Mark’s Kaddy Korner

Punta Cana- Cap Cana Championship

The Dominican Republic sports numerous challenging golf courses including Pete Dye’s incomparable Teeth of the Dog and the Champions Tour has been coming to Punta Cana for the last four years. Jack Nicklaus designed a challenging tract with eight holes directly touching the stunning blue Caribbean waters and a layout weaving around ancient underwater ocean formations. The first and second tees are perched on limestone cliffs, once submerged but now overlooking the Cap Cana Oceanside resort, the Caribbean, and on a clear night the lights from Puerto Rico.

The CA Championship has only been coming to Doral since 2007; my first trip here was 1988. Back then the Blue Monster was probably one of the toughest courses on tour, now it ranks eighth easiest among the par 72 tracks on tour. If the wind doesn’t blow the top players in the world eat this course alive.

In the late 90’s the Doral Resort and Spa owners brought in Ray Floyd to toughen up the layout and put some teeth in the Blue Monster. He followed their orders, added some bunkers, tee boxes, and created some doglegs to challenge the tour players. After some sniveling and whining the course was softened again and Raymond took some unnecessary criticism for ruining the Blue Monster. He was only following orders and the pampered PGA Tour players couldn’t handle the challenge.