wouldn’t call him a minimalist, but he loves taking what the Earth gives and then weaving a golf course in there that is aesthetically pleasing. But from a playability standpoint, he likes to challenge the golfer at every level.”

Like few places in the Coachella Valley, the nine holes coming home on the Mountain reveal Dye’s vision of turf threading about Earth.
“The Mountain Course is really fun to play,” Kelly continues. “You have water, you have mountains, you have elevation, and you have some really interesting par 3s that are challenging over water. But you also have reachable par 5s. It’s not necessarily about length on the Mountain. You’d prefer to pull out a 4-iron or a hybrid on a lot of holes instead of a driver to find target spots on the fairway.

“And there’s incredible scenery on the back nine,” Kelly adds. “The tee boxes are cut right into the mountains. You can get entranced back there. It’s one of the most beautiful settings you can find.”

Kelly and crew make extended use of the idyllic environs on the back, often setting up white-linen tabletops for special occasions when play has concluded for the day. The post-round serenity is matched only by Kelly’s fondness for the course designer.

“I just adore Pete Dye. He’s the godfather of a lot of modern-day architects like Nicklaus, Norman, and even Tom Fazio to some degree,” Kelly says. “Dye blends a lot of different components. He’s always challenging your game, but he’s always fair. He likes you to hit the ball in the fairway and when you don’t, he penalizes you. But he doesn’t destroy you. His fairways are wide and typically undulated, and his greens are well-positioned to be attacked — and Dye frames them very well.”

Other local courses: PGA West TPC Stadium Course (public, La Quinta), Mission Hills Country Club-Pete Dye Challenge (private, Rancho Mirage), Hideaway Golf Club-Pete Dye Course (private, La Quinta)

NICK FALDO
Marriott’s Shadow Ridge
9002 Shadow Ridge Road, Palm Desert, CA 92260; 760-674-2700, www.marriott-vacations.com

Based on an exceptional playing career that included wins at six majors, Nick Faldo was knighted last year by Queen Elizabeth II in his native England. By adding “Sir” before his name, Faldo added to myriad titles affixed to his moniker, including: champion, Ryder Cup captain, broadcaster, businessman, Harrison Ford look-a-like, and golf course designer. When looking at Faldo’s first U.S. design, Marriott’s Shadow Ridge, it becomes clear that it’s a course befit for kings.

“The design takes a lot of different elements from Nick’s experiences in the game,” says Director of Golf Brett Meabon. “With Nick being from England, there’s a little bit of a links feel to the course. More importantly, it has the feel of the Australian Sand-Belt courses. We have native areas off of the roughs and fairways that are made of a lot of native desert plants. There’s also a lot of rolling hills; not a ton of elevation change but many nice rolling features. And the fairways are quite generous with the exception of one or two holes.”

Spraying off of those ample fairways, however, will find ball-strikers competing with Shadow Ridge’s 89 bunkers, making deft sand play a must to succeed. In addition, short-game acumen is crucial here, lest golfers duel with run-off designs about the greens. Noting that lofted clubs can oft-prove a smart (and safe) waste to rescue oneself from waste areas, Meabon adds:

“One of the things Mr. Faldo did here is create a number of the greens held up with collection areas that are tightly mowed to fairway length. If you miss a shot to the right or left, it will run off to one of the collection areas — so it’s really important to be able to get up-and-down here. The greens have a lot of undulation, so there are definitely some spots where you can get into some tricky situations.”

Recognized by Golfweek as the nation’s 75th “Best Resort Course,” it appeals to players of all levels to use Shadow Ridge’s exceptional prep and instructional opportunities at Faldo Golf Institute.

“We have an extensive practice facility,” Meabon says, noting that a master club fitter is on site. “We have a double-tee driving range, along with a wedge range for shots 100 yards and in. We also have three short game areas with bunkers and practice greens to work on chipping, pitching, and putting.”

With practice facility access included with greens fee, step out of the shadows early and get in a solid warm-up session before your round. It’s surely better to experience Shadow Ridge like Sir Nick then to spend your day in the native areas looking like Indiana Jones.

JOHN FOUGHT
Indian Wells Golf Resort — Players Course
44500 Indian Wells Lane, Indian Wells, CA 92210; 760-346-4653, www.indianwellsgolfresort.com

Although injury shortened his playing, golf course architect John Fought has long evidenced the same design skills with computer-aided drafting as he once did with Hogan blades en route to winning the 1977 U.S. Amateur Championship and 1979 PGA Tour Rookie of the Year honors.

Celebrated for his work at courses such as The Gallery South Course (Marana, Ariz.) and The Reserve South Course (Aloha, Ore.), Fought took the City of Indian Wells’ former East Course and crafted The Players into what Golfweek regards as the nation’s No. 7 “Best Municipal.”

“There were two courses there that were a bit outdated, so I think the City of Indian Wells wanted a serious upgrade and to be one of the top places in the desert,” Fought says. “Clive Clark turned what was the West Course into the Celebrity Course and I turned what was the East Course into the Players Course. Clive is into doing flowers and water-features, which are of course spectacular. For my course, we did a more classic look with the ability to stretch it out for championships.”

To complement the classic elements, Fought’s redesign of the grounds involved a total overhaul — with one notable exception.

“We tried to keep as many of the large trees as we could, which means we had four or five holes [that] play in the same sort of corridors, but were either lengthened or changed,” Fought says of the former Skins Game site. “When you have trees that are 30 years old or more, you need to take advantage of those. … That’s one of the charms, because the course isn’t surrounded by houses. We needed the challenge to save those trees, because we knew they’d give us a very mature feel — which is rare in the area.”

Speaking further to his design vision, Fought explains:

“I worked hard to take advantage of the mountain views and to use the wash that runs along there as a feature. I removed two-thirds of the water, because I’m not a big water guy. So we created some California-style barrancas with sand in them and that kind of thing. And as they mature and grow, they’re becoming better and better.”

Highly respected for the large degree of time he spends on-site during construction, Fought views the Players Course among the top accomplishments in his portfolio.

“There was a lot of detail work to this project,” he says. “It was a complicated design that required not only a great vision but a great contractor — a lot of time went into the features. And I love the fact it’s all built on sand, which is terrific.

“I can’t image that there are many courses of mine that are as beautiful or as well-maintained as the Players Course. It’s one of the best-conditioned courses ever. They keep it in tip-top shape; it’s one of the most amazing places I’ve ever had a chance to work.”

Other local courses: Cimarrón Golf Club (two publics: Boulder Course and Pebble Course, Cathedral City), Ironwood Country Club (private; redesigns of North and South courses originally designed by Desmond Muirhead and Ted Robinson in consultation with Arnold Palmer, Palm Desert)

JACK NICKLAUS
Escena Golf Club
1100 Clubhouse View, Palm Springs, CA 92262; 760-778-2737, www.escenagolf.com

The recently re-opened Escena could seamlessly affix “Clásico” to the club’s moniker. From clubhouse to green, the Nicklaus Design Team course vibes the “classic scene” of Palm Springs’ Era of the Cool.

“We’re trying to invoke Palm Springs of old, with a 1950s and ‘60s architecture that was prevalent in those times,” says General Manager Todd Connelly. “The palm trees are skirted, and Washingtonian palms have the beards that run the circumference of the tree. We wanted to make sure that we kept that look, so it matches the Palm Springs of old.”

Like a golf ball serving as a cyclical sphere of style, the Escena player segues from the club’s hip midcentury modern clubhouse to a track encompassing nearly 80,000 of those classic trees and plantings.

“The golf course was shut down for two-and-a-half years, so we had to replant 20,000 plants as well as trim a lot of the plant material that was strong enough to survive with minimal maintenance,” Connelly says. “[And] the greens encroached rather largely from the Bermuda outside of the green itself. So we had to go back in and enlarge almost every green about a foot in circumference to have the green sizes that were originally planned for the course.”

Connelly counts the tireless maintenance of those sizeable green as a reason Escena has fast resurfaced as a premier desert destination.

“We have Tifdwarf greens and we oversee them with Poa Triv and Bent Grass,” Connelly says. “Which is really nice seasonally. So all year long you’ll have a great putting surface.”

Yet with nearly 100 bunkers and desert terrain running off the rough, players best not get overly caught up in Escena’s aesthetics or the lure of a post-round Tom Collins. Among the myriad targets of necessary focus, Connelly counts Escena’s “tremendous” par 3s among his favorites.

“No. 12 is my favorite hole on the course,” he concludes. “It’s a par 3 with a rather large, redan-style green that’s shaped like a banana from front-to-back. It drops down from the front; there’s a large swale in the middle and it probably drops four feet. It can be very intriguing, depending on where we put the pin everyday.”

Other local courses: The Club at Morningside (private, Rancho Mirage), PGA West Nicklaus Tournament Course (public, La Quinta), Toscana Country Club (two private courses, Indian Wells)

ARNOLD PALMER
SilverRock Resort
79-179 Ahmanson Lane, La Quinta, CA 92253; 760-777-8884, www.silverrock.org

Mirroring the gravity with which “The King” brought golf to the masses, Arnold Palmer’s prolific design career has brought the masses to golf in a way matched by few other architects. With his vast thumbprint pressed wide across the Coachella Valley, Palmer’s biggest impression might be SilverRock, part of the Hope Classic rotation of courses since 2008. Touted as Golfweek’s No. 50 “Best Tour Course You Can Play,” it proves a stout challenge for pros and amateurs.

“All the feedback I’ve ever had with the pro has been very positive,” says course General Manager and Director of Golf Randy Duncan. “They generally like the course and find it very fair — it’s probably the most challenging of the courses now in the Hope rotation. The players respect it; you definitely have to bring your A-game to play SilverRock.”

Known for designing with great respect for nature, Palmer and his team blended SilverRock with an earnest mesh of beauty and beast.

“The most stunning aspect of SilverRock is the setting itself,” Duncan says of the City of La Quinta-owned course. “We’re situated at the base of the Santa Rosa Mountains, so when you come into the property, it’s one of those awe-inspiring moments. Literally, every hole you play here, you’re either hitting toward the mountains or alongside the mountain.”

While generous fairways abound, the course demands great length from the tips (nearly 7,600 yards) and can prove a bear for balls skewing off the short stuff.

“We have water on 10 holes,” Duncan says. “A canal runs through the back nine, and that comes into play on several holes. We also have several large lakes that you’re either hitting over or [along]. So there are quite a few hazards out here.

“We also have 50 acres of native areas, which are natural vegetation of the desert,” he continues. “It could be in the form of sand, trees, Pampas grasses, or shrubs. That’s definitely something that stands out here. If you can find your ball, you can hit out of them. But there typically aren’t big trees in front of you in the native areas so, depending in you lie, you still have a crack at getting to the green or to your next approach shot location.”

Yet even if you hold your game for the wealth of a round, take a deep breath coming home, as SilverRock looms most demanding on the final four holes.

“There are a lot of great holes on the back,” Duncan says. “But I think the course starts to get tough on No.’s 15, 16, and 17 — those are probably three of the toughest holes you’ll play in the area. No. 15 is a long par 4 that has a canal running from tee-to-green. On 16 you’ve got another long par 4 with the mountains on the left and a ‘catcher’s mitt’ bunker guarding the green. 17 is our probably famous hole out here — it’s a par 3 that requires a tee shot over a lake onto a green protected by a bunker on the left and a creek on the back.”

With a thinking player’s par 5 on No. 18 that sports sand on the left and water on the right, SilverRock ensures that you leave with an impression made upon the precious metals in your bag.

Other local courses: Mountain View Country Club (private, La Quinta), Classic Club (public, Palm Desert), PGA West Palmer Course (private, La Quinta)

DAVID RAINVILLE
Oasis Country Club (Palm Desert):
42330 Casbah Way, Palm Desert, CA 92211; 760-345-2715, www.theoasiscountryclub.com

David Rainville eschews ego like few designers of his era. Tabbed as the “average golfer’s designer” by the American Society of Golf Course Architects, Rainville’s portfolio ranges from the luminary (complete redesign of Torrey Pines with Billy Casper in the mid-‘70s), to the inspiring (Warner Springs Ranch), to the leisurely. Per the latter, his work on the Oasis executive track serves as evidence that golf should prove an experience as approachable and pleasant as the man himself.

“I always do something that’s going to accommodate the developer’s needs. You need to know who the target is and tailor the design as such,” says Rainville, who began his design career in 1961. “At the Oasis, they didn’t have much land and needed to have a certain yield on the development. What it came to be was a really strong executive golf course. In the desert you can go down and grade and get the golf course below so people have overviews of it, and that’s really important to enhance the surrounding area. But you want a lot of variety into that, and that’s what we did. The desert allows you to be pretty creative with a lot of undulation and character and really enhance the surrounding area with something that’s both intriguing and also fun to play.”

Rainville’s ubiquitous flexibility was instantly put to task at Oasis.

“Early on, they realized that the units there that were facing water were at a premium and were going quickly,” he says. “The owners came back to me and asked, ‘Where can we develop additional lakes on this course?’ So I took the design and I came up with 22 places, thinking they’d probably take six or seven of them. But they wanted all 22! So, we modified the design where it does have all those lakes but they don’t all come into play.”

Among Rainville’s most prevalent design tenets is to offer a variety of challenges on his green and bunker placement:

“One of the things I’ve done with green design is to have 80 percent of a green surface that is forgiving and relatively open so the average guy can play it with a certain degree of challenge,” Rainville explains. “I call that the ‘working area.’ But then I have the ‘tournament area’ where pins can be placed to increase the challenge. So there’s flexibility built into the course. And that extends to the bunkering. There are bunkers that Joe Blow can’t reach, so he’s not going to be in trouble. If the average guy is constantly in trouble, that slows the pace of play. So bunkers are placed to create a challenge for the low handicapped, but Joe Blow doesn’t get totally beat up.”

Rainville’s recognition of golf as recreation has long formed a design philosophy that would just as soon see a smile on a player’s face, as the designer’s name on a scorecard.

“I’ve been on courses where you can see a designer working on his ego, and it doesn’t always serve the client or the people playing that course,” he concludes. “So the expectation is to make it appear challenging, but also to make it fun.”

Other local courses: Desert Princess Country Club (private, Cathedral City), Cathedral Canyon Golf Club (with Billy Casper, public, Cathedral City)

TED ROBINSON
Tahquitz Creek — Resort Course
1885 Golf Club Drive, Palm Springs, CA 92264; 760-328-1005, www.tahquitzgolfresort.com

Arnold Palmer may indeed be “The King,” but one of the few design contemporaries he would surely bow to is the late, great Ted Robinson, hailed as “The King of Waterscapes.” With more than 20 desert works to his credit, Robinson’s lasting impression on golf in the Coachella Valley is near peerless. And across his portfolio, few desert courses can wholly present the Robinson design philosophies of “flexibility,” “memorability,” and “natural beauty” in the form offered by his Resort Course at Tahquitz Creek.

Speaking to those tenets, course General Manager Brandon Alexander says, “Ted Robinson’s belief was to let nature take its course, and I think the Resort Course is a good example of that. There’s lots of natural indigenous landscape. The trees and plant life are all natural. In the springtime when the temperature rises, the creek fills with runoff from the snowmelt of the San Jacinto Mountains. It’s cold when you go up and touch it. It doesn’t necessarily come into play, but you hit over it on No. 14 and it’s barely on No. 15 in front of the green. I get a lot of phone calls when it comes down. People think that the facilities up above us on the mountain are pumping out their ponds or have a busted sprinkler head.”

As for offering varying degrees of challenge for golfers at differing strata, Alexander continues, “Robinson was a believer in flexibility. So you’ll see lots of generous landing areas off the tee and the greens are challenging but also quite generous. Some of the greens are quite big, but there’s lots of undulation to make it challenging but still fair.”

With his ear to the turf, Alexander states with confidence that said fairness at Tahquitz often results in players embracing taut scoring.

“Quite often, I’ll hear someone talking on their cell after a round and they’re telling their friend that they just came off the Resort Course and shot the best round of their life.”

While Robinson’s trademark water comes into play on eight holes, the largest presence for this municipal track may be its proud standing among the desert community.

“When the Resort Course was built the City of Palm Springs had a vision of the facility as a part of life for the citizens here,” Alexander says. “Along No. 14, you’ll find Demuth Park. There’s just a ton of activity there, and there’s actually an equestrian trail that goes through the Resort Course, as well as a bike trail. They both go along the outside, but they’re both part of the Resort Course and a part of the community. No. 17 is a par 3 where you hit over a lake onto a two-tiered green, and right behind it sits Knott’s Soak City and you can see part of it and hear the kids in the summertime. Golf snobs might not like that, but we feel we’re part of the community out here and golf’s a big part of that, and we want to keep it that way.”

Other local courses: Monterey Country Club (private, 27 holes, Palm Desert), Mission Lakes Country Club (semiprivate/open to public, Desert Hot Springs), Indian Wells Country Club (with Eddie Sussalla, private)

LEE SCHMIDT AND BRIAN CURLEY
Golf Club at Terra Lago
84000 Terra Lago Parkway, Indio, CA 92203; 760-775-2000, www.golfclub-terralago.com

Lee Schmidt and Brian Curley are the Martin Scorseses of the golf world: They’ve worked with everybody. With a global portfolio and a roster of design cohorts that includes Dye, Nicklaus, Faldo, and Fred Couples — to play a Schmidt and Curley course is to experience an amalgam of some of golf’s finest minds in the last 50 years. Their dual North and South Courses at Terra Lago are no exception.
“Most courses in the Coachella Valley — even though they’re in the desert — they look more like JW Marriott Desert Springs than they do desert-target type golf,” Curley says of the tracks that hosted the Skins Game from 1999-2002. “On these courses, we left more than half of it in its native desert state — we didn’t grade it. They have that stark contrast of turf and existing desert. At the same time, especially with landing areas, we wanted to give players enough room where they could hit it, find it, then hit it again -- not make it so penal off the tee.”

Employing a soft-lined design philosophy that aimed to create seamless transitions from turf into desert, Schmidt and Curley’s work served as a departure from real estate driven golf.

“The South Course is on the lower part of the property, which has more loose sand and dune environment while the North has more of a mud hill, rocky terrain,” Curley says. “On the west side is where the terrain is most severe, and we left a lot of that intact. We tried to design as little disturbance to the desert area as possible, and tried to get a little difference between the two courses.”

Curley says of the North’s lure of tournament play: “We arranged three greens sites on the North Course right in front of the clubhouse: No. 14, which is a drivable par 4; No. 15 which is an island green par 3; No. 18 which was [designed as] a reachable par 5 and is now a long par 4. So, during a tournament situation, spectators can hang right around the club area and see all this action right in front of them.”

Speaking to a noted element of the South Course, Curley adds, “No. 4 on the South course goes through the northern part of the property, back in a little canyon-type area. It’s got that that stark, mud-hill terrain in there. But we went in there and, instead of creating a formal bunker, we threw sand across there and made it look like a sandy blow-out deposit. So in some of those areas we tried to create that look where you have the sand blown up the face of the mud-hill.”

While playing Terra Lago may encompass a mere four hours of your day, the appreciative design mind will walk away knowing they have traversed fairways crafted along a timeline of luminary design experience.

Other local courses: Shadow Hills Golf Club (public, Indio), The Plantation Golf Club (Brian Curley with Fred Couples, private, Indio)