Southern California, March 29 & 30, 2017
Sherwood CC March 29: Up
early on Wednesday 3/29 as I had a 7:30 tee time at Sherwood Country Club in
Thousand Oaks, CA. Temperature was in
the high 40’s when I arrived at the club…but with bright sunshine forecast it
promised to warm up quickly. Talking
with the new head pro, Nick Yannotti and my caddy, Drew, it felt like I was
back on the east coast. Nick grew up in
Fairfield CT and we traded stories about the courses of Westchester and
Fairfield counties, especially CC of Fairfield.
Drew played in the 2013 US Amateur at Brookline (but missed qualifying
for match play) and it was great fun trading Brookline stories with him during
the round.
David Murdock, who developed the
entire area, founded the club and it opened in late 1989. The club membership through the years has
included (and in many cases still does include) the likes of Sean Connery,
Kenny G, Mel Gibson, Wayne Gretsky (and his daughter’s finance Dustin Johnson),
Tom Selleck, Sylvester Stallone, and a bunch of “newies” a few of whose names are
vaguely familiar.
Those of you with television
sets are probably very familiar with Sherwood as it hosted the Shark Shootout
from 1989-1998, the Tiger Woods World Challenge 2000-2008, and one of the
Champions Tour playoff event in 2016. It
also was the site of a Tiger Woods-David Duval TV match in 1999 (Tiger won 2 &
1).
The course gets flipped for
tournaments. Holes 1-8 become 10-17 for tournaments,
10-17 become 1-8, and 9 and 18 stay as 9 and 18…and if you can figure that out,
you are better than I. For the ease of
your readers, the holes I refer to will be the tournament holes numbers. And…even if you don’t watch golf on TC (what
else is there besides Fox News and “24”?), you saw this property in the opening
helicopter scenes each week on “M*A*S*H”.
The best holes are:
o #2,
a 536 yard par 5 that turns slightly right and is flat off the tee and then
slightly downhill to an island green that is very deep but very very narrow and
can leave one with some wild putts; laying up is not a simple option as the lay
up area is fairly narrow;
o #8,
a 232 yard downhill par 3 that almost is a dogleg right to a green (well
guarded by deep bunkers) that angles from front left to back right and slopes L to R…an imposing target;
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| Sherwood #8 par 3 tee shot |
o #14,
459 yard dogleg left with a raised green that slopes toward the back left…in a
spectacular setting that you will remember from TV;
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| Sherwood par 4 #14 tee shot |
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| Sherwood par 4 #14 approach shot |
o #15,
186 yard par 3 over two ponds to a green sloping heavily from back to
front…again a familiar sight from TV coverage;
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| Sherwood par 3 #15 |
o #17,
168 yard par 3 to a very small raised green…deep bunker front left must be
avoided; I curled in a putt of about 50’ from back left to a front right cup
location for a birdie…but the TV crew was taking a break and missed it.
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| Sherwood par 3 #17 |
Some of you may recall the “Rock
Hole” (#7) which has a group of large (6’-7’ high) bolders in a cluster in the
middle of the fairway…in his match with Tiger, David Duval had to take an
unplayable out of that cluster. My drive
stopped just short of the cluster and I, of course, decided to make a go of
it. It hit one of the rocks firmly and
darted toward one of the large homes
lining the left side of the fairway. We
heard it hit the patio and the side of the house, but did not hear any glass
break or screams of “help”. Apparently
no one was home, and I left that ball behind as compensation for any damages.
My score was 38-40 = 78…based on
the member’s hole order….and 40-38 = 78 based on the tournament hole order.
From the tips Sherwood is 7098
yards (par 72). Overall, I have a very mixed
view of the course…it has a very high number of excellent holes…and even more
that are truly dramatic. However, it is
filled with many homes (a good number of which certainly fit the definition of mega-mansions) that line most of the holes…and “intrude” on a very special setting. The homes and the trees separate the holes
from one another thereby inhibiting the “flow” of the course. Yes, there are many superb holes, but
somehow, a golf course should be more than the “sum of its parts” IMO.
As I expected, the course was in
perfect condition but too green IMO. The
service level in the clubhouse is simply superb…but a bit too “over the top”
for my tastes.
After the round, I drove 18
miles north to a public course, Rustic Canyon…as different from Sherwood CC as
you can imagine.
Rustic Canyon Golf Course,
March 29, 2017: Designed by Gil
Hanse (opened in 2002) and set in a parched canyon, this course is simply
brilliant in its simplicity. Wide wide
fairways (with a number of bunkers smack in the center) create all sorts of
angles into greens that can drive a player simply nuts…but what fun! It was
even fun when a superb 3 wood approach on 9, which was just about pin high
before I looked away…and then ended up some 30-40 yards short of the pin. I had a 41-40 = 81.
The front nine is relatively
flat (but the entire Canyon sloped gently from N to S and this slope
dominates short play around and on the greens) and the back nine is built on
slightly more interesting land. Golf
Magazine called Rustic Canyon the best value in the USA and it richly deserves
that title. From the tips it plays 7044
yards (par 72) but because it is so firm and fast, it plays much shorter. In terms of simple unpretentious fun, this
course belongs right up there with Wolf Point Ranch (TX), Palmetto (SC)…and
most of the courses in GB&I!!!
Better bring a good ground game here and start thinking about how the
ball will react when it hit the ground.
Very tough to figure out first
time around (and, of course, I only had time for 18) but just like The Old
Course, this is one where you will never stop learning alternative ways to play
the holes
While I loved the firm fast
nature of the course, and the fairways and greens were generally in good
condition, the bunkers and areas off the fairway could use some cleaning up…but
at about $40/round on weekdays, no complaints.
Play was fairly slow, but that tends to be true at public access golf
Unfortunately my camera lost its
charge by the time I arrived at Rustic, so no pics. If you love wide open interesting courses and
brilliant architecture…this is a must to see and play!!
La Costa Resort, March 30,
2017 (Champions Course): Truly a name from the past. Completed in 1965 and designed by Dick
Wilson, La Costa hosted:
o The
CBS Golf Classic…a made for TV series of matches featuring the golf stars of
the late 1960’s and early 1970’s;
o The
Tournament of Champions (later renamed the Mercedes Championship) from
1969-1998 (when it moved to Kapalua on Maui); and
o The
WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship for seven of eight years between 1999 and
2006 (when it moved to Tucson, AZ).
The T of C was always played
during the Tour’s West Coast swing during California’s rainy season…and the
course was frequently very very wet when presented on TV. It was renovated by Joe Lee in 1973 and 1984,
and then by Damian Pascuzzo, Steve Pate, and Jeff Bauer in 2011. The latter renovation was a very big change
and changed the original course by splitting it up. I had been told when I booked the tee time
that today’s Champions course was built on the land that had the original T of
C/CBS Golf Classic etc. course. During
my round I suspected that was not true as we did not play on land similar to
the flow of the old holes #15-18…long, with water right, and flowing westward. Talking with an old timer in the pro shop it
became clear that holes 1-3 and 13-18 of the Champions Course we played was
built on the old front nine and the back nine of the new Legends Course was
built on the land that housed the old back nine.
I played with an old friend and
fraternity brother, Bob Blumberg, who has lived in the San Diego area for about
the last 35 years or so. We have kept
in touch during this time but not close enough and it was great to spend four
hours with him. Bob was a very good
tennis and squash player back in the 1960’s and like many have taken up golf
with a vengeance over the last 20 years or so.
I was tired this morning. Probably a function of the very long drive
from Thousand Oaks yesterday evening…right in the midst of a typical LA rush
hour…only about 140 miles but it took a full four hours. It showed during my play on the front nine of
Champions but I did get my game back to some degree on the back and ended up
with a 46-42 = 88.
The course is good but certainly
not “great”…and frankly based on my current recollections, the original course
was probably never “great”. The
bunkering is surprisingly tough and “penal”, especially for a resort course. Many of the holes have water or bunkering
fronting the green thereby eliminating a “run-up” option so critical to the
design of firm/fast strategic design.
And, not surprisingly, La Costa is very very green and soft (I should
point out that CA experienced an extreme amount of rain this year). From the back tees it totals 7172 yards (par
72) and it is not a “candidate” for either the Golf Magazine or Golf Digest Top
100 (nor should it be).
For now, I am checking it off as
“played”, but know that I must return to play the old back nine (the current
back nine on Legends). Not something I
want to do, but will have to get it done sometime over the next few years.
Pauma Valley Country Club,
March 30, 2017: I remember Pauma
Valley consistently showing up on the Golf Digest USA Top 100 in the Golf
Digest Top 100 from the mid 1960’s through mid 1980’s but knew almost nothing
about the course. I do not remember
seeing it on TV, but in 1964 it hosted a Shell’s Wonderful World of Golf
“Challenge” match played as a four ball match play event between Arnold
Palmer/Gary Player and Jack Nicklaus/Mike Souchak. Palmer/Player ended up winning the match on
the 16th hole. As implied by
its name, the area is in a valley surrounded by beautiful mountains, and the
area is filled with large and beautiful avocado and citrus groves. It lies about 50 miles inland from La Costa.
I heard a funny story from our
friend Tom B at LACC about Pauma Valley.
Apparently, a couple of decades ago it was regularly used by the USGA to
host sectional qualifying for the US Open…and became known for lightening fast
greens due primarily to the slopes on some of the greens. One year, some of the putts were so fast that
players (and we are talking very good players) were 6 and 7 putting. One player after hitting a slick downhiller
that looked like it would never stop, walked up to the ball as it was moving
and stopped it with his putter…and thereby incurred a 1-stroke penalty. He then proceeded to tap in the 1 footer that
was left for a bogey…probably saving himself 1-3 strokes. He qualified for the Open as a result.
The greens were anything but
fast on March 30, 2017! They were in
fact very slow and the fairways were in definite need of a cutting. I played this day with an old friend from California,
Steve Knudtson. Steve is a good player
but is just getting back into the game after successful open-heart surgery a
few months ago. It was good to catch up and see him
coming back.
The club seemed to be very
active and we were surprised by the conditioning. The back nine was far more interesting than
the front and I played better on the back (44-41 = 85). Best holes were 10, 15, 17 and 18. The views form almost everywhere on the course are simple gorgeous. See pics below:
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| PV #10 uphill par 4 396 yards |
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| PV #15 from tee; 397 yard par 4 |
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| PV #17 par 5 525 yards and very uphill on approach |
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| PV #18 downhill par 4-463 yards and runs parallel to #10 |
After the round, Steve headed
back home, I showered at PV and then had a long drive back to LAX and the joys
of a red-eye flight back to Charlotte, followed by a two hour drive to
home.
All in all a good trip but with
the exception of Rustic Canyon a little disappointing in terms of courses…but I
have learned that is often the case when playing the ones that were on early
Top 100 lists.
Next journey (which I actually
in the middle of as I am typing this) is to Arizona, California, and Nevada the
week after the Masters.
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