The Pete Dye Course at French Lick Resort is an extraordinary golf course in every way: exquisitely maintained, fiercely challenging, beautifully designed holes on a colossal scale, panoramic views and remote.
The 1901 West Baden Hotel in the valley 2 miles from the golf course. Faithfully restored.
The lobby.
The Pete Dye Course clubhouse.
From up at the clubhouse you get a good view of what awaits you on the course. Tight landing areas with abundant bunkering and side hill lies on the edges.
Amazing views.
Looking out 17 and 18 coming back. The course is designed on wheel spokes moving out and back from the clubhouse, utilizing the high ground with bunkers and densely turfed side hill lies on the edges of the fairways.
17 tee
Fairways are narrow in many landing areas but there is generous amount of rough on the sides. The rough is very healthy and dense and a true one shot penalty is felt because you find yourself hitting a side hill lie with the ball well below or above your stance.
Hit it in the rough and you will find yourself in some very thick healthy bluegrass with an uncomfortable stance. As a Chicagoan I am not used to hitting from this kind of stance. My suggestion before you go to play here is practice hitting your long to mid-irons from various stances above and below the ball because that shot is going to be played here.
Also of interest from a design and maintenance perspective are the gravel paths with the grass growing in the center. I noticed that these are holding together remarkably well and on the curves where you invariably need to install curbs in the case of concrete or blacktop paths, there were no worn areas in the turf. This is the kind of stuff that gets my attention as a greenkeeper. If you put blacktop or concrete on this golf course I think it would mess up the whole motif of remoteness and the organic feeling engendered by the whole property.
Many of the greens are long and narrow with generous fringe cut on the sides. The up and down off the fringe cut is intimidating because on the other side of the green there is deep bunkering or steep 10 foot fall offs to deep rough. Getting up and down off fringe cut is more challenging than from 2 inch embankment cut because there is less margin in the swing arc for getting a clean shot. Its a lot more common to see balls come up short or long of the target from these short cut roll off areas.
This picture doesn't do the feature justice - the amount of earth moved to create this little volcano bunker behind the green is almost equal to the amount of earth to build a green! The bunker is probably rarely hit from but the slopes that support it set up some very tricky shots - downhill chip to a narrow green.
Some incredible skyline greens. My shot to the uphill 5th. You just have to trust that there is enough green to work with, and don't miss left!
18 tee. Clubhouse on top of the hill commanding the highest elevation for many miles.
If you hold the fairway this is your second shot on 18. There is plenty of green to go for it but if you end up short you are chipping up with no view of the green.
Number 3. Another par 5 with the clubhouse in view. Only the straitest drive holds the fairway and the penalty for missing is bunkers right and a steep fall off left.
The greens did not seem as difficult to putt as Blackwolf Run. The real test is getting on them in regulation.
My shot to 4. It is such a special privilege to play a Pete Dye golf course.