For a look at more of the top 50 new courses,
visit www.golfweek.com/slideshows.
The fourth hole
at No. 2 Cornerstone
COURTESY OF CORNERSTONE/DICK DURRANCE
By Bradley S. Klein
Few courses are opening in the
U.S. these days, but the ones that
are debuting are pretty good.
They had better be if they are to
stand a chance.
With the golf market more competitive than
ever, owners and designers know they have
to deliver quality and value to establish
a toehold and draw play.
Our No. 1 new course, Mountaintop, in
Golfweek’s course
Cashiers, N.C., certainly does that. Set in a
rankings are based on
residential community, this high-end private
input from nearly 500
club designed by Tom Fazio is built on a
raters who regularly
rugged site. Yet even with 300 feet of elevation
submit ballots based
change, it remains walkable and playable,
on 10 criteria, each
largely because Fazio confined the uphill
of which is graded
transitions for the land between greens and the
The 17th hole
at No. 7 Tetherow
COURTESY OF TETHEROW/MIKE HOUSKA
on a 10-point scale.
next tees, while the steepest downgrades are
Scores for each
reserved for the carry areas immediately fronting tees.
It will be interesting to see how many of these 50 rookies
course are averaged
Not every course on this list is high-end. Part of the
crack the top 100 of our Golfweek’s Best Modern list,
to get the overall rating.
appeal of our No. 45 new course, Bandon Crossings in
which is published each March. One already has
Criteria details
Bandon, Ore., is precisely that the inland layout designed
done so: Chambers Bay in Tacoma, Wash. It’s hard to
can be obtained
by Dan Hixson is modestly priced and readily accessible –
know which debut is more impressive: its No. 3 on the
by downloading the
in contrast to the fully booked and more expensive links-
Best New list or No. 17 position on the 2008 Golfweek’s
Rater Handbook at
inspired trio of courses at nearby Bandon Dunes Resort.
Best Modern list.
www.golfweeksbest.com.
One of our courses represents a “blow up and start over”
Not that we’re alone in our esteem for this Robert Trent
project. The Champions Course at TPC Scottsdale (Ariz.),
ranked No. 41, is a total overhaul of the 20-year-old
TPC layout that sat there. So thorough a renovation did
architect Randy Heckenkemper undertake that we consider
it a new course.
Jones Jr. layout that sits on Puget Sound. Still in its infancy,
Chambers Bay already has been tapped by the U.S. Golf
Association to host the 2010 U.S. Amateur and the 2015
U.S. Open.
