Saturday
Dec032011
WGA has notion for Alotian
Saturday, December 3, 2011 at 8:14PM
Writing from Chicago
Sunday, December 4, 2011
The return of the Western Amateur to the Chicago area will take a detour in 2013. A big detour, one that may presage similar wanderings in the future.
The 2013 Western Am will be played at The Alotian Club, between Northpoint and Roland, Arkansas, near Little Rock, the sponsoring Western Golf Association has announced.
That’s a long way from Olympia Fields Country Club, the original scheduled site. Six hundred and forty-five miles, to be exact.
There are two logical reasons for the move, the first being the arrival of the United States Amateur at Olympia Fields in 2015. That’s two years more distant, but a membership that already hosts an annual college tournament – the highly-regarded Illini Invitational – didn’t want to overfill its outside calendar, not with a roster of members who like to play golf themselves. (Another tournament off the club’s schedule is the Illinois PGA Championship. Mike Small won the 2010 version on Olympia’s North Course.)
The course receiving the Western Am is relatively unknown to Chicagoans, but highly ranked nationally. Designed by Tom Fazio, it opened in 2004, was selected as the best new course in the U.S. by Golf Digest in 2005, and has quickly risen to 14th on that magazine’s national top 100 ranking.
The ownership also has pedigree. Little Rock tycoon Warren Stephens is the owner. His father, industrialist Jack Stephens, was a long-time member of Augusta National Golf Club, as Warren Stephens is. Jack Stephens also succeeded Hord Hardin as chairman of the club and the Masters Tournament.
In that regard, Alotian is a backyard course, much like Jerry Rich’s Rich Harvest Farms layout on the outskirts of Sugar Grove. But whereas Rich’s course, which will host the Western Am in 2015, was built in stages over a decade, and has a disjointed feel to it, Stephens pointed Fazio to the most interesting 300 acres of his 1,200-acre estate and told him to have at it. Three years and approximately $18 million later – including the purchase of a 300-acre farm for topsoil, according to a 2004 report in Arkansas Business – Alotian opened.
Those who have played it say Alotian has Augusta touches, from immaculate conditioning to elevation changes that make a player think, including the 200-yard par-3 sixth hole, with a 100-foot drop from tee to green. There are also cottages in the Augusta sense: eight bedrooms each.
What Alotian has not had, at least in a national sense, is a competition. The Western Amateur will change that, and bring both spectators and national publicity to what has to now been a private haven for Stephens, his hand-picked fellow members, and those lucky enough to be guests.
The Western Am’s played in the heat of late July and early August, with 36 holes played on each of the last three days – at least for those who survive to the match-play championship final round. The location and the topography will make the championship even more of a marathon. While Alotian has caddies – including a pair of brothers who are Evans Scholars, Joe and Kevin Evans, economics majors at Northwestern – it’s a cart-only course. Caddies generally act as forecaddies. Presumably, that will change the week of the Western Am, but if it’s 100 degrees with humidity to match, the situation will get sticky.
Stephens saw the caddie connection a logical reason to invite the Western Golf Association to bring the Western Am down south for the first time since 1966, when it was held on Pinehurst No. 2.
“Hosting a world class competition and supporting scholarships for caddies made the decision to welcome the Western Amateur to Arkansas an easy one,” Stephens said in a WGA release.
The 2013 date may make it possible for an Arkansas Razorback to contend for the title. Ethan Tracy, a native of Hillard, Ohio, won this year’s Western Am at North Shore. He’ll have graduated from Arkansas in the months before the 2013 championship, the 111th in a string that began at the Glen View Golf & Polo Club in 1899.
– Tim Cronin
The Western Amateur calendar
2012 Exmoor Country Club, Highland Park, Ill.
2013 The Alotian Club, Roland, Ark.
2014 Beverly Country Club, Chicago
2015 Rich Harvest Farms, Sugar Grove, Ill.
2016 Knollwood Club, Lake Forest, Ill.
Sunday, December 4, 2011
The return of the Western Amateur to the Chicago area will take a detour in 2013. A big detour, one that may presage similar wanderings in the future.
The 2013 Western Am will be played at The Alotian Club, between Northpoint and Roland, Arkansas, near Little Rock, the sponsoring Western Golf Association has announced.
That’s a long way from Olympia Fields Country Club, the original scheduled site. Six hundred and forty-five miles, to be exact.
There are two logical reasons for the move, the first being the arrival of the United States Amateur at Olympia Fields in 2015. That’s two years more distant, but a membership that already hosts an annual college tournament – the highly-regarded Illini Invitational – didn’t want to overfill its outside calendar, not with a roster of members who like to play golf themselves. (Another tournament off the club’s schedule is the Illinois PGA Championship. Mike Small won the 2010 version on Olympia’s North Course.)
The course receiving the Western Am is relatively unknown to Chicagoans, but highly ranked nationally. Designed by Tom Fazio, it opened in 2004, was selected as the best new course in the U.S. by Golf Digest in 2005, and has quickly risen to 14th on that magazine’s national top 100 ranking.
The ownership also has pedigree. Little Rock tycoon Warren Stephens is the owner. His father, industrialist Jack Stephens, was a long-time member of Augusta National Golf Club, as Warren Stephens is. Jack Stephens also succeeded Hord Hardin as chairman of the club and the Masters Tournament.
In that regard, Alotian is a backyard course, much like Jerry Rich’s Rich Harvest Farms layout on the outskirts of Sugar Grove. But whereas Rich’s course, which will host the Western Am in 2015, was built in stages over a decade, and has a disjointed feel to it, Stephens pointed Fazio to the most interesting 300 acres of his 1,200-acre estate and told him to have at it. Three years and approximately $18 million later – including the purchase of a 300-acre farm for topsoil, according to a 2004 report in Arkansas Business – Alotian opened.
Those who have played it say Alotian has Augusta touches, from immaculate conditioning to elevation changes that make a player think, including the 200-yard par-3 sixth hole, with a 100-foot drop from tee to green. There are also cottages in the Augusta sense: eight bedrooms each.
What Alotian has not had, at least in a national sense, is a competition. The Western Amateur will change that, and bring both spectators and national publicity to what has to now been a private haven for Stephens, his hand-picked fellow members, and those lucky enough to be guests.
The Western Am’s played in the heat of late July and early August, with 36 holes played on each of the last three days – at least for those who survive to the match-play championship final round. The location and the topography will make the championship even more of a marathon. While Alotian has caddies – including a pair of brothers who are Evans Scholars, Joe and Kevin Evans, economics majors at Northwestern – it’s a cart-only course. Caddies generally act as forecaddies. Presumably, that will change the week of the Western Am, but if it’s 100 degrees with humidity to match, the situation will get sticky.
Stephens saw the caddie connection a logical reason to invite the Western Golf Association to bring the Western Am down south for the first time since 1966, when it was held on Pinehurst No. 2.
“Hosting a world class competition and supporting scholarships for caddies made the decision to welcome the Western Amateur to Arkansas an easy one,” Stephens said in a WGA release.
The 2013 date may make it possible for an Arkansas Razorback to contend for the title. Ethan Tracy, a native of Hillard, Ohio, won this year’s Western Am at North Shore. He’ll have graduated from Arkansas in the months before the 2013 championship, the 111th in a string that began at the Glen View Golf & Polo Club in 1899.
– Tim Cronin
The Western Amateur calendar
2012 Exmoor Country Club, Highland Park, Ill.
2013 The Alotian Club, Roland, Ark.
2014 Beverly Country Club, Chicago
2015 Rich Harvest Farms, Sugar Grove, Ill.
2016 Knollwood Club, Lake Forest, Ill.
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