New Lidar: Hawkshead Golf Course, South Haven, Michigan

[GullLakeMi]

TGC Name: "Hawkshead Links Lidar V4". Originally published last winter, but wanted to make sure folks new it was available.

Golf Digest’s 4 1/2 Star Rating “Places to Play.” HawksHead Golf Course, designed by world renowned golf architect Arthur Hills, is truly a masterpiece unique to Western Michigan. Variety is what makes a golf course memorable and we offer something for everyone.

Tees:
Black: 6,875 yards (74.1/135 course rating/slope)
Blue: 6,515 yards
White: 6,224 yards
Green: 5,646 yards
Gold: 4,912 yards

3 Pin positions

Hole 1 tee view:



Hole 6 tee view:



Hole 10 tee view:


Hole 11 tee view:


Hole 18 tee view:

[Brettster]

Thanks GullLakeMi - I live close enough I may actually get up there to play Hawkshead... Your design looks fantastic. Which theme did you use to get the sand dunes surrounding the course? I'm looking forward to having my Sim finally setup soon, and I will play Hawkshead on my ProTee sim.

[GullLakeMi]

Hawkshead is a gem. Really playable. I played there a couple times this past summer. They have been making changes (taking out trees, adding berms that aren't in Lidar data yet). I got one of the two in this design. This is one of two courses I have completed designing in TGC. I've probably played 20 courses in TGC that I have played IRL. I'd rate this one as "good".

I chose the Autumn Theme to get the best mix of trees for the course and then the Backdrop with the lowest profile. I struggle with those selections as it is a best-fit choice and never a perfect fit, especially for SW Michigan that is relatively flat. The Theme and Backdrops always seem to have hills on the horizon line.

[jpotas]

Agreed regarding the backgrounds, hate them. I just redid an enter course, turned it into an island in the highlands theme because I had to get rid of the hills in the background. When I changed themes it caused crazy changes to trees, making some of them probably 300' tall.

On a side note, in Chad's Tool there is a box preset at 16.0 for background scale. Does anyone know what this does? I always assumed that TGC controlled the backgrounds but maybe this helps????

[Wizard of Coz]

Was it in better shape this year? I could put it in the society some time. I would need to add some wind. It's windy over there most of the time.