Golf stars cash in by designing courses

Tiger Woods marches down fairways fixated on winning. During the last two years, however, the world's No. 1 golfer acknowledges he's had a harder time maintaining his focus on the course.

It's not the overzealous fans or overeager photographers. As a budding golf-course architect, Woods says, his tunnel vision has cracked at the sight of certain water hazards, split fairways and three-tiered greens.

"Every golf course I play, I look at the golf course differently now," Woods says. "'Why would they construct that? Why would they build this? What were they thinking here?' I'm trying to understand it instead of just plotting my way around the golf course. It is kind of fun."

Woods, 31, is part of a new wave of top golfers who have begun moonlighting as course designers in a lucrative, logical extension of their playing careers. Such players -- including Phil Mickelson, Ernie Els, Annika Sorenstam, Sergio Garcia, Vijay Singh, Fred Couples, Jose Maria Olazabal, Darren Clarke, Davis Love III, Colin Montgomerie and David Toms -- stand to make millions of dollars trading on their fame in such arrangements. And at a time when golf-course construction is slowing in the USA, they are helping to fuel an explosion of new courses abroad.

Woods' initial project is a par-72, 18-hole championship-quality course in oil-rich Dubai. Working from a blank canvas of desert, he envisions stunning water features, elevation changes and five sets of tees to accommodate every golfing ability. A company owned by Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, vice president and prime minister of the United Arab Emirates and ruler of Dubai, is paying Woods millions to bring his ideas and his name to the project, scheduled for completion in 2009.

"Designing golf courses has always been a dream of mine," Woods says. "I hopefully will create a memorable, everlasting legacy."

For years, big-name golf pros have become course architects before they stopped competing. Icons Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player began building courses in the late 1960s. Twenty years later, Greg Norman, Ben Crenshaw, Tom Weiskopf and Tom Watson got in the field. Seve Ballesteros, Nick Faldo, Ian Woosnam, Bernhard Langer and Curtis Strange began designing courses within the past decade.

But not since the early 1970s -- when more than 400 golf courses were being built in the USA annually and many touring pros were getting in on the action -- have such a large number of prominent players gotten involved in designing courses. It's partly a reflection of demand: Golf-course construction in this country has dipped to less than 130 a year, according to the American Society of Golf Course Architects, but public, private and resort golf courses are booming elsewhere. The demand for new courses is particularly high in Africa, China, Eastern Europe, Mexico, the Middle East and Russia.

"The world is out there for architects, and it's open for business," says renowned golf-course architect Tom Fazio, 62, who has been involved in more than 200 courses. "With golf growing worldwide, people who want to build golf courses know the big names in golf, and that's who they want."

In the past, the degree to which pros were involved in designing courses varied. Some took part in projects in name only, essentially for an endorsement check.

Today, Palmer, Fazio and others say, golfers who get involved with course projects are expected to be significant contributors and to share their behind-the-scenes knowledge of the game's intricacies. Because the best players must be acutely aware of various factors that can affect a player's shots, they can become well versed in issues such as turf management, landscape engineering and irrigation.

"When I started building golf courses, there were only a few golfers who were architects," says Palmer, 77, whose design company has worked on more than 300 projects around the world since the mid-1960s. "Today just about everybody who plays or plays well has become an architect."

As a result, says Fazio, who was not a tour player, "The players today can't afford to just lend their name to a project and cash a check. ... They know critics will show up and hammer them if the course isn't that great and the player wasn't (actually) involved."

Player-architects say they view their emerging professions as a way to stay involved in golf when they retire from the professional tour.

"I wanted to be young enough to just flip over (to full-time course design) when I'm done playing; I didn't want to start doing this at age 50," says Els, 37, who has designed four courses that are open, seven that are under construction and eight that are in the planning stages. A globe-trotter as a player, he is the same way as a course designer, with projects from Hawaii to South Africa to China.

Nicklaus' design company, which has been involved in more than 400 courses, is working in 29 countries for the first time, adding to the 26 in which it already has worked.

Player, who has built more than 200 courses worldwide, says the game's best players bring a unique perspective to the work.

"I think if you asked me today who's the best golf designer, it's Jack Nicklaus," says Player, 71. "Why? Because he was a hacker, believe it or not, at one stage in his life. Then he became a reasonable player, then a better player, then the best player in the world.

"So he could look at a golf course from all different angles, whereas no other golf architect who's a 15 handicap can ever possibly do that. All of the players who are designing now have that background. I think it's great that they are all getting into it. Golf is the winner here."

World interest fuels demand

One of the busiest places for golf-course construction is Dubai, the booming Middle Eastern emirate where Woods is building his course in Dubailand, the region's largest tourism and leisure project.

Els is designing a links-style course in Dubai Sports City, and Singh designed one of the four courses at Jumeirah Golf Estates. Norman helped create the first two Jumeirah courses. He will team with architect Pete Dye -- who designed the Stadium Course at TPC Sawgrass in Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla., home of The Players Championship -- and Garcia for the fourth.

"It's very easy to make a very tough course," says Garcia, 27. "The challenge is to make a course that is challenging for (elite players) and at the same time the amateurs can play and say, 'You know, I want to come back and play here.' I'm brand-new at this, but I love it."

Singh, 44, has his vision, too.

"Over the years of playing so many different courses, some great, some not so great, you learn in your own mind what you would do," he says. "I want to build a limited number of courses and make each of them a modern-day golf course that is playable for everyone and something that I am proud of."

The new architects haven't designed enough courses to develop a signature touch, such as Dye's use of railroad ties around greens, bunkers and tees or Nicklaus' preference for relatively small greens.

"I'm not sure I want to have a signature touch on every golf course I'm involved in," says Sorenstam, 36, whose initial project, the Annika Course at Mission Hills Golf Club in China, opened in 2003. She's also designing a course in South Africa and is doing a redesign of the Patriots Point Links Golf Course in Charleston, S.C. "I want each golf course to stand on its own."

Stars take pride in designs

The player-architects won't divulge their design fees, but Mike Kenny, president of Ernie Els Design, says such fees typically range from $400,000 to $2million a course. The top first prize on the PGA Tour this year is the $1.62million that went to Mickelson for winning The Players Championship.

The golfers usually squeeze in numerous visits to course construction sites and have or share control of topographical maps, landscape engineering, construction drawings and alterations.

"It's only been in the last 30 years or so that people learned that a golf course was actually designed," Fazio says. "Before the golf stars gave it recognition, the general public really wasn't interested in who designed the course. Jack and Arnie changed that, and Tiger and Phil and all the others are doing that now. When Jack or Arnie showed up, the golf course got attention."

Woods, a self-proclaimed control freak, says he will be hands-on with his designs.

"Everything is based on his vision and guidance," says Bryon Bell, Woods' childhood friend and president of Tiger Woods Design, Woods' new course-design firm. "The vision is to create an exclusive selection of amazing courses around the world. It's difficult to speculate how many courses he will design ... but the focus will always be quality over quantity."

It hasn't taken Woods long to realize his new vocation isn't as easy as a tap-in putt.

"It is a lot harder than I thought it would be," Woods says. "I don't know how Jack has designed over 250 golf courses around the world. It's mind-boggling, because my first one is very difficult. But it's stimulating and challenging, and it's been great."

The new architects didn't enter the industry solo. Each is associated with experts who understand how to design, construct and put together courses. Els, for instance, worked with Nicklaus' design team before branching out on his own. Woods hired Beau Welling, who worked with Fazio, to help with the Dubailand project. Welling now has his own company.

Golfers who get involved in design typically must hit the books to learn more about drainage, irrigation and grasses. Such training also includes an education in environmental issues that can emerge when golf courses are built, such as how to preserve and care for plant and animal life. This can range from endangered rosemary in Florida to multiple prairie plants in the Midwest to 300-year-old saguaro cactuses in Arizona.

"These things don't happen overnight," Els says. "At the end of the day, my name is on the course, so you bet I'm going to be involved in every aspect. This is a way I can ... build something that will last long after I'm gone."

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