Pinehurst (No.4)

Donald ross was hired by james walker tufts, the businessman who established the pinehurst resort at the end of the nineteenth century, to create the golfing aspect of his vast sandhills lands, and the architect eventually built five 18-hole courses, three of which are still in use today.

One of these courses is the no.4 course, which was designed in 1919 and updated by robert trent jones snr in 1973, with a subsequent renovation by rees jones a decade later. When tom fazio completely rebuilt the structure in 1999, all of the work performed by the father and son design teams became redundant.

The course co-hosted the us amateur championship in 2007, and the third edition of the us amateur four-ball championship was scheduled to take place in 2017, replacing the us amateur public links tournament on the usga calendar. The 2017 four-ball championship was relocated to the no.2 course after bob dedman, pinehurst owner and ceo, revealed that gil hanse would rebuild no.4 and create a short course (the cradle) in november 2016.

Because of the scenery donald ross encountered when he arrived in 1900, pinehurst has a distinct personality, according to bob dedman. âĢľhe may have been a minimalist by choice back then, but we've preferred to view our historic golf courses in a natural state reminiscent of that time frame. The incredibly positive response to our work on pinehurst no. 2 inspired us to look at solutions that would continue the endeavor. We believe this is a pragmatic approach to the future of golf at pinehurst, and we believe gil hanse is the best guy for the job, with his timeless and natural nature philosophy.âĢĿ