Starkville, MS (PRWEB) December 31, 2010
The men’s and women’s golf teams at Mississippi State University (MSU) were in need of state-of-the-art practice facilities to stay competitive not only in the Southeastern Conference, but also in recruiting on a global scale. In addition to the men’s and women’s golf teams, the University course is also home to the MSU Institute of Golf, the Professional Golf Management (PGM) and Sports Turf Management programs, and the MSU Golf Academy. Although the MSU Golf Course has been routinely ranked among the top public courses in the state, the driving range has been too small and cramped for as long as Nathan Crace can remember. A 1994 graduate of the university’s PGA of America-sanctioned PGM program, Crace is now getting an opportunity to help fix the course. The principal and co-founder of Watermark Golf/Nathan Crace Design began his career as a golf course architect shortly after graduation and has built an impressive client list, including some award-winning projects. This time, he gets to give something back to the school that helped him turn his childhood dream into a professional reality.
“When I came here as a freshman, I remember the range being very small and practically backward,” explains Crace. “That’s because the widest part of the range was the tee, then it tapered to a point at the far end some 250 yards away. It was too short and small twenty years ago and you can imagine how the advances in golf equipment and technology have compounded that problem.”
Crace says that the biggest hurdle was a lack of room to expand because the first, second, and eighteenth holes surrounded the range. The solution for improving the range came in the form of the need for the University’s golf teams to have their own private practice facilities and, consequently, the two projects were merged into one. After more than a year of working closely with university officials, golf course management, and the two golf team coaches (and with the financial backing of generous alumni), Crace developed a plan that tripled the size of the driving range and created a new public tee to lengthen the range while adding a separate private tee for the golf teams along with a two-acre private short game/pitching/chipping area and large private putting green for the golf teams. A future phase includes a team building for the golf teams.
“We spent a lot of time working with school representatives looking at numerous options, routings, and amenities,” Crace says. “And in the end we came up with a cost-effective solution that minimized course impacts to changing the par-4 10th hole to a par 3 and shortening the monster 650 yard par-5 18th hole to a more dramatic and reachable 540 yard par-5 with plenty of risk/reward. It’s actually a much better hole now.”
The new 18th hole will feature two large fairway bunkers—one along the right side just beyond the first landing area providing a line of play off the new back tee and another further up the left side that sneaks out into the fairway, forcing golfers to decide whether to go for the green in two or lay up short, right, or beyond the second fairway bunker. The existing lake still runs along the right side of the fairway, now stopping just short of the new and rolling 8,500 sq. ft. green fronted by four new bunkers. Although you cannot tell from the ground, Crace says that from the air his design of the new green and green side bunkers resembles the large paw print of a bulldog—the school’s longtime mascot.
The project also includes converting the already short par-4 10th hole into a par-3 that will include the addition of a new lake guarding the front and right side of the green with a creek beyond and trees and out of bounds left—meaning the new par-3 will be more challenging than its 125 yards on the scorecard might indicate. By changing the 10th hole, Crace says they were able to free up room for the new private golf team practice tee with enough room for 25 hitting stations and nearly 325 yards to the opposite end of the new range. Additionally, the teams will have a private 9,000 sq. ft. putting green and a separate private short game area with an 8,000 sq. ft. chipping green, numerous bunkers and the ability for players to practice shots from green side up to 100+ yards. They can also turn toward the range and work on long bunker shots and mid-irons to numerous target areas from the short game area.
“When I designed the new team practice facilities at Ole Miss in 2006, I took some heat from fellow MSU alumni,” laughs Crace, referring to the project at the in-state arch rival of his alma mater. “Because when it opened up, people were calling it one of the best on-campus facilities in the SEC. What we wanted to do here was give the MSU coaches a chance to show prospective recruits that playing at Mississippi State meant they would have access to some of the top facilities in the conference too. I’d put this facility on par with any other on-campus facility because it will not only be a place where the teams can improve, but it will also be a powerful recruiting tool for years to come.”
For more information about the work at Mississippi State University Golf Course or about Watermark Golf/Nathan Crace Design, visit http://www.watermarkgolf.com/mississippistategc.html or the Watermark Golf web site at http://www.watermarkgolf.com/design
Contact:
Nathan Crace,
Watermark Golf/Nathan Crace Design
Phone 601-849-0461
Email: nathan(at)watermarkgolf(dot)com
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