Orlando Golf Scene

Tom Watson’s Conservatory Course at Hammock Beach is hosting limited play this winter in anticipation of its first big event, the Champions Tour’s Ginn Championship at Hammock Beach March 26- April 1, 2007. The tourney at the Ginn Resorts’ Hammock Beach Club in Palm Coast, south of St. Augustine marks the return of the Champions Tour to the first coast after a four year absence. Florida residents Mark O’Meara and Nick Price will be among the “rookies” eligible for the $375,000 first prize from a $2.5-million purse surpassed on the Champions Tour only by the U.S. Senior Open.

Two well-known measures of the quality of a restaurant are: Do the locals like it? How many visitors come back again? It’s not a bad yardstick to use on golf courses either, especially in areas like Orlando that depend on a faithful local base with returning cadre of visitors. Under both criteria, Ridgewood Lakes Golf and Country Club passes the loyalty test with the flying colors of deep green fairways and white crushed coquina brought in by the ton to improve playability and better define the landing areas.

Add that conditioning and improved aesthetics to a reputation for courteous service and a challenging layout and get something rare in resort-area golf. A pledge of allegiance from its faithful. Or put more simply, repeat customers.

Ridgewood Lakes’ General Manager and Director of Golf Brian Boeling doesn’t have to be a big fan of reality TV. He and his staff have lived it over the past year after taking the blows (literally) of Hurricanes Charley, Frances and Jeanne last summer Yet Ridgewood Lakes Golf and Country Club, a semi-private club located just off Highway 27 fifteen minutes south of Disney World, has come out of last summer’s turmoil better than ever, in a story that would probably make pretty good reality TV itself. The “Real World” of Charley taking out 143 trees and closing the course for 10 days became the “Surreal Life” when, after being open only a week after the cleanup of Charley, Frances blew in and hung around for 3 days, closing the course for 2-1/2 weeks.

Golf in these times is so much about growing relationships, on so many levels other than just for business and exercise. Sure it is still a great way to conduct business and build partnerships. But it’s also about partnerships of a different kind, parents passing a love of the game to their kids, spouses enjoying the sport of a lifetime together, associates bringing people together for a common charitable cause.

Nowhere in Central Florida is this better understood, and more passionately practiced than at ChampionsGate Golf Club, just south of Orlando off I-4. With two 18-hole Greg Norman-designed Championship courses, 730 guest rooms and suites at the on-site Omni Orlando Resort at Championsgate offering customized stay-and-play packages, villas springing up at the Del Webb developed BellaTrae at Champions Gate just across the street, and as the home base for David Leadbetter’s world-renowned Golf Academy, all of the elements are in place here for the golf experience of your life.

The folks at Deer Island Country Club like to call their golf oasis “challenging,” “classic” and “pristine,” all words that fit quite nicely. But the man who designed Deer Island, Florida legend Joe Lee is much more succinct in his appraisal of the 400-acre getaway surrounded by Lake Dora and Lake Beauclaire, yet still within 45 minutes of downtown Orlando.

Lee says simply, “It’s the most unique golf course I’ve ever designed.”

Yes, there is a bear story behind Black Bear Golf Club which is located northeast of Eustis in Lake County. Folks there vividly remember a decent sized black bear wandering by the clubhouse around Thanksgiving some years back, leaving a few paw print, and a few mouths gaping as he “played through” down the ninth hole and back toward the Ocala National Forest just north of the course.

You’ll know Falcon’s Fire Golf Club is different even before you’re offered free valet parking by a member of their welcoming staff. You might have recognized something was different as early as when you booked your tee-time, whether through their easy-to-follow online service (that’ll also save you on your greens fee) or you were greeted on the phone by one of the friendly pro-shop staff who’ll make every effort to get you the time you prefer, whether as a single or a group.

Maybe you just rolled out of your luxury accommodations at the adjacent Gaylord Palms Hotel. Maybe you’ve already been through a hard day or two at one of Orlando’s hundreds of conventions. Maybe you’re down on vacation and have just dropped the kids at one of the theme parks. You’ll quickly recognize that one of Falcon’s Fire’s best assets is its location, five minutes from Disney World, 15 minutes from the Convention Center and the Orlando International Airport. Falcon’s Fire is in the middle of everything, yet is a quiet oasis within vibrant Orlando.

When Eagle Creek Golf Club opened in mid-2004, its unique theme of “Save the Best Round for Last” was intended to focus on the “last”, featuring course’s proximity to Orlando International Airport. But now, as it grows into its third full season the most popular courses in the entire region, the distinctive European/ American design of Floridian Ron Garl and Englishman Howard Swan can shift its emphasis from “last” to “best”. Course critics, professionals in the golf industry, and most importantly, players like you, continue to add to the accolades at Eagle Creek.

It all began soon after the first tee went into the first tee box, when Travel and Leisure Golf Magazine selected it as one of the best courses to open in Florida since 2000. Among the other “bests” from the critics include Florida Golf Central’s “Best 18th Hole in Florida” award for the 535-yard signature finishing hole.

What is it they say about the value of real estate being based on location, location, location? There isn’t a more conveniently located upscale golf hideaway than Shingle Creek Golf Club, a David Harman-designed gem that’s no more than a couple of long irons away from Orlando’s Orange County Convention Center, right off the 528/BeachLine (formerly the BeeLine) to the airport and the theme parks.

And now it is the centerpiece of the 1,500-room Rosen Shingle Creek Resort, an elegant five-star facility designed and decorated in the motif of 1800’s Florida, and operated by the same folks who have run the Rosen Center and Rosen Plaza, the two distinctive hotels that flank the Convention Center.

Shingle Creek is a thrill ride of its own. For as wide-open as Harman laid out his 7,228-yard challenge, you rarely see anyone other than the group in front of you because of the young plantings of cypress, oak and pines, and the mounding that shapes each hole individually. And while not a true links course, you’ll definitely get a European feel from the 40-yard-wide landing areas and room to run the ball up to nearly every one of the large (averaging nearly 8,000-square-feet), undulating greens that consistently roll in the 10-1/2 range on the Stimpmeter. Didn’t we say “thrill ride”?

Like with the most classic car or elegant home, time has a way of wearing down even the best golf courses. Elements of nature and heavy play can often rob a golf course of its character and beauty. Such was the story with the International Golf Club, located in the heart of Orlando, FL.

Yet with the purchase of the course by Marriott Golf, and with an impressive renovation by Steve Smyers, the International Golf Club has been reinvented in such a way that it even required a new name.