Coyote Creek in Northern California

[Dan King]

I just player the Valley Course at Coyote Creek. Some who've been to Northern California will remember it as Riverside. It just opened last Friday and I played it this afternoon (in Texas-style heat.)

This course is so much better than the Nicklaus-signature course next door. I can't even imagine people choosing the sig course over this one. The sig-course costs around $100, but that includes a cart, something you wouldn't want to play without. The Valley Course was $35, without cart, which isn't a necessity.  You reverse those amounts and I choose the Valley Course.

It was an enjoyable course.  The signature course has fescue rough that is just brutal. None of that on the Valley Course. Granted the greens are much more interesting on the signature course, but getting to them wasn't ever any fun. The Valley course played hard and fast and had ways to play to the green with a bump and run. I'm sure many Californians are going to consider it unfair, since I hit a few shots 30-40 yards short of the green and they ran through.  But usually not into any real serious trouble, usually into a cool chipping area in a little swale.  Good stuff.

Good course. I'd give it a thumbs up, especially at that price.  I look forward to playing it again.

Dan King
dking@danking.org

"he only equivalent plunge from genius I could think of was Ernest Hemmingway's tragic loss of ability to write. Hemmingway got up one morning and shot himself. Nicklaus got up the next morning and shot 66."
--Ian Woolridge (British journalist, on Nicklaus shooting 83 in he first round of the Open and following that up with a 66)/quote]

[aclayman]

Dan- How much of the old riverside is still there?

[Lynn_Shackelford]

Who designed it?

[Dan King]

Both courses are Nicklaus designed, not sure who working for Nicklaus actually designed the courses. If you ask them, I'm sure they will tell you Nicklaus spent countless hours on the sig course, and his crew mostly worked in the Valley Course. I've played a few Nicklaus courses in my day and I saw no Nicklaus on the Valley Course.

There are only two maybe three holes left from the Old Riverside. Some they combined features of some of the old holes.  The old 8th and 9th make one good par-5. The old 12 is similar, but the green is moved down to the left from its old location. The old 18 is now the 15th, but with some spectacle bunkers in the fairway and a much better green complex. They'd changed much more of the course than I expected.

I might have gushed more than I should, because it was such a surprise. I look forward to another round. Nothing better than going in with low expectations, pay only $35 and be pleasantly surprised. Maybe I ruined it for y'all  .

Dan King
dking@danking.org

quote:"This place is like one of those hot-air hand dryers in toilets. It's a great idea and everybody uses it once, but never again. It takes too long."
--David Feherty (on a golf course designed by Jack Nicklaus in Grand Cypress, Florida)

[Peter Galea]

Dan,
I'm here to tell you there is Jack at the Valley Course. It is not the sharp edged, fall off the edge, high fade Jack. I toured the course in May 2000 with JN and entourage.
He made strategic decisions, set green contours, tweaked and added bunkers. He was there and in charge.

[Pete G.]

Here is Jack's drawing of the "spectacles" you mentioned. While standing on the tee he said, "what we have to do her is make a par 5 that will work for higher handicaps while challenging the better players". He then went to the fairway and started to redraw the green and put in the "spectacles". He tweaked his glasses showing how he would like the bunkers and talked about how he thought that CB would like this. On the page this hole runs diagonally from lower left to right. JN's drawing is at the bottom right.

[Gib_Papazian]

Pete,
Lemme get his straight, Nicklaus actually knows who CB was?

He may have been there that day making a few modifications, but I have it on good authority that he devoted very little (read: no) time to the routing and basic schematic.

That said, perhaps he is finally learning from his mistakes. (Like next door).

[Pete G.]

Gib,
I was only there that day. I was impressed with what I saw JN do at the site. The routing was pretty much set using existing Riverside corridors. Phil Wycoff could elaborate on Jack's input better than I.  

[Matt_Ward]

Dan: Appreciate your comments and agree with them regarding the Nicklaus siganature course at Coyote Creek.

Some people obviously think highly of it, but I don't. The next time I visit the area I will make it a point to play the Valley Course. Glad to see that the Valley allows for different types of shotmaking.

One final note: some people that I spoke with during my visit to Coyote Creek actually believe the Nicklaus signature course is beyond Corde Valle in terms of overall quality. After playing both of them I had to wonder what kind of water are they drinking!

That's just my humble opinion ...

[Neal_Meagher]

The actual credit for the design of the new valley course should go to Tom Pearson, the guy in the plaid jacket in the above photos.  Tom was with Nicklaus Design for over 20 years before going out on his own and worked on this project as a consultant to Nicklaus.

[THuckaby2]

God dammit Dan King, is there NOTHING you can't do earlier and better than me?  I played the Valley Course yesterday morning and was all excited to come in here and tell everyone of a great new place where Jack (or his minions) saw the light and whammo, I see this.  So much for my thunder.

I will concur with the esteemed Mr. King that it is one hell of a golf course.  In addition on the positive side, and I can't believe Dan left this out, but there is a short par 4 with a BIARRITZ green!  I am not kidding!  Yes!  Well, not the standard 220+ par 3 type biarritz (so maybe it doesn't meet the definition?), this is angled off from you a bit and it's on a par4, but the green itself most definitely has two plateaus and a significant hollow in the middle and I was cracking up laughing when I saw it.  It's a very cool hole - short par 4, only 350 or so, dl left - and if you go far enough right as is the proper play (I know now), you have a shot running straight in along the angled green, allowing for a bounce through the hollow to a back pin.... Again, the green is smaller than the standard biarritz also, but what the hell, we don't get this stuff at CA public courses.  I was very impressed.

The spectacles par 5 mentioned above was interesting to me because unlike it's famous father at Carnoustie, here the spectacles come into play ON THE DRIVE.  From the white tee they are about 265 out, slightly down hill... so make that 285 from the blue...just the place where a strong player has to think about reaching them... Very cool.  Great greensite on this hole also.

I don't mind gushing - this course is great.  There are several other wonderful holes worth mentioning but this is too long as it is.

BUT, there is a negative.  Dan seems to have glossed over a serious downside I saw - it is one TOUGH walk, which sucks especially since the land is basically flat and there's no reason for it to be so...Whoever chose the sequence of holes must have been on acid.  I'd say about 12 times, you leave a green and have a tee right next to you, only to find out it's NOT YOUR NEXT HOLE and you have to walk 1/2 mile to get to where that is!  It was brutal... time and time again this happened... and the walk from 9 green to 10 tee was Bajamar-esque (2mile cart ride there, used for effect here).  I've got to think the current routing is temporary... give me a map of the course and I know I could do it better, keeping every hole exactly as it is. The end result is you have a basically unwalkable course on very flat ground... I was BEAT after my 18.

Just reversing the nines would do wonders.

And another negative - whereas Dan got the afternoon twilight rate, full fare on weekends is $75, so not cheap.  Of course compared to it's neighbor at $125, it's a steal.  It's a better course.

I'll go back again FOR SURE the next free weekday afternoon I have.

Anyone in the Bay Area or coming here should check it out also - and play all 36 if you can, just for a great lesson in contrasting styles... Over-the-top brutality at the Tournament course, fun, subtle strategy on the Valley.  It's amazing to me they came from the same company.

Just do be prepared for a VERY tough walk on the Valley, and carts only on the Tournament.

TH

ps - Dan, I was sitting around watching boring USOpen coverage Fri afternoon.. gimme a call next time you head out for something like this!  I was thinking yesterday you were the one guy I would have LOVED to play this course with... my partners didn't get it at all.

[THuckaby2]

PS - I can't believe Dan wrote that the greens are more interesting on the Tournament course... wow, this is ABSOLUTELY WRONG!  Dan, go back and do both again - you must have some strange memory re the Tourament.  Whereas those have either bullshit huge tiers or are boring and flat, several on the Valley are crowned and there are no stupid tiers, just a few subtle areas... and some rolls on some that would make Maxwell proud.  Now methinks you might have been on acid, or were you just trying not to gush too much?

I'll take the greens on the Valley 100 times over those on the tournament.  Check again.

TH

[John_Sheehan]

Dan and Tom-
So when are we playing?!  You guys have got my interest piqued...

[THuckaby2]

JS - this would be a GREAT place for us to get together... Just do take heed my caveat re the tough hike.

I'll try and set something up when Dan returns.  He's gonna be on a post-Bandon high though and it might be tough to do anything else!

TH

[Dan King]

This is part of the problem of only playing a course once and forming an opinion. Tom and I agree on many things, but have differing views on the greens at Coyote Creek.

On the sig course I remember a lot of movement through many of the greens. There didn't seem to be many with large, flat areas. The Valley course had some movements around the edges, but many of the greens were flat. Even the few with multi tiers, the tiers were flat.  But I need to check out both again some time -- though I can't imagine myself paying over $100 for the sig course.

About the walks, we had a twosome playing with us who was riding the course. So for some of the longer walks, I jumped on the back. I think Nicklaus, etc...  were forced to use the same tree corridors, but they went out of their way to avoid any of the routing of the old Riverside. Come off the old 10th hole, and it makes sense to go to the old 11th tee. But instead you walk a few hundred yards to a new hole they created.  There were many instances like that, what seemed to be a forced effort to avoid what was done before.

Which hole has the Biarritz hole? I missed it. Maybe it was a hole where I finished in my pocket and never got around to spending time on the putting green.

Dan King
dking@danking.org

quote:"Hitting a golf ball and putting have nothing in common. They're two different games. You work all your life to perfect a repeating swing that will get you to the greens, and then you have to try to do something that is totally unrelated. There shouldn't be any cups, just flag sticks. And then the man who hit the most fairways and greens and got closest to the pins would be the tournament winner."
 --Ben Hogan

[THuckaby2]

Dan, Dan, Dan.  Ok, maybe it's because I have had the "fortune" to play the Tournament course several times and just came off the Valley course yesterday, but if you truly think the greens at the Valley are "flat" then you must have been BIP on all too many.  There are signifcant, interesting rolls in nearly all of them.  If you like I'll do a full head to head comparing the greens on the two courses but that really should not be necessay.  It's  not even close.  The tournament course has one absolutely silly green (par 4, #6 I think, tough dl left up hill over barranca on 2nd) with an enormous tier and just tell me right now:  if you LIKE that green and consider it good, end of story, we're just so different as to make this discussion meaningless.  That green to me is just plain too over the top.  But if that's what you like....

The greens at the Valley are incredibly well designed I thought, each one a challenge in and of itself but for putting and for approaches.  I would not say that about the Tournament and I fail to see all the cool interior movement you are talking about.  There is literally one hole on which that is true, #13 which has a neat little "bathtub" effect.

The Valley has stuff like that all over the place and it surprises me you of all people would fail to see this.  But you do never cease to surprise me, that's for sure!

Now as to the walking issue, well, if one has to get a ride from green to tee, that's the end of story.  I was in an all-walking group so we didn't have that luxury... you do mention all those long rides you had - just picture doing this with no cart to help.  MAJOR problem with this course.  Whether they did it to make it different from Riverside or whatever, it needs to be changed.  I think it will in time... given they allow walking on Valley and not on tournament, they gotta do something to help the walkers.  But what do I know....

The Biarritz was #12... great short par 4, almost identical to a former Riverside hole in layout but with an entirely new green complex.  No offense, but if you don't remember this green, I'm getting suspect of your other recollections!  It was definitely the coolest green complex I have seen in the Bay Area in a LONG time... on public courses anyway.

That's cool though, it's silly to waste time thinking about San Jose given where you are right now.  You'll be forgiven if and when you ever return to the home of overpriced golf.

TH

[Peter Galea]

Tom, Dan and John,
I'll drive! I'll drive!
I'd be happy to fill out the foursome and shuttle you all on the long walks.

[THuckaby2]

Pete - you would be the PERFECT fourth, that's for sure!

I was thinking about this more last night and I suppose it's not so crystal clear which course has the better greens.  To me it's the Valley course, but I do value approaches to greens more than most and a lot of these were very cool.  I'm also no fan of large tiers.  But to each his own... the cool thing is the two courses are significantly different.

I still think the current routing must be temporary.  No sane man causes walks right past so many potential next tees to get one 1/2 mile away.

TH

[John_Sheehan]

Pete, Dan, Tom -
Let's do it!  Pick a date and I will be there! Should be a great time.

[THuckaby2]

Sounds great to me, John.  I'll start an email re setting a date.  Just start being REALLY nice to Pete, who has to ride and would indeed be a great help, or start REALLY getting in shape.  Man that walk did wear me out.

Stay tuned....

TH

[THuckaby2]

Sorry to bring this back up to the top, but reading the paper this afternoon, I just had to post this:
http://www0.mercurycenter.com/premium/sports/docs/golfcol28.htm

The pro says he's received few complaints about the routing... well, one of them was mine, that's for sure!

It's great to find myself not insane every once in awhile.

It's going to be a very fun round Monday, fellows!

TH

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