68 SEDGE VALLEY a parcel of land near the back nine of the Sand Valley course, they spotted an opportunity to add something different to the resort’s portfolio. “I had done routings for three different locations at Sand Valley previously, but never looked at this part of the land,” says Doak. “When Michael Keiser first reached out, he said another architect really liked the land, but he didn’t think there was enough for 18 regulation holes. Michael asked if I would be interested in doing a shorter course – something more like 4,500 or 5,000 yards. I replied that I had always wanted to do something in the 6,000-yard range, like Swinley Forest, Rye and West Sussex, so when I received the maps, that’s what I started to look for.” Those English layouts provided Doak with inspiration for Sedge Valley, with the architect casting aside any notion of trying to achieve a par of 72 or 7,000plus yards, and instead routing a course that would mix par threes, short fours and par fours with just a single par five (albeit perhaps the longest in the state). “Michael initially thought that the course would start up behind the seventeenth green at Sand Valley, which would be the closest possible spot to the main lodge, so I started trying to route from there,” says Doak. “Later on, he decided to build a separate clubhouse for Sedge, so what I routed as the eighteenth hole is now the first, and my opening hole became the second.” On early visits, Doak had identified a rock outcropping at the western end of the site that could become a focal point for the back-to-back par threes. “My initial routing played up and around the rocks, but wandered onto an outparcel that the resort does not own, so the back-to-back par-three holes I had designed would not work,” he says. “In the end I came up with a different set of par threes at the base of the rocks, but the idea of back-to-back threes came from the parcel we couldn’t use!” The opening holes of the final routing give little hint of what’s to come. The start is four consecutive par fours; two relatively gentle holes that provide ample width and might be reached with a drive and a wedge – a Photo: Kevin Murray The green of the challenging par-four third sits beyond a cluster of cavernous bunkers “ I had always wanted to do something in the 6,000-yard range, like Swinley Forest, Rye and West Sussex”
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