Matt WardThe Club at New Seabury
Ocean Course
3rd hole / 433 Yards / Par-4
Architect: William Mitchell (1964)
Mashpee, Massachusetts
Hole #3 schematic rendering
The ultimate situation for golfers is when land and water intersect. There are locations where that happens but finding such situations in the Northeast is quite a challenge given the pressure to either develop such property for other commercial interests or to have it simply be kept in its natural state.
The Club at New Seabury provides 36 holes of golf and it is on the aptly named Ocean Course — formerly
known as the Blue Course — when such intersections happen.
The Ocean quickly takes you near the water with the opening series of holes and the par-4 3rd is truly a major challenge golf wise and one blessed with stellar views.
Generally, the wind direction during the prime playing months is into the player’s faces. The hole runs parallel to Nantucket Sound and those pulling their tee shots left face either rough, or if pulled badly, the sandy beach area.
The right side is more available but going that route only extends the distance to the green. The approach is usually played with a mid-to-long iron to a small green guarded by greenside bunkers on both sides. The putting surface is not overly big and is sloped from back-to-front. It pays to keep one’s ball short of the hole in order to maximize one’s opportunity for a low score.
There are plans to update the course through the service of Bruce Hepner who recently completed such work on the companion Dunes Course. Interestingly, at one time the Ocean Course was rated among the top 100 courses in America by Golf Digest.
Clearly, the 3rd on the Ocean marries all the key elements that make a golf hole stand apart from all others.
***
For more info go to:
Photo Courtesy of The Club at New Seabury
WHAT'S YOUR REACTION?