The Hay at Pebble Beach Golf Resort is, as the revered golf resort on Monterey Peninsula describes it: “Pebble Beach, the Tiger Woods way.” The nine-hole course opened in April, routed across a parcel of land once home to what was among the first short courses in the United States. The 9-hole layout was designed in 1957 by Peter Hay, the resort’s longtime head professional who reveled in the opportunity to introduce juniors to the game of golf.

Partnering with TGR Design, Pebble Beach entrusted the firm’s proprietor, Tiger Woods, to reimagine the outmoded short course. Woods was an ideal fit since he had previously included a 10-hole par 3 course called The Playgrounds at his premiere US layout, Bluejack National.

In his rerouting of The Hay, Woods conceived of nine holes that play as short as 47 yards and as long as 106 yards. Some of those holes feature classic architectural features, such as a Biarritz-style green or a dell hole (a par-3 that requires tee shots hit to a green that’s almost completely concealed from view, which Alister MacKenzie made famous at Lahinch Golf Club in Ireland almost a century ago). Each hole also bears a name that pays homage to the resort’s longstanding and celebrated history.

The course even includes a replica of the famous seventh hole on Pebble Beach Golf Links—only the short course’s rendition doesn’t sit atop jagged cliffs on the edge of Carmel Bay. “We know not everyone who comes to Pebble Beach will have a chance to play the US Open course,” Woods says, “so we wanted to create the opportunity for all visitors to experience one of its most famous holes.” pebblebeach.com

The newest addition to Destination Kohler’s golfing lineup, The Baths of Blackwolf Run, opened for play in June. Located about nine miles south of Whistling Straits at Blackwolf Run—the first golf destination developed by Herb Kohler and Pete Dye during the late 1980s—The Baths offers 10 holes that vary in length from 60 yards to 160 yards and were designed by Chris Lutzke, a Pete Dye protégé who spent 30 years working alongside the late course architect.

As its name suggests, The Baths is laid out around four strategic water features, though the course’s name also references Herb Kohler’s primary enterprise in the plumbing, kitchen, and bathroom industries. In fact, Kohler’s fingerprints are on more than just the course’s name, as the plumbing magnate served as a co-designer of the course and leveraged his decades of travel around the United States—as well as the United Kingdom and Europe—playing some of the world’s greatest courses.

Although The Baths features multiple water features, those hazards don’t require forced carries, unless a player so chooses. The short course also boasts a routing that can allow players to create their own holes—starting at one tee box but finishing at another hole’s green—however, this type of cross-country golf is only possible when a limited number of players on the course makes it safe to do so. Don’t expect such casual play in September, when The Straits course at Whistling Straits (a Pete Dye design) hosts the Ryder Cup.  destinationkohler.com

Longstanding visitors to Pinehurst Resort have likely noticed subtle changes to the property’s demeanor in recent years. The historic resort, long considered to be the cradle of American golf, has loosened its tie and unbuttoned its collar, so to speak. The more relaxed atmosphere represents a purposeful shift—one instituted to heighten the resort’s appeal with a younger generation of golfers—and its catalyst was the creation of The Cradle, a 789-yard short course that opened in 2017.

Across the course’s 10 acres, laughter and jovial banter frequently fill the air; and via concealed speakers strategically placed along The Cradle’s nine holes, classic rock ballads and contemporary pop hits accompany golfers completing their rounds. The nine holes are the handiwork of Gil Hanse and Jim Wagner, who designed The Cradle one year before they began an extensive redesign of the resort’s No. 4 course. “They created something that’s fun; that’s stimulating to a scratch player and welcoming to a beginner; and something that can be played with only a putter, if that’s what you want to do,” says Tom Pashley, president of Pinehurst Resort and Country Club.

That such a place exists less than 1,000 feet from the first tee boxes of both the No. 2 and No. 4 courses—the two most popular and serious layouts at the resort—is an even greater accomplishment. As Pashley acknowledges, “The Cradle is 789 yards that has done more to redefine what Pinehurst stands for than anything else that we’ve done.” pinehurst.com

Golf developer Mike Keiser has long subscribed to a philosophy that one course will make your property a curiosity, but two courses makes it a destination. Keiser’s second North American resort, Cabot Cape Breton, which he developed in collaboration with co-founder Ben Cowan-Dewar, now has three. Situated on the northeastern coast of Nova Scotia, Cabot Cape Breton has dazzled golf enthusiasts ever since the architecture firm of Whitman, Axland & Cutten completed Cabot Links (the first 18 holes at the resort) in 2012. The resort strengthened its appeal four years later when Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw designed a second championship-caliber course, Cabot Cliffs; and then Whitman, Axland & Cutter returned during the summer of 2020 to put the finishing touches on the 10-hole short course, The Nest.

“The natural ground contour with rolls, dips, and ridges, combined with the angle of the holes, makes for an interesting and exciting golf experience,” says designer Rod Whitman. “Each of the [hole] offerings could easily be found on both [the] Links or [the] Cliffs, making [The Nest] a fantastic addition to the existing lineup of golf.”

The short course was designed to offer the same level of excitement as a traditional round of golf, but it can be tackled with only a handful of clubs. In addition to offering dramatic property views with ocean vistas, The Nest will also allow groups of as many as eight golfers to play together. As Cowan-Dewar acknowledges, “the new short course complements the current golf experience and provides a tremendous amount of fun for golfers at all levels.” cabotlinks.com

Forest Dunes first established itself as a serious golf destination in 2016 with the opening of a reversible, 18-hole course designed by Tom Doak. Since then, the Northern Michigan golf club has continued to build on that reputation, most recently unveiling a 10-hole short course conceptualized by Keith Rhebb and Riley Johns, two architects who earned recent acclaim for redesigning an historic nine-hole course in Winter Park, Florida. “You don’t often get the chance to get super creative when designing courses,” says Rhebb, “but with the short course [at Forest Dunes] we really had the opportunity to have some fun with it.”

Like The Cradle at Pinehurst Resort, The Bootlegger at Forest Dunes benefits from 16 speakers placed strategically around the course, so players can chip and putt to music. That modern golf amenity is juxtaposed by classic, links-like architectural features, which allow golfers to creatively approach how they’ll play each of the holes. Ranging in length from 65 to 150 yards, those holes encourage players to utilize slopes and banks around the greens to bounce balls toward the flagstick. Incidentally, the practice of these shots on The Bootlegger course will come in handy once players tee it up on The Loop, Forest Dunes’ aforementioned reversible course.

“The land gave us such a great canvas to create something fun that offers a ‘welcoming handshake’ to entry-level players and says ‘this is what golf can be,’” says Johns. “Here you can go out in your flip-flops and hit flop shots with a few buddies, try to make an ace on every hole, or use a putter off the tee to try and run one onto the green.” forestdunesgolf.com

Unlike the other short courses on this list, which are diminutive both in their length and their total number of holes, The Sandbox at Sand Valley Golf Resort in central Wisconsin keeps its hole lengths short (the maximum yardage for any one hole is just 149 yards), but it offers 17 of them, all designed by Coore & Crenshaw and all accentuated by bold contours that can sometimes render a shot successful—or not—by the luck of the bounce.

Some avid golfers may be inclined to overlook a short course like The Sandbox, especially when multiple full-length, championship-caliber courses are easily accessible, as is the case at Sand Valley. However, the course, which plays through a restored sand prairie, has often been described as “a fun and wild ride of unique shot-making opportunities,” and it features recognizable classic green complexes, such as a Biarritz, punchbowl, double plateau, lion’s mouth, and Redan.

Just how legitimate is Sand Valley’s short course? Only a few months after the course opened in 2018, the Wisconsin State Golf Association created a new state par-3 championship that was contested there. The event was thought to be one of the first—possibly the first—short course state championship contested in the United States, which suggests these new short courses are likely to remain viable long into the future. sandvalley.com