Architect Jim Engh is no stranger to the “Best in State” rankings with a number of his stellar compositions featuring prominently in recent years.
From Tullymore in Michigan and Hawktree in North Dakota to Sanctuary and Redlands Mesa in Colorado, all have borne the contemporary stamp of a man who really knows how to push the golfing envelope.
One of an octet of courses that Engh has designed in the Centennial State, Lakota Links golf course (formerly Lakota Canyon Ranch Golf Club) lies just outside New Castle, below the Flat Tops Wilderness Area at an altitude of over 5,000 feet above sea level.
The layout is part of a residential development that opened in 2004 and it was one of the architect’s most challenging sites to work on due to the difficult topography.
Fairways are strung out in two loops of returning nines along the sides and bottom of deep, narrow valleys so storm drainage was a major factor in the design specification. Many of the holes feature elevated tee boxes where golfers face everything that lies between tee and green.
A pair of back-to-back par fives on the front nine are feature holes whilst, on the more built up back nine (housing overlooks either side of the fairway at the 18th) two of the final four holes are long par threes where a good score could be severely threatened.
