CrossCreek Very New, Very Retro

Temecula's newest 18 holes is "Pristine Golf" the way it used to be

By Eric Tracy
Eric@TheMulliganMan.com

Things "new" can be scary but exciting. Things "old" are more familiar and comfortable. Do you agree? But, when "new" is combined with "old" the result is often both "exciting and comfortable". It's like that Goldilocks bowl of porridge that's "just right". That's how I describe CrossCreek Golf Club the newest 18 holes to open in the Temecula Valley. For my golf tastes, what golf architect Arthur Hills has created in the hills west of the I-15 is "just right". A beautiful layout using the natural terrain to form a hole's difficulty with nary a railroad tie, fairway mogul high enough for skiing or any other golf gimmick that leaves you shaking your head.

WARMING UP:

One of the ads for this new course in the hills above the Temecula wine country is: "Seems familiar? It's because you've seen it in your dreams." Where the sense of history is so much a part of the presentation that CrossCreek has gotten much national press for a unique twist in the way they operate. The staff wears knickers, white shirts, Ben Hogan hats and bow ties and each person wears the name tag of a golfing legend. So the Pro behind the counter might be Bobby Jones. The starter might be Jimmy Demaret. The cart girl might be Babe Didrikson Zaharias. Each employee must research the person they represent and must be able to tell a little of that person's contribution to the game. It's golf and a history class. It's terrific. And it doesn't stop there. Each hole is marked with a salute to some of the great architects of the past, Donald Ross, Alister McKenzie. At CrossCreek, just the drive up from the freeway makes you feel you've entered another world. "Pristine Golf", is what they call it. (Photo: Links Management President Larry Beech and course architect Arthur Hills)

MY FAVORITE HOLES:

• No. 5, 506-yard par 5 (15 handicap): The first place to make up a stroke if the first four holes caused any trouble. Can you reach it in 2? Maybe if you abandon the black and gold tee box and start from the blue, which is about 100 yards closer.
• No. 7, 540-yard par 5 (11 handicap): The longest hole is also usually going into a prevailing breeze. ü No. 9, 457-yard par 4 (1 handicap): Judged the toughest, maybe because in the afternoons it's going uphill against the wind with a nice-sized pond on the left to make your sweat a little. You're aiming at the biggest green on the lot with your second shot.
• No. 13, 403-yard par 4 (10 handicap): Don't be tempted to cut the right corner, unless you smack a big ball, because there's too much in the way, including about a 50-yard bunker on the other side of the shrubs. The key is maybe a 5-wood off the tee about 225 to the fairway where you stay on the same level of land as the green. About 250, and the ball rolls down a ridge that could give you about 30 extra yards, but then you're in a valley looking way up at the flag. So it's your choice. You can be aggressive, but it has to be a controlled aggression.
• No. 14, 502-yard par 5 (12 handicap): Try to reach in 2 with the help of the bailout on the left, but hittingit straight and going for position on the left side will end up being the smart move. The green also slopes back so you'll probably have to make an exaggerated putt to find the cup.
• No. 17, 170 yard par 3 (18 handicap): The signature hole gives you a chance to catch your breath and remember the round is almost over, so enjoy this view while it's here. A little babbling brook will gobble up anything short, but that shouldn't come into play.
• No. 18, 450-yard par 4 (2 handicap): Notice how the ends of the front and back nine are the two toughest holes on the Figure-8 links-style route? This is a two-step process, the first of which is positioning the tee shot far enough left to see the green but not far enough to reach the cliff - not a ridge, or a ravine or a bluff or a gorge, but a real cliff. The tree on the right frames the green, but it also poses a bit of a natural dilemma. For a classic course like this, it's the perfect grand finale.

WILDLIFE ALERT: Be aware of poison oak when you decide to dip your arm into the weeds to find that lost Nike ball.

DID YOU KNOW: While most traditional courses use the black-blue- white-red color scheme to determine farthest-to-closest tee boxes, CrossCreek does what more newer courses try, and that's establish a new way to look at the tee color pattern. In this case, the black-gold-blue-green mix might confuse you if white is your normal tee box.

COOL PERKS: In addition to the traditional scorecard, there's a "track your stats" card attached with an expanded space to note on each hole your driving distance, fairways hit, up and down opportunities and conversions, sand trap hits, sand saves and putts (with definitions of each term on the back).You can then log the numbers into the course web site (www.crosscreekgolfclub.com) and enter their "Leaderboard" competition.

SUMMING IT UP: The conversion of desert scrub and rugged terrain into greens and fairway wasn't easy, but CrossCreek seems to have pulled it off in this abandoned quarry. In competition with other course around like Red Hawk, the SCGA Members' Club and Temecula Creek Inn, this one proves that a new course doesn't have to be 9,000 yards to be challenging, that the past can be the present planted among the thousands of oaks and sycamore trees. Like any classic, it rewards good shots and penalizes the not-so-good, and unless you can carry the ball 240-yards with a tee shot, don't ruin the trip around by trying to hit off the black tees. The new 6,000 square foot clubhouse opens sometime around the first of the year. The California Bungalow style architecture will be more friendly than formal which fits with the atmosphere they've designed. Nothing really takes away from the golf or the course that's the real star. As Larry Beech, President of Links Management, the company that's running CrossCreek said, "there are no railroad ties or big sloping greens, you look at every hole and it's like God designed it. Nature dictates the layout." Amen

Eric Tracy
The Mulligan Man
Eric@TheMulliganMan.com