TPC at Sawgrass

Tournament Players Club at Sawgrass

Stadium Course's signature 17th hole
Club information
Location	Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, United States
Established	1980, 44 years ago
Type	Resort
Operated by	PGA Tour TPC Network
Total holes	36
Tournaments hosted	The Players Championship (1982–present)
Website	tpc.com/sawgrass
The Players Stadium Course
Designed by	Pete Dye, Alice Dye
Par	72
Length	7,215 yards (6,597 m)
Course rating	76.8
Slope rating	155
Course record	63 - Fred Couples (1992)        Greg Norman (1994)        Roberto Castro (2013)        Martin Kaymer (2014)
Dye's Valley Course
Designed by	Pete Dye, Bobby Weed
Par	72
Length	6,864 yards (6,276 m)

TPC Sawgrass

Location in the United States

The Tournament Players Club at Sawgrass (TPC at Sawgrass) is a golf course in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, a suburb of Jacksonville, United States. Opened 44 years ago in 1980, it was the first of several Tournament Players Clubs to be built. It is home to the PGA Tour headquarters and annually hosts The Players Championship, a golf tournament on the PGA Tour.

TPC Sawgrass Stadium Course, the golf stadium of the course, has a capacity of 36,000.

The TPC at Sawgrass is situated in Ponte Vedra Beach's Sawgrass development. It has two individual courses, the Stadium Course and the Valley Course. The Stadium Course was designed in 1980 by noted golf course architects Pete and Alice Dye, and is known as one of the most difficult golf courses in the world. Constructed specifically to host The Players Championship, it employs a distinctive "stadium" concept: like in other sports, fans at the TPC sit in "stands" made of raised mounds of grass. It is known for its signature hole, the par-3, 137-yard 17th, known as the "Island Green", one of golf's most recognizable and difficult holes.

The course has been featured for many years on the best-selling Tiger Woods PGA Tour series of video games.

Meanwhile, the Dye’s Valley Course hosts the Web.com Tour Championship since 2013.

History

Over 415 acres (1.68 km²) in the Florida swampland, the course contains narrow fairways lined with hazards like marshes and "waste bunkers" (long strips of sand that groundskeepers never maintain); dozens of deep "pot bunkers," strategically placed to catch even a slightly misplaced shot; thick rough that features craters and mounds; tall, shot-obstructing palm trees; and rock-hard, lightning-fast greens. When the first Tournament Players Championship was staged at the Stadium Course in 1982, the story was not eventual winner Jerry Pate but the complaints the players had about the course, which had supposedly been built in their honor. "It's Star Wars golf, designed by Darth Vader," Ben Crenshaw pronounced. When asked if the TPC suited his playing style, Jack Nicklaus replied, "No, I've never been very good at stopping a 5-iron on the hood of a car." J. C. Snead called the course "90 percent horse manure and 10 percent luck." Over the following year, Dye tweaked the course, making the greens less severe and replacing several bunkers. After the changes, the course became far more playable. "Now it's a darn good golf course," Crenshaw said of the improvements.

The course was the site of the U.S. Amateur in August 1994, where 18-year-old Tiger Woods defeated Trip Keuhne in the finals, 2 up. This was the first of his three consecutive victories.

The Island Green

TPC Sawgrass' signature hole is the Stadium Course's 17th, known simply as the "Island Green," although it is technically a peninsula. It measures only 132 yards (121 m) from tee to green (requiring only a pitching wedge for most pros), but it consists of nothing but a 78-foot (24 m)-long green with a tiny bunker in front of it. Save a small path to the green, the green is completely surrounded by water, and its location amidst many trees causes the wind to swirl over it. Club selection in the weather conditions at the hole is a huge consideration, as there is nowhere to land the ball but on the green or in the water. It is estimated that more than 100,000 balls are retrieved from the surrounding water every year, courtesy of professionals and tourists alike.

"Island Green" par-3 17th hole

The Island Green design came by accident: the original design for the 17th was to be a simple par-3 green only partially surrounded by a lake. However, the soil surrounding the 17th consisted of sand, which is necessary to build a good golf course, but rare on the otherwise swampy property, and by the time the course was near completion all the sand had been dug from the area, leaving a large crater. Alice Dye suggested the Island Green concept, remembering another course with a similar green. Pete was not thrilled at the idea but went ahead with it, in the process creating one of golf's most recognizable holes. Because of its popularity among fans, The Golf Channel devotes 11 cameras to it during the tournament.

Probably the most famous incident that has occurred on the Island Green involved Steve Lowery in the 1998 Players Championship. His tee shot successfully landed on the green, but then a seagull swooped onto the green and picked up his ball several times. The gull found it difficult to hold the ball in its bill, but finally managed to carry it into the air and over the water, where it dropped it. One of the TV commentators quipped that the 17th now had yet another hazard. Under Rule 18-1 of the Rules of Golf, as a bird is considered an "outside agency" and as Lowery's shot was at rest, he was permitted to replace the ball at the spot where the ball initially came to rest on the green.

In May 2007, a record 50 balls landed in the water at the 17th hole in one round, which broke the single-round tournament record of 45 set in 2000.

During the week of Super Bowl XXXIX, played at nearby Jacksonville in February 2005, Fox Sports organized a "closest to pin" contest with MLB, NFL, and NASCAR players (all sports properties of the network) on the 17th green. Dale Jarrett defeated Trent Green and John Smoltz in the final by being the only player to make it on the green.

Scorecard

TPC at Sawgrass - The Players Stadium Course

Tee	Rating/Slope	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	Out	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	In	Total
The Players	76.8 / 155	423	532	177	384	471	393	442	237	583	3642	424	558	358	181	481	449	523	137	462	3573	7215
Blue	73.9 / 146	394	507	160	359	446	360	407	195	546	3374	388	519	332	156	436	416	486	128	426	3287	6661
Blended	72.3 / 143	394	507	160	359	422	360	382	168	522	3274	388	469	332	156	377	366	486	128	426	3128	6402
White	70.9 / 137	360	469	134	324	422	333	382	168	522	3114	351	469	313	141	377	366	470	115	387	2989	6103
Green	65.3 / 125	292	381	97	263	360	269	329	121	453	2565	247	395	243	109	334	288	410	92	336	2454	5019
Par		4	5	3	4	4	4	4	3	5	36	4	5	4	3	4	4	5	3	4	36	72
Handicap	Men's	11	15	17	9	3	13	1	7	5		12	8	16	18	4	6	10	14	2
Handicap	Women's	11	1	17	5	7	13	9	15	3		10	2	14	18	12	8	4	16	6

Gallery

• 

  Tiger Woods at the 17th hole in the 2007 Players Championship.

• 

  Phil Mickelson on the 18th hole in the 2007 Players Championship.

• 

  Sergio García winning the 2008 Players Championship.

• 

  Former President George H. W. Bush shakes hands with Rear Adm. Joseph Kernan and then received the Professional Golfers Association Tour Lifetime Achievement Award.

External links

• Official website
• Golf Course Histories aerial comparison 1980 v 2012