Post by Richie3Jack on Jul 12, 2010 15:14:29 GMT -5
www.worldwoods.com
Pine Barrens at World Woods is a Tom Fazio design located in Brooksville, Florida. It is a 54 hole course with Pine Barrens being one of the 18 hole courses. Pine Barrens is designed with Pine Valley in mind as Fazio is a member at the fabled New Jersey course.
It plays about 7,000 yards from the back tees with a slope of 138. An interesting part of the course is like Pine Valley, it’s filled with sand everywhere, but ALL of the sand is considered a waste bunker. So a golfer can ground their club, take practice swings, etc. It’s really quite the experience if you haven’t played it because if you hit your tee shot into the waste bunkers, it’s almost as effective as hitting into tall fescue grass or US Open style rough and you are likely going to take a bogey or worse. Currently, Pine Barrens is ranked the #74 best golf course in the US by Golf Magazine.
Fazio calls it his best work and considers it as ‘Pine Valley meets Augusta.’ I can see that even though my knowledge of Pine Valley is limited. Fazio also designed a course in the Atlanta area that I’m familiar with called The Frog at the Georgian Resort. There’s a lot of similarities between these courses as well, although The Frog has a higher slope, I think it’s the far easier course between the two. But the courses have very similar type of use of trees and rolling hills along with Wildlife Preserves.
The great part about Pine Barrens is the course not only fails to have a bad hole, but there are so many great golf holes on the course that it’s hard to choose the best. I’d say the strongest ones are #4, #5, #7, #9, #15, and #16.
The rest of the course is phenomenal. They have perhaps the largest practice green I’ve ever encountered along with numerous other practice greens. It also has 4 different driving ranges along with a very nice clubhouse. When I played there, I got the twilight rate for $30 which included cart. Not bad.
However, the course is practically in the middle of nowhere. After the round when I wanted to get something to eat, the only places open were a good 12 miles away. But, it’s certainly worth the trip to play there, even if you’re on a winter vacation in Orlando or Tampa and need to make a 90 minute drive.
3JACK