https://golfclubatlas.com/courses-by-country/usa/dormie-club/When people say they like or don’t like a course, they often times are referring to their own experience based on their most recent play, with comments weighted toward the experience as opposed to the architecture. That is perfectly understandable. Indeed, who doesn’t want to skate through life, going from one great experience to another?! Yet, this is a golf architecture web site and we are supposed to drill down on the architectural components that make a course resonate – or not. That’s what I do with this Dormie profile – keep the focus on the architectural elements.
This profile is fifteen years in the making. A friend was involved from the outset at Dormie and he and I would periodically go find Bill Coore out in the woods roaming the property in 2005. Eventually, holes 4 and 15-18 opened for play as a teaser for what was to come. We played those five holes 40+ times and a feeling was always engendered that Dormie was going to be something special. Then the financial recession hit, construction was halted for a period, and when the course opened, outside play was welcome. A modest cabin was used as the clubhouse and I LOVED IT.
Unfortunately, few shared my same feelings. For sure, the walk was disjointed as the golfer needed to dart into the woods too often to walk on cart paths to cross wetlands. Maybe I am sulking because people didn’t agree with my high opinion. Certainly, parking in a makeshift gravel/dirt parking lot, checking in the modest cabin, and being told there was no drinking water on the course kept expectations in check.
After five + years of being open for play, I was surprised by something: the course’s presentation remained at a high standard. The course had to exist on its own generated cash flow and I was waiting for there to be a drop in playing conditions (i.e. this would be the northern hemisphere’s version of St. Andrews Beach as in great design, poorly presented). That never happened. Dormie has had one Green Keeper its entire life and Billy Lewis deserves huge applause for how he held things together. You want to know the chops of a Green Keeper? Give him a limited budget and see what he defines as important. Dormie has never overseeded and its dormant Bermuda fairways are superb at releasing the ball November through March. It’s my favorite time to play there as Coore’s lay of the land design aspects really sparkle.
After my beloved Southern Pines CC, I have played more rounds at Dormie in the past ten years than anywhere else locally. Still, I never profiled it, primarily because the walk was too gummy and therefore, hard to endorse directing people here. However, Dormie has been under the Dormie Network ownership for two years and they have just engaged someone to build the required footbridges this year. Plus, the cabin has been demolished and a modern (stylishly rustic) clubhouse is now being built. The experience will soon match the perceived quality of the design, IMO.
Hence, the timing of this profile. GolfClubAtlas’s own curmudgeon (J.C. Jones from Charlotte) drove over in January. He had last played Dormie in 2012 and warming up, he didn’t disappoint, complaining about this and that about the course. As I listened (what else can you do when he gets going?
), I reserved judgement because some of his criticisms didn’t appear valid. After the round, he was naturally morose about his team’s loss
but here is what he later wrote me:
In my opinion, the land, holes and strategy shine at Dormie along with the setting and the “good hike in the woods” aspect of the course. Dormie is mentally and physically challenging in a serene place that has a wonderful aesthetic. Shot selection and placement from the tee through the green is Pete Dye-esque in that it presents a wonderful puzzle on all fronts. It doesn’t have the pacing or the flow or the elegance and grace of #2 or Mid Pines. It’s a golf course that, to me, conjures images of Teddy Roosevelt in boots with set of clubs headed off into the forest. It’s masculine. It’s rugged in the way it challenges the golfer to execute and endure. Your description of deer trails and hunting are apt. What changed for me in the 8 years between plays is that the course, perhaps through the benefit of not having had any money, got to really settle into the landscape and presents itself, and the strategy of the holes, in an honest manner without any pretension. The course shines as a presentation of the amazing land on which it sits and it does so in a mature manner that makes you feel as though the course is a part of the place and not a course that’s been imposed on the land. It’s almost as if it’s gone back to being hunting land. And that’s a good thing. I’ve always felt that the best courses reflect their geography. Dormie does that.
JC isn’t a fan of a couple of the longer walks (especially 6
th green to 7
th tee) and I like the routing more than he does but he and I agree on one thing: The thought of playing 36 holes isn’t high on our list. However, at age 56, I place less and less importance on that. I love Royal Hague, for instance, to the nth degree but I am not going up and down those dunes twice in a day. One round is plenty of exercise for this Old Goat.
Anyway, I will be curious how/if the perception of Dormie changes as the Coore design is surrounded and embellished by some of the finer trappings. What’s indisputable is that Dormie represents a Coore routing over sandy soil and rugged topography. Plus, I contend these green complexes are in Coore’s top five as a set.
That’s a big call but after 100 rounds of various putting debacles, it is one I am willing to make. Add in the Green Keeper’s efforts to have the ball release and you have a design whose full potential is now being realized.
Best,