Dunes Club

[Sean_A]

I felt a bit guilty for dragging Tony out in the Christmas craze to post his book my way so I thought it best to read a bit of it today.  To my surprise The Dunes Club is a featured 9 holer.  It sounds to be a cool club with minimal facilities.

In describing a few of the holes Tony flags #6 as a very diverse par 3.  Tees some 50 yards in depth and bit more more in width.  Does anybody have pix of this hole?  How bout some other holes?  

I also found it interesting that hole locations are changed twice daily.  Has anybody experience a course which does this?  

Has anybody played this course?  It seems to fly under the radar a bit.  In fact, I think I have confused Dunes Club with Lost Dunes, which is apparently just down the road. For those that have played it, any strong impressions?

Ciao

BTW THIS THREAD IS NOT MEANT AS A CHEAP PLUG FOR TONY PIOPPI'S TO THE NINES.  Its a free plug!

[Michael Dugger]

S

Many of the Chi-town guys have played The Dunes Club, yes indeed.

Are you aware it's also a Mike Keiser owned course?  Dick Nugent design.  Quite low key and private, I've heard.

I've only ever seen a handful of pictures of it, it's got a Pine Valley thing going on.  Looks pretty sweet.

If you explore maps.live.com you will find a nice aerial and even "birdseye" views of the course.  Go east of Chicago along Lake Michigan to New Buffalo.  It's easy to find.

[C. Squier]

I've played Dunes Club twice, both times were equally memorable.  The entrance is the most understated entry in all of golf....literally afraid your car won't wedge through a chain link fence.  Park between a few dense trees and you're there.  

I haven't gotten close to even sniffing Pine Valley, but from what I've seen, read and heard, Dunes Club gives a similar dose of golf.  Golf your ball and you can score.  Get lax, you'll pay for it.  No tee blocks, the honor gets to choose where to slash from.  Lots of choices gives back to back 9's plenty of variety.  

CPS

[ANTHONYPIOPPI]

Sean:

Free plug, cheap plug, it's all good by me.

Anthony

[Joe Hancock]

Sean,

I played there this past summer.

The course is tough, quite long in places. It's conditioned like a country club, and, quite frankly, they had their hands full on the very hot, humid day we played. They had people everywhere dragging hoses, and they were struggling to put out enough water. Most of the greensites are such that airflow is an issue.

The clubhouse, caddies, ambiance and parking are as previously described....understated, adequate, and apart from the norm, and that's what most people talk about after a visit.

Joe

[Andy Troeger]

I've only played the Dunes Club once and it was a few years back so my memory may be faulty but here's my best shot with the pictures I have. The ambiance of the place is amazing and much of that has already been mentioned. The clubhouse and the hole in the fence are things I've not seen anywhere else. The feel of the place is really cool as well. My take on the architecture was that it is good but the only comparison to Pine Valley's very high standard (haven't been there so I'm going off reading posts here and its standing as #1 or 2 in the US) is likely the look and not the holes themselves IMO. The Dunes Club is very position oriented, there's enough width in spots to bring angles into play, but there's not much reward for risking anything on most of the holes. People often really praise #8; I think its rather goofy with a tree that blocks most of the landing area. You kind of have to play a punch into the green unless you get it in one little nook of the fairway. #5 I have profiled below, and #4 when I was there would have benefitted from some tree trimming to open up the left side of the fairway. To each their own I guess. As a whole its easily worth playing and a wonderful and unique experience, but I don't think comparing it to Pine Valley serves much purpose for either club. I also think Lost Dunes and Point O'Woods are better golf courses.

1st hole is brutal, 420 or so and narrow with a green that falls away from the fairway. Its a good hole, but real easy to make a huge number right out of the gate. I think it would work better later in the round personally.


Third is a position par five, hit to the first landing area, then to the second before an iron in. Not too hard if you play it that way, but if you wanted to try to get it right to the end of the first landing area from the tee you could try to go for it I think. You better not miss going that route.


Fifth is the water hole, very pretty but there's nowhere to go if you can't carry the pond and a missed fairway leads to a layup in most cases. The fellows I played with didn't carry the ball real far and this hole was brutal for them.


Nine is a really cool hole, possibly the best longer hole on the course. Drive out of a chute to where the photo was taken from, then that little front bunker is a great little hazard.


The clubhouse, great little place.

[J_ Crisham]

I thought the 1st hole was probably the hardest right out of the car-no range and roughly 430yds of golf out of the chute. Tough green contours on 1. Very cool place to play. Would strongly recommend a day here if one were invited. Cool little clubhouse-everything you would want in a course .The perfect hideaway club-good luck finding it the 1st time!

[Jonathan Cummings]

Dunes has twin tees so you can play 18 holes.  I would assume the majority of Tony's nines do likewise but it's an interesting question to ask.

How many nine holers are truly just nine holes making no attempt to "replay" the nine greens from slightly different tees to get a synthetic 18?

JC

[ANTHONYPIOPPI]

Jonathan:

I've found that most 9s have it set up so that you play a different set of tees the second time around, but in the majority of cases that just changes the yardage, but no the angle. Very rarely are the tees for the second trip around markedly different, say more than 20 yards either shorter or longer.

I did not play the Dunes Club but walked with a group of members and was surprised to see how many hole required longer players to layup off the tee.

Anthony

[Jeremy Rivando]

Thanks for the pics Andy.
 I was just about to ask Michael for pics of the Dunes club figuring they weren't too common.
We might have to start a post re: the best 9 hole courses in the country.  I'll search to see if it's been done already.

[ANTHONYPIOPPI]

Jeremy:

That's a good idea. Hey, what about a book on some of the coolest 9-hole courses in the country?

Anthony

[tlavin]

Heck, I've read the book and I thought it was great!

[Joe Hancock]

Jeremy:

That's a good idea. Hey, what about a book on some of the coolest 9-hole courses in the country?

Anthony

TRANSLATION:

"Hi, Jeremy. Welcome to GCA.com. I happen to have written a book on nine hole courses titled "To the Nines". I'd be happy to answer any questions you may have about nine hole facilities located throughout the country."

[ANTHONYPIOPPI]

Jeremy:

Joe is absolutely correct in his translation. I was trying to be funny. I have no idea if it worked. Joe, thanks for the translation. How are you with French? I need to send a letter to some friends there.

Anthony

[Mark Smolens]

The Dunes Club had better be the most difficult 9 hole course out there, because if it's not, then somebody's not having much fun at that other place.  I played in a Shivas Irons Society outing there about 4 years ago (we also played Lost Dunes and stayed in their cabins), and was paired with two guys who were bogey golfers at best.  Great guys, but if you spray the ball at the Dunes Club, your caddy will have a tough day keeping you from losing a ball.

Dave Hettinga's burgers at the turn are the best.  For a little tiny clubhouse, no range, and a friggin hard golf course, I'd never miss an invitation to the Dunes.

[ANTHONYPIOPPI]

Mark:

In my opinion, Gleneagles Golf Course at McLaren Park in San Francisco, is the toughest. No level lies, tiny greens, whipping wind. When the course opened in 1962 San Francisco Chronicle Columnist Art Rosenbaum wrote, "It is not true that the par players at McLaren will need a mercury-bubble level, an anemometer, an altimeter, and one leg shorter than the other, though these might lend aid and birdies to the situation."

Anthony

[Brian Joines]

Andy,

Thanks for posting those pictures. I've searched for pictures of the Dunes Club many times with no luck. I've always had a picture of what I thought the course looked like in my head and it looks like I was way off. It's much more wooded than I had originally thought.

How does this compare to Lost Dunes? The corridors look a little tighter at the Dunes Club.

[Andy Troeger]

The course is narrow in spots; in other places the fairways are actually pretty generous (#4 and 8 fwys come to mind). I had forgotten about the laying up bit, but that is a good point. I could not go full out with a driver on either par five from the second set of tees, or on #7. It is VERY wooded and could stand a little trimming in my opinion.

Wish I had pictures of all the holes but I only snapped a few shots.

Lost Dunes' greens are much wilder than at the Dunes Club. LD has a better variety of holes too and overall more width. Personally I like LD a fair bit better, probably 7-3 out of 10 rounds to LD.

[Jeremy Rivando]

Anthony:

The humor is not lost on me, I'm chuckling and thinking "of course there is a book on the topic"
I'll try to be a little wiser with my thread ideas in the future.
That's another great example of why it says "newbie"

Joe:

I look forward to reading your book.

[Joe Hancock]

Jeremy,

The humor did a sidestep on you. The book is Anthony's work, not mine.

My book is an autobiography entitled "Divot Sniffing Lunatic Fringe Mower".

 

[Jeremy Rivando]

Thanks Joe

I'll have to order a copy of Anthony's book, and of course I look forward to the autobiography

[Tom_Doak]

Brian J:

There is probably 5 times as much fairway acreage at Lost Dunes as at The Dunes Club ... which is only nine holes, accounting for half the difference.  But Lost Dunes' fairways are VERY wide (because the dune-grass rough is really severe), and The Dunes Club is narrower than most modern courses I've seen, plus two or three of its longer holes have the fairway interrupted.

[Jim Nugent]

Mark:

In my opinion, Gleneagles Golf Course at McLaren Park in San Francisco, is the toughest. No level lies, tiny greens, whipping wind. When the course opened in 1962 San Francisco Chronicle Columnist Art Rosenbaum wrote, "It is not true that the par players at McLaren will need a mercury-bubble level, an anemometer, an altimeter, and one leg shorter than the other, though these might lend aid and birdies to the situation."

Anthony

Of the 5 or 6 public courses I played around SF in the 1980's, Gleneagles was my favorite by far.  A picture of the 18th at CPC, on Patrick's thread about visuals, made me think of the 9th hole at Gleneagles.  

[Matt_Cohn]

Anthony,

Is Gleneagles tougher because of the bad lies, dead ground, tilted tees, inconsistent greens, etc.? Or is it actually a harder layout?

[ANTHONYPIOPPI]

Matt:

I found the ground to be firm and not dead. Not sure what you mean about inconsistent greens since they are all mowed with the same mowers set to the same height and if the tees are not laser levelled they were not bad enough for me to notice.

I think the fact their are very few level lies in fairways, most of the approach shots are either up or down hill and the winds make it the most difficult layout.

Jeremy: Thanks for the support. I'm going to see if I can find some of the photos that were not used in the book and either post them or send them to you.

Anthony