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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowPete Dye had just returned from studying the links-style courses in Scotland when he began working on Crooked Stick Golf Club in the mid-1960s. The fledgling course designer had a head full of rolling fairways and stingy bunkers as he began laying out what would become the back nine, which opened for play in 1965.
“We saw just about every golf course in Scotland—good, bad, old and new,” Dye said. “And there was such a variety of bunkers. When I came back, I was all hipped on building a variety of bunkers.”
The Carmel-area course is now routinely named among the top 100 courses in the U.S., and hosts the PGA’s BMW Championship this week from Thursday through Sunday. The top 70 players in the FedEx Cup standings are set to play in the event.
The 86-year-old Dye, who maintains a residence alongside the course’s 18th hole, is considered a living legend in golf circles and plans to be a fixture in the gallery for the $8 million tournament.
In the video above, IBJ asked Dye and Crooked Stick head pro Patrick White to give their insights on playing the course’s classic finishing hole. In addition to the three menacing pot bunkers that guard the green, Dye added a lake on the right side of the fairway. Will the pros fold on this 457-yard, par-four challenge?
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