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ROME, Wisc. - Which is greater: 68 or 72? How about 6,000 or 7,000?
We know what your 5th grade math teacher might say. Tom Doak is not a math teacher. He's a golf course architect, a darn good one, and his newest golf course is, among other things, a conjecture, a conundrum, a delight.
Oficially opening July 1, 2024, Sedge Valley ($295) - the newest of (now) four 18-hole courses at Sand Valley Golf Resort in north-central Wisconsin's ancient, choppy glacial dunescape - turns golf-math on its head. "Less is more," it declares.
Playing to a par of 68 at not even 6,000 yards from the longest scorecard yardage (unpublished tips eke out 6,100 yards), it acts as a proof of just how much more less can be in golf course design.
He-man golfers will sniff at the course's printed list of five par 3s, a dozen par 4s (just four of them over 400 yards) and a single par 5. But they will be shown the foolishness of their arbitrary adherence to golf standards like 7,000 yards or par 72 quickly once Sedge sinks her claws in. The course logo is a fox - friendly-looking enough, but chickens learn the truth the hard way.
Part of Sand Valley's enduring appeal is the scale of its 18-hole golf courses. The original, by Bill Coore & Ben Crenshaw, is graceful but grandiose. David McLay Kidd's Mammoth Dunes is, well, mammoth, with massive concave features ready to embrace the golfer into pleasingly low scores. The Lido, Tom Doak and Renaissance Golf's reproduction of a mythic Long Island course, is downright operatic.
Although Sedge Valley has been described as "intimate" by some, that word is only relatively accurate. Its modest raw length and sylvan setting belie a pleasant roominess that abides on most holes. Several fairways are more than 50 or 60 yards wide, though it is often better to hone in on one side for a better angle into the green.
Whereas Sand Valley's other courses meander along expanses of exposed sand, Sedge Valley is decidedly more verdant while still primed for the type of firm and bouncy conditions visiting golfers crave. Broad fairways camber and roll down into formal bunkers that both intrude into the lines of play and sit in precisely the spot where marginal tee shots and approaches seem destined to congregate. Greens, many of them medium-sized, feature a hearty mix of convex and concave exterior slopes and plenty of internal movement without feeling overbaked.
Much has been made of the inspiration architect Tom Doak and his team drew from the great heathland golf courses south of London - Sunningdale, St. George's Hill and Swinley Forest, to name a few. There are echoes of the heathlands at certain points in the routing where the course snuggles up to dense woods and the bunkering also gestures in that direction. But overall Sedge Valley's mix of meadow and forest feels comfortingly American. Its looping away-and-back routing unfolds in stages and the landscape presents itself less predictably than at the other courses on property. At times, one can almost sense how Lewis & Clark may have felt uncovering the American wilderness centuries ago.
The sense of a journey knits Sedge Valley together in a way that helps the overall course exceed the sum of its constituent holes, but there are several set-pieces of note. After a mild introduction, the 455-yard 3rd hole signals the course has gotten serious in a hurry. A tee shot across a valley leads to a semi-blind long approach up and over a partially ridge to a small, sunken green at meadow's edge. Gorgeous bunkering terraced into that ridge requires a heroic-feeling carry from the left half of the fairway.
Doak has a way of making seemingly awkward hole sequences feel natural; such is his fidelity to the land's gifts. Most architects would avoid serving up three par 3s and a reachable par 4 in a four-hole stretch, but the 5th through 8th holes at Sedge Valley feel especially right for their environment. At only 136 yards, the 5th was a bit of happenstance discovered late in the routing process but its V-shaped green is one of the more striking single features on the course.
After a long downhill par-3 8th hole that plays through funneling contours, the dogleg-left par-4 9th is one of the most graceful-looking holes in the Midwest. Staggered bunkers tease golfers from either side of a wide fairway that is shared with the 10th, which runs alongside it. In a climate where big and loud features are in vogue, the restraint and quiet feeling of this part of the golf course stands out.
The inward nine stretches its legs beautifully; from the 11th fairway, the 13th and 14th heave into view across open sand-speckled meadowland. The drivable-for-all par-4 12th has the course's most eccentric green, long and slender with a cinched midsection and sides that will funnel shots toward the middle. Arriving back at the 17th tee is a rewarding moment, showing both how far the golfer has come while setting up the excitement of the final stretch. The short par-4 18th, with a heaving two-level fairway and an L-shaped punchbowl green, is a great opportunity to finish with a birdie.
That Sedge Valley is more than 1,000 yards shorter than its fellow "big" courses is a feature, not a bug - although the terrain covered is far from flat, the experience walking the course is fulfilling without being exhausting. Rounds should take less than four hours in most cases. It will be part of countless 36-hole days, which are a staple of the Sand Valley experience. It may well be the resort's toughest course relative to par. It may well be many visitors' favorite course at Sand Valley (I would rank it second behind Lido myself).
In addition to unleashing a worthwhile golf course concept, Sedge Valley seems destined to be a hub of activity on property. Its clubhouse, The Gallery, features a new Italian restaurant as well as Sand Valley's tennis facility, which includes grass courts and a quirky throwback "court tennis" facility. Chris and Michael Keiser, the property's overseer/caretakers, have shown a willingness to push against convention at Sand Valley. Sedge Valley's supporters will be glad for that.
Read more one-off reviews of new golf courses here
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