I was lucky enough to play Peachtree this week as the final stop of a two-week trip through NC, SC and GA that was built around going to The Masters for the first time.
A lot of what I had been able to find online about Peachtree promoted the "Augusta Junior" narrative and I was excited to follow up a visit to the tournament at ANGC with playing a course created in its image. I try not to read too much about a place before I play it, so I was unaware until the night before that it was exclusive even by US private club standards etc. I mention that to try to make the point that I wasn't all gooey about the club to the point that I would gush about the course regardless.
I actually think the "Augusta Junior" stuff does Peachtree a disservice. It is in its own right and on its own merits a tremendous course on a top-notch site with a routing that brings to the fore those natural qualities and its architectural DNA was, I thought, actually quite different to ANGC.
The land undulates in all directions, and the course plays with those slopes such that I reckon the only level lies I had all day were on the tees. The par threes are exacting, the par fours mix up the yardage and shot types nicely while the par fives are more scoreable but use both sand and water to set up some strategic and heroic decisions into their bold greens.
Many of the greens are sited on landforms that promote dramatic shaping, with the surfaces a mix of knobs and ridges and also a lot of constant slopes that are subtle enough to make green-reading really challenging. The greenside bunkering uses some of those steep grades to create bunkers that despite having low lips, are "deep" in terms of their position relative to the green surface you're trying to escape to. While on the bunkering, while it is bright white in the style of ANGC, the shapes are far more sophisticated and artistic IMO.
Bunkers are used sparingly as drive hazards, with the land creating the strategy off the tee quite a bit in the way Abercrombie courses often do and in other cases the creek that winds through the property is well-used off the tee.
The club has been engaged in significant tree removal recently to make the pines and other quality trees thrive and star, and to improve the turf. This has also had the effect of opening up some wonderful long views across the course of the kind you see at ANGC from the field between 9 & 18 across 8, 2, and 3 towards 5 or from 17 down into Amen Corner. If you've seen the course profile in Planet Golf USA or the Planet Golf website, it no longer has that aesthetic.
On the same trip I played Old Town, Yeamans Hall and Palmetto -- which based on the latest Golf Mag World 100 would all be considered broadly comparable quality-wise -- and of that group only Old Town would get more rounds than Peachtree in a 10-round split.