OCALA, FL. – An 18-hole par-3 course is unusual. More often than not they’re nine-holers.
This 18-hole par-3 is called the Skills Course at The Club at Ocala Preserve. It’s played as a par 54 with the shortest hole at 63 yards and the longest at slightly over 200 depending on your tee choice.
The same layout’s first six holes are called the Gallery Loop, and it’s designed for golfers with time constraints. Want to squeeze in a few holes? This one is for you.
There’s also a Players Loop, also six holes but designed with one par-3, four par-4s and one par-5. Those holes range from 155 to 520 yards, a more diversified layout for players with limited time available.
And there’s more.
Tour the Players Loop three times and you have a full-fledged 18-hole experience that plays at 6,700 yards and a par of 72.
Even though the course is almost 10 years old, the hole routing is innovative or revolutionary, take your pick.
If you want to play a match – and members frequently do – there’s a Horse Course layout where players can select their own tee preferences. There are no defined tee boxes.
No matter what version of the course is played, the unique white sand bunkers are a strategic factor. The tees, where needed, are unusual, too. They have only one marker, not two. You can tee off on either side of that marker, wherever you choose.
Two other things you should know: the course is built on only 50 acres (most 18 holers require over 100) and the scorecard – at least the one given us for the Skills layout – provided only the hole numbers and the pars. There was no yardages and the hole handicaps were not listed. There were just blank spaces for players to write in their scores.
In nearly 70 years playing this game I’ve never found a course like this one.
Ocala Preserve, called Trilogy when it opened in February of 2016, was designed by Oklahoma-based architect Tripp Davis and Tom Lehman, a long-time tour player with impeccable credentials.
Lehman, now 66, is a sometimes competitor on PGA Tour Champions but in his heyday he won the 1996 U.S. Open and also captured titles at two of the most prestigious PGA Tour events – the Tour Championship and Memorial.
For one week in 1996 he was No. 1 in the Official World Golf Rankings. In 2006 he was the captain of the U.S. Ryder Cup team and in 2009 he won his first start on PGA Tour champions. This man knows his golf.
Ocala Preserve is part of a 600-acre community that includes a seven-acre lake and a very pleasant clubhouse that has a great view of the course and the most enjoyable Salted Brick restaurant and bar. Walking, biking and hiking trails as well as a spa are also part of the community ambience.
While Ocala Preserve has a membership the course is open to the public on certain days each week. For details check out www.ocalapreserve.com.
