Steyn City opens new 18-hole golf course ready for play

STEYN City’s winning formula of a visionary and a developer first led to the acquisition of a world-class site, and then to the instinctive knowledge of where best to position a top golf course within a lifestyle resort of this scale.

This vision has seen a formerly disused granite quarry, situated on 2 000 acres transformed into Steyn City’s 18-hole championship Nicklaus Design golf course.

Steyn City CEO Giuseppe Plumari said, “Like the rest of Steyn City, nothing has been compromised in terms of quality. As a result our golf course is unprecedented in terms of us having incorporated a dedicated ‘growing-in phase’ and exceptional manicuring into our construction timetable. This has allowed all our fairways and greens to fully develop, prior to the launch and resulted in the world-class, fully completed course that you will experience.”

The opening of the Steyn City’s new 18-hole Nicklaus Design championship golf course took place on October 14 with a four-ball alliance.

The top of the range golf course has also created that rarest of sights, namely green and immaculate fairways in the middle of the Highveld winter! Steyn City’s golf course greens and tees are planted with 007-Bentgrass and the fairways and roughs with cool season fescue/rye grass, guaranteeing a green playing surface all year round, a welcome respite from the harsh Gauteng landscape during the cold season.

Steyn City’s sprawling golf course spans approximately 90Ha, making it one and a half times the size of a normal golf course in terms of playability, maintenance and management. It is a par 72 over 7 000 metres from the championship tees and the greens are built to USGA specification. The course has been specifically designed as a user-friendly golf course for the average handicap golfer, but can also be set up for tour professionals.

This verdant new course first broke ground in 2009 followed by three years of extensive shaping and construction to devise the right contours for each hole. This included making clever use of the river and natural canyons as well as the construction of 73 sand bunkers, inland dams and water features and the laying of a 12km cart path.

The course plays on both sides of the Jukskei River and boasts a magnificent clubhouse discreetly carved out of a sloping rock face. The clubhouse position was conceptualised for returning holes ninth and 18th, and the first and 10th tees, to offer magnificent north-west facing views of the entire course and resort and a spacious and elegant halfway house.

Behind the Golf Clubhouse which provides 180 underground parking bays, is another standout feature, the double-sided 325m long by 100m wide driving range. There are seven target greens with real bunkers that simulate the shot-to-green target experience with availability to hit off both grass and mats. The range includes a comprehensive short game area, equipped with a large chipping and putting green.

Inside the clubhouse, a timeless architectural masterpiece is waiting to be discovered with vaulted, cellar-like ceilings and splendid marble floors; an opulent contrast to the clubhouse’s understated exterior with its camouflaged ‘planted’ roof that blends into its topography. This makes it hardly noticeable from a distance with the naked eye.

The course has also seen the installation of a pre-treatment water site and a sophisticated irrigation system, extensive indigenous landscaping and the planting of thousands of trees. It has also undergone a further two years of conditioning, a first for any South African golf course.

The golf course is fully navigable with a golf cart and is equipped with state-of-the-art GPS technology, allowing the course management team to monitor and control the whereabouts of each cart. Should a player attempt to drive the cart into a ‘no-go zone’ on the course, the cart will automatically shut down, forcing the player to remain within the demarcated areas protecting the manicured and maintained tee-boxes and greens.