Valspar Championship: a hole-by-hole guide to the Copperhead Course at Innisbrook Resort

Midcentury-modern style has enjoyed a resurgence in popularity over virtually all aspects of American culture in recent years.

Except, it seems, golf course architecture.

Since the recession of the late-2000s, many noteworthy new golf courses and renovations of existing projects have seemed to reject the long flowing lines and simpler shapes of the 1950s, 60s and 70s, often in favor of the strategic merits, wider corridors and rustic visual flair of courses built prior to World War II.

Which is fair enough, for the most part. The nouveau-retro turn in golf course design has produced some of the most striking and fun work ever built, and has helped super-charge the game's resurgence in the last five years.

But after having learned the game on a meat-and-potatoes 1961 design in Connecticut, I still have a soft spot in my heart for the more thoughtfully executed courses from what others have dismissed as golf design's "dark ages." And the circa-1974 Copperhead Course at Innisbrook Resort north of Tampa, Fla., is one of them. The annual host of the PGA Tour's Valspar Championship is tricky off the tee, with sinewy fairways bordered by deep rough, large amoeba bunkers and water features. The greens, far from the most undulating pros will encounter all year, are nevertheless sloped enough to command attention. And the terrain the golf course enjoys features an almost perfect amount of vertical movement, especially considering its proximity to the coast.

Pros laud Copperhead for its straight-ahead challenge; the narrow confines tend to amp up the pressure over the weekend, and the most persistent players tend to emerge victorious. Notably, the course does not tend to favor bombers over plodders or vice versa; long-hitting Gary Woodland won the 2011 edition of the tournament, and then Luke Donald won in 2012 with an incredible short-game display.

Architect Larry Packard, who lived to 100 years old, laid out the Copperhead as one of four courses at Innisbrook, a winter destination for visitors and an attractive seasonal home for snowbirds for more than half a century. Packard was prolific, with more than 200 golf courses to his portfolio, dozens of them within several hours' drive of Chicago, though it's one of his Florida designs that provided the biggest feather in his cap. For mere-mortal golfers, Copperhead is a stern challenge, but from the right tees it is surprisingly playable. I got to take on the course the Monday following the 2024 Valspar, and once I got used to the tour-deep rough (and started hitting some fairways), I was able to settle in and play some decent golf. It is not a cheap green fee, but it is one of the Sunshine State's best accessible golf experiences.

Innisbrook Resort & Golf Club - Copperhead Course

Palm Harbor, Florida

Resort

4.5769230769

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As gentle a handshake as PGA Tour players get all year, this hole typically plays as the easiest on the golf course at around half a shot under par for the week. That makes it tricky in a way by placing early high leverage on the prospect of a birdie or eagle. Given the tough three holes that follow, a par here feels like a setback. A downhill drop of more than 50 feet to the first of the Copperhead's sinewy fairways invites a big first swing, and a sneakily pitched green makes putting from the wrong side stressful.

The first of many tee shots that must reckon with awkward fairway bends, this slightly uphill hole presents a conundrum: bite off some extra yardage at the risk of finding gnarly rough or water, or lay back and add a club or two to an already demanding approach?

Water begins to pinch the fairway just 245 yards from the elevated championship tee on this hole, prompting many players to lay back with a hybrid or long iron, which makes this hole play considerably longer than most others of its length, which have become drive-and-wedge attack holes in recent years. With more than three times as many bogeys and worse as birdies, this played as the third-hardest hole on the course in 2024.

The first of what ends up being one of the PGA Tour's longer sets of par 3s asks a relatively simple question: can you hit a high, fading (for a righty) middle iron? That answer is usually "Yes," but three greenside bunkers (a fourth, well short of the green, is out of play) stand by to make sure.

Copperhead's most interesting individual hole gets relatively little attention because it comes early in the round, but its long, straightaway uphill march before an abrupt leftward bend at the crest of a hill stands out as an inspired routing choice by Packard. Pros who hit good tee shots often try to press their luck by bashing something as close to the green as they can, and often find awkward recovery shots. But the odd successful attempt to get near the green in two is truly exciting.

Reverse-camber fairways are one of the last defenses against modern golf equipment, requiring pros to shape a tee shot against the prevailing slope. That is the beginning of this hole's defenses, which also include an elusive elevated green.

On paper, Copperhead's second-shortest two-shotter should be a green-light hole, with no fairway bunkers and a large putting surface. But only five holes were harder relative to par in last year's Valspar. The narrow confines of the tee shot and the way the large bunkers make the green look smaller may have something to do with it.

One of the shots that sets pros the farthest apart from mere mortals is long irons, and it's unfortunate that so few PGA Tour courses really test that aspect of their game. Thank goodness, then, for this hole, which can top 250 yards with a back tee and rear hole location.

Golf courses that rely on fairway bunkering tend to privilege the longest hitters, and while the Copperhead's design mitigates that fact somewhat, this hole is a bomber's paradise, where a carry of 295 yards or more takes the sand out of play. Finding the fairway is still important, though, as the approach plays uphill to one of the slicker putting surfaces on the course. Though it sits less than two miles from Florida's west coast, this hole feels like it was airlifted out of the Midwest.

What goes up swiftly comes down, and this is another chance for bombers to separate themselves, although trees line both sides of the fairway. Two bunkers collar either side of this green, which slopes from back to front. It's the most pedestrian hole on the course, a pure test of execution.

Copperhead's heady collection of par 5s continues with a long run along the property's eastern boundary. Anyone who misses the fairway is consigned to a layup, but things get interesting quickly after a good drive. A large backwards-C-shaped bunker cuts off the fairway 40 yards short of the green, putting extra stress on an attempt to get on in two. A relatively small putting surface creates potential awkward greenside shots, and leaves many players walking away feeling as though they've missed an opportunity to gain ground.

Once again, Copperhead plays longer than its posted yardage, as this little sister to the 3rd hole forces a tee shot of no more than 225 yards, as water intrudes and then cuts off the fairway. Still, pros are good at attacking from a flat lie within 165 yards, and the putting surface is relatively benign. Peter Malnati made a key birdie - his third in a row - here en route to his 2024 Valspar victory.

Par 3s don't often play as the second-toughest hole on a golf course, but this one can become a nightmare when the wind kicks up and swirls around the trees. The front-left-to-back-right orientation of the shallow green punishes any weak-side misses with a bunker or water, and the bailout spot long-left is no picnic, either.

Packard's calling-card double-dogleg par 5 appears at a critical moment, when players start smelling the clubhouse. It weaves left, then right, forming a clever switchback hole for those who hit the fairway. A pond on the right side of the fairway keeps layups honest, and the putting surface is dwarfed by a huge greenside bunker on the left.

Once again, Packard plays with bunker sizing - two large ones and one small one - to add a hint of discomfort to the downhill tee shot. Judging the elevation and wind is a tricky task here.

The beginning of the famous Snake Pit run of closing holes brings the most nerve-fraying single shot on the course: a slightly downhill tee ball that must fit between trees on the left and a lagoon on the right, whose shore shimmies uncomfortably. Another slightly elevated green makes depth-perception a chore, especially with a longer iron in hand.

Skinny in front and widening to the back, this green is the most intriguing on the course, meaning that the hole location greatly determines the difficulty of the last of Copperhead's five one-shot holes. Malnati took advantage of a relatively straightforward middle hole location in the final round of the 2024 Valspar, making birdie and consolidating what would be his two-shot victory margin.

A narrow tee shot through a maze of bunkers is made more intimidating by the fact that it plays slightly downhill to a slightly angled fairway bend. Getting on the short grass means a birdie opportunity despite the uphill approach to a green that can be tough to see entirely.

Architecture

July 27, 2018

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