The following is an article from the Sioux Falls Argus Leader regarding The Prairie Club being constructed near Valentine, Nebraska. The Prairie Club will feature two 18-hole layouts designed by Tom Lehman and Graham Marsh and a Par-3 course designed by Gil Hanse and Geoff Shackelford. Mark Amundson is the project manager. They plan to have the courses ready for play in 2010 and to allow public play for the first few years.
Link to article:
http://www.argusleader.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080601/SPORTS/806010314&referrer=FRONTPAGECAROUSEL&GID=+NhQCfjfUFVKk/SslZqK1ADu140AJtTCnRZz2SNy//w%3D'Destination Golf' Expands Its Reach
Sioux Falls group behind exclusive Nebraska club
VALENTINE, Neb. - Construction has begun at The Prairie Club, bringing Sioux Falls businessman Paul Schock closer to his dream of building a world-class golf facility.
Located about 17 miles southwest of Valentine on Highway 97, The Prairie Club will consist of two 18-hole courses on part of nearly 2,600 acres of land Schock owns in the fertile Sand Hills region of northern Nebraska.
One course, designed by former British Open champion Tom Lehman, will be a traditional links-style venue shaped from the natural dunes.
The second, designed by Champions Tour mainstay Graham Marsh, will be cut out of a 11/4-mile parcel of land filled with Ponderosa pine overlooking the Snake River.
"We think our golf courses have the potential to be as good as any other in the country," says Schock, the president of Destination Golf Ventures, a company he founded and operates out of his Phillips Avenue office in downtown Sioux Falls.
The Prairie Club, slated to open in the spring of 2010, is the third "destination golf club" to spring up in the Sand Hills region in the last decade, joining Sand Hills Golf Club and Dismal River Golf Course, both private facilities located outside of nearby Mullen, Neb.
"I really expect it to have a huge impact on Valentine and on Cherry County," said Dean Jacobs, the executive director of the Valentine and Cherry County Convention and Visitors Bureau. "We expect a lot of people from across the country will be flying into Valentine to play golf at The Prairie Club."
When completed and open for play, The Prairie Club will join an ever-growing list of destination golf sites.
Sutton Bay, recognized by Golfweek magazine as the best new private course in America when it opened, is South Dakota's answer to this trend in golfing venues.
Located 45 miles north of Pierre alongside Lake Oahe, Sutton Bay has a nationwide membership and has drawn rave reviews from a variety of national golf and travel publications.
In addition to Sutton Bay, Schock, a member there, has used Bandon Dunes on the Oregon coast, among others, as a model for The Prairie Club.
"I have spent a lot of time visiting clubs, trying to find a niche," Schock said. "I want this to be a place of serenity. Part of the success of Bandon, Sand Hills or Sutton Bay is that it's an adventure to get there. We think that's fun, the trip you have to make."
Matter of fate
Schock's foray into developing The Prairie Club actually started several years ago with a conversation about fly fishing.
That took place at world-renowned Sand Hills with then-club professional Jim Kidd, also a top-flight fly fishing guide. Schock, a member of the club designed by Ben Crenshaw and Bill Coore that annually ranks among the top 10 courses in America, asked Kidd if he knew of a good place to fish for trout in Nebraska.
"I think he was trying to decide if he liked me enough to share this with me," said Schock, who recalls vividly the look he got from Kidd when posed with the question.
Kidd, now the director of golf at Friar's Head Golf Course in Riverhead, N.Y., trusted Schock enough to introduce him to Valentine physician Cleve Trimble, also a member of Sand Hills and the owner of a three-mile stretch of the Snake River that was a prime fishing spot for trout. A friendship developed immediately.
"We really hit it off," said Schock of that day seven years ago when they first met. "And the fly fishing there is as good as anywhere."
Trimble shared his plans to develop a private golf club in the Sand Hills near Valentine, on land he owned overlooking the Snake River. Schock said he and Trimble had similar views concerning land stewardship and conservation, and how that ties in with building a golf course.
Schock's experience in business development also proved beneficial to Trimble's plans.
"I helped him move the ball forward," says Schock, who in 2002 became just the fourth golfer in history to win the SDGA Match Play and Men's Amateur championships in the same year.
But Trimble's plans for a golf destination derailed when he became ill. To keep the project moving, Schock purchased 1,900 acres of Trimble's ranch land - and now he was in the golf business.
Soon after, Schock purchased another 680 acres - 200 from the Nebraska Board of Educational Lands and Funds, and 480 from the Sawyer family along the Snake River.
That allowed for the project to include two different golf courses.
"I inherited the project Cleve had begun," he says.
Finding the vision
Course designers Lehman and Marsh spare few words when describing the land.
"To say it is special is too cliche," said Lehman, the 1996 British Open champion and 2006 captain of the U.S. Ryder Cup team. "The first time I walked on the ranch, I sensed this was a spiritual, serene, powerful place. You see this and you say, 'Yes, there is a God.' That's how I felt. I have never had the opportunity to work on a piece of land like that.
"It is perfect topography for golf. The real mission was to discount the things that were really great and to find things that were better. It took us a year to finalize the routing. Every time we would go there, we would see something different."
Chris Brands, a golf course architect who works with Lehman on his projects, said the project took this long to get started because the land provided so many opportunities.
"What took so long was finding the golf course," said Brands, adding that only three or four thousand cubic yards of earth will be moved to complete their layout. "We didn't want to build the golf course; it was already there. We just had to find it."
Landing Lehman
Among Lehman's credits are the Witch Hollow and Ghost Creek courses at Pumpkin Ridge in Cornelius, Ore.; Rush Creek in Minneapolis; TPC of the Twin Cities in Blaine, Minn.; and the Raven at Verrado in Buckeye, Ariz., a course Golfweek magazine rated in its top 10 best new public courses in America for 2005.
When Schock took over the project from Trimble, he contacted Lehman - whom he had never met - via e-mail. He sent the five-time PGA Tour winner a message outlining his plans for The Prairie Club.
Within 24 hours, the two were talking on the phone.
"His e-mail explained enough," Lehman said. "It was personal, it was inviting, so I immediately called him back. He gained credibility by being forthright about the land and his vision. He was also clear about his Christian faith, and we had an immediate connection."
Nine days later, in December of 2006, they met for the first time on Schock's Nebraska land.
Since that visit, Lehman has returned to the Valentine area several times a month. He was there again last Monday, in between stops on the PGA Tour.
"In the end, what you want to see is something that looks like it has always been here," Lehman said. "It was a matter of finding what were the absolute best holes."
Marsh makes impact
Schock's interest in Marsh as a designer was the result of Marsh's work on Sutton Bay, the South Dakota gem located on Lake Oahe about 40 miles north of Pierre.
"Everything I had heard about Graham's commitment to a project has proven to be true," said Schock, a Sutton Bay member. "And because of his work at Sutton Bay, I already had a bias toward him that was favorable."
Marsh, a familiar figure to many in Sioux Falls because of his presence every summer at a golf benefit for the Children's Home Society, has completed more than 30 golf projects around the globe.
A winner of 64 tournaments worldwide, including the 1997 U.S. Senior Open, Marsh developed the Wild Marsh Golf Club in Buffalo, Minn., and the Old Silo Golf Club in Sterling, Ky., in addition to golf courses in Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Malaysia, China and The Philippines.
"One of the most inspiring things to me is the quality of the site," said Marsh, who was at The Prairie Club on Sunday and Monday before heading for Des Moines, Iowa, to play in this week's Champions Tour event. "When you get an opportunity to work on a site like this, it's challenging, yet tremendously exciting. Our expectations are extremely high."
'Stunning' property
Mark Amundson, the driving force behind Sutton Bay, is the project manager for The Prairie Club.
"The property is stunning," said Amundson, a lifelong friend of Schock's since their days playing baseball growing up as kids in Sioux Falls. "The chance to be involved on the ground floor of a project like this and to get it up and running is what I enjoy."
Amundson, who still lives in Sioux Falls, is vice president of operations for Destination Golf Ventures. He will split his time between Sutton Bay and The Prairie Club as construction continues throughout the summer.
Amundson, who like Schock has enjoyed an accomplished amateur golfing career, hired Colorado native Tyler Swedberg last month to serve as construction manager and golf course superintendent.
Swedberg said the fairways most likely will consist of what he called a colonial bent grass mixed with four or five fescues.
"That type of mix gives you the flexibility to play the course hard, like a true links course should," he said. "With that type of grass, you can also change your mowing patterns."
The fairways, teeing grounds and greens will be planted in late summer or early fall. The average size of the greens will be 12,000 square feet.
Exclusive destination
In addition to the two 18-hole golf courses, The Prairie Club will also have a Par 3 course, full practice range and putting green.
The club will also offer fine and casual dining along with a pub and cigar bar where golfers can share their experiences of the day, Schock said. The lodge and housing units, being designed by Architecture Incorporated of Sioux Falls, will sit along the edge of the Snake River Canyon.
The cost of a membership has not been disclosed.
"Most of the high-end golf clubs are geared for memberships that are highly priced and small in number," Schock said. "The obvious exceptions are Bandon Dunes and Whistling Straits (north of Milwaukee), which offer great golf and are expensive, but you don't have to be members to play.
"One reason they are successful is they are attractive to fanatic golfers who have a desire to travel and play. We will be open to and encourage public play for the first several years until memberships are sold out. Public play will then be on a limited basis."
BREAKOUT INFORMATION:
The Prairie Club
WHAT: A destination golf venue on land owned by Paul Schock of Sioux Falls featuring 18-hole golf courses designed by Tom Lehman and Graham Marsh and a Par 3 course designed by Gil Hanse and Geoff Shackelford.
WHERE: Approximately 17 miles southwest of Valentine, Neb., on Highway 97.
WHEN: Construction has begun with a target date to be open for play in the spring of 2010.
INFORMATION: For Information for Destination Golf Ventures call 605-357-5319 or 1-888-402-001.