So listen to him talk about his designs — now numbering some 340 worldwide — and you hear him say things like “something for everybody.”
That’s not to say the Golden Bear, winner of 73 PGA events during his storied career, has softened. It’s that he likes to create golf courses out of what nature provides, aiming to challenge the talented while not intimidating the ordinary.
His latest, Bahia at Punta Mita resort development just north of Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, is like that, a championship 18 holes with a half-dozen water holes on one side and the foothills of the Sierra Madre mountains on the other.
It doesn’t have a trademark hole like “Tail of the Whale” island third at his neighbouring Pacifico course, but it overall plays less like a resort course and more like something a guy like Nicklaus would enjoy.
It’s not especially long – 7,000 yards from the back tees – but then Nicklaus’ view is size isn’t everything.
“The game of golf has changed a lot, in my opinion,” he said during a whirlwind visit for its November inauguration, all but cursing the technological advancement in clubs and balls.
“Golf is 80-90% power today. Now, I was a power player but I much more enjoy a course where you have to finesse your way around, to strategize.”
That’s what you find at Bahia. And he’s not finished tinkering yet.
“I like to take the driver out of a player’s hands,” he says, noting the tighter fariways, thoughtful undulations, shrewd bunkers and a certain “spice” to the greens.
The course has eight of his classic short par 4s, five par 5s and and five par 3s. The same, in fact, as Pacifico, which also plays to approximately the same length, although with fewer obstacles — Tail of the Whale being the exception.
For the uninitiated, that’s hole 3B on the course, thought to be the world’s only natural island hole, a par three that requires a 150-yard drive over the water — and playable only when the tide is low.
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