Falcon, Colo. - Before Antler Creek Golf Course opens this summer, its pro shop had better be fully stocked with hot drivers, fairway woods and long irons.
Demand for distance clubs figures to be high at Antler Creek, which will play 8,100 yards from the back tees, making it the first golf course in Colorado to stretch more than 8,000 yards and the second-longest in the nation, according to the Golf Course Superintendents Association of America.
The 8,325-yard Pines Course at The International club and resort in Bolton, Mass., opened in 1977, had held the title of 'world's longest golf course' until the recent news that an 8,500-yard layout has opened in a mountainous region of China.
Antler Creek isn't just for long hitters, however. It will have six sets of tees on each hole, playing as short as 5,335 yards from the forward tees. Golf course architect Rick Phelps expects that no more than a foursome or two per day will play from the tips, but this was no gimmick or publicity stunt, he said.
'Obviously, the number 8,100 will get noticed,' Phelps said. 'But it's more about wanting to design a quality course for today's young golfers, who really hit it a long way. This is a course that might attract an NCAA Championship, a U.S. Public Links Championship, or a U.S. Amateur may not be out of the question. That was my goal from the beginning.'
From the back tees, the prairie-links layout features four par-5s that play more than 600 yards, including No. 6, a 690-yard monster. Phelps has suggested that signs be erected in the pro shop recommending that only golfers carrying a handicap index of 5 or better play from the back tees, where the average carry to the fairway is 280 yards.
On the other hand, golfers playing from the third sets of tees will need an average drive of 225 yards.
Keep in mind, Phelps said, that the elevation of Antler Creek is 7,000 feet. He fashioned the fairways to be wider than usual. There are several angles to attack each hole, and longer holes are designed to play with the prevailing wind.
'If you believe the science on how far the ball flies in thin air at high elevation, then an 8,000-yard course at 7,000 feet will play more like a 7,200-yard course (at sea level), which is no big deal,' Phelps said.
Even so, Antler Creek promises to raise some eyebrows from those in the golf industry already concerned about the distance craze.
Marty Parkes, the USGA's senior communications director, hopes 8,000-yard courses do not become the wave of the future.
'Courses that long are more expensive to maintain, and obviously those costs will be passed on to the consumer,' he said.
Jack Nicklaus has never designed an 8,000-yard course. But on a visit to Colorado this week, Nicklaus said 8,000 yards is a viable length at elevation.
'Less than 2 percent of all players play from the back tees anyway,' he said.
Nicklaus has long been a proponent of scaling back today's hot golf balls, pointing out that a continuing inflation of driving distances have rendered thousands of classic courses much too short for championship golf. Jack Vickers, president of Castle Pines Golf Club and the annual PGA Tour event, The International, played there, has made it his crusade to convince the USGA and PGA Tour that hot golf balls are ruining the game.
'For championship golf, the ball has taken away any use for the 3-, 4- and 5-iron,' said Vickers, who has distributed more than 500 videotapes of his 'Ambassador of Golf' acceptance speech last August in Akron, Ohio.
'I was really critical about what's going on with the golf ball,' said Vickers, who has sent tapes of the speech to prominent club directors, USGA board members and PGA Tour officials.
Vickers doesn't fault Phelps for his 8,100-yard design, however. In fact, Vickers said he might have asked Nicklaus to make Castle Pines that length if it were designed today.
'Any project we're looking at in Colorado, I'm having a hard time looking at less than 7,700 or 7,800 yards,' Phelps said. 'That's the way golf is going to have to evolve here in Colorado.'
Source: The Denver Post
