Cass Anderson / BroBible
If someone were to blindfold you and drive you to the Streamsong Golf Resort in central Florida you would be hard-pressed to know where on planet earth you were. It is a 16,000-acre resort on what used to be a phosphate strip mine and it is home to four of the best golf courses on the East Coast, with a fifth from Bandon Dunes architect David McLay-Kidd on the way.
I recently had the opportunity to walk the yet-to-be-named 5th course with the architect himself. The course is set to open some time next year; the grass is already filling in quite nicely, but was still very much under construction, which made it all the more fascinating to hear the architect describe the myriad of ways each golfer, across all handicap and swing speed ranges, can play each hole.
Hearing David McLay-Kidd discuss the numerous approaches a golfer can take tee-to-green on every hole wasn’t dissimilar from the first time I saw the Rocky Mountains up close or discovered psilocybin, and was faced with the revelation that I’d been playing 2-D chess while there was a multi-dimensional world out there I wasn’t tapping into.
Streamsong Solidifies Itself As #1 East Coast Golf Destination With David McLay-Kidd’s 5th Course
In the modern pantheon of golf, there has emerged a new Mt. Rushmore of Course Designers: David McLay-Kidd, Tom Doak, Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw, and Gil Hanse.
Apologies out there to the readers that know how intertwined these architects are, but I’ll run through this quickly for the uninitiated. Bandon Dunes in Bandon, Oregon has been widely considered to be the #1 golf resort in the world. David McLay-Kidd designed the original Bandon Dunes golf course, which opened in 1999.
After that, Tom Doak designed Pacific Dunes (2001). Coore and Crenshaw designed Bandon Trails (2005), the resort’s third course. Tom Doak and Jim Urbina designed Old Macdonald (2010), the 4th course. Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw came back for Bandon Preserve (2012), a par-3 course, and later finished Sheep Ranch at the north edge of the property, which opened in 2020 and is where I played the most memorable round of golf in my life in what were probably 45-50 MPH gusts.
By now, all of the names are familiar, right? Now let’s hop in the car from Bandon Dunes and drive 3,130 miles southeast across the country from Oregon to central Florida to Streamsong where four immaculate courses are open with a fifth on the way.
In December 2012, Streamsong Resort opened with the Red (ranked #20 by Golf Digest) and Blue (ranked #26) courses, which share a clubhouse. Streamsong Black ranked #33 and its separate clubhouse opened in 2017. The Chain, a 19-hole short course designed for match play, opened in 2024 and I was one of the very first outsiders to get to play all 19 holes.
Streamsong’s Red and The Chain were designed by Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw. Blue was designed by Tom Doak. Black was designed by Gil Hanse. One name is missing, right? The original Bandon Dunes architect, David McLay-Kidd. He is the man who went first at Bandon and started what many believe will become the most revered golf resort on earth. Now he will have a 5th course alongside the others that followed in his footsteps at Bandon.
What We Know So Far
Cass Anderson / Streamsong
Is there a name for the new Streamsong 5th Golf Course? Yes. Does anyone outside of the project’s inner circles have any idea what that name is? No. But we’ll surely know soon enough. For now, we have a map (below) showing the routing, the scorecard above with the pars and distances of each hole, and all sorts of additional images of the course below.
There are all sorts of popular guesses in golf circles. Given the existing full course names of Red, Blue, and Black, many believe Streamsong will stick with the color theme. But ‘The Chain’ is Streamsong’s newest course and broke that mold so there is no telling what the course’s name will be. I’d rather not speculate, but if it is Silver or Platinum, I wouldn’t hate it…
Initially, the 5th course posed a logistical problem where it seemed that it would require a new standalone clubhouse. This was going to be located right when you drive onto the Streamsong Resort property to the right and would have cost tens and tens of millions of dollars for the clubhouse alone. That is money that could be much better spent crafting the next top-10 public golf course in America and David McLay-Kidd was able to sort that out.
The yet-to-be-named 5th course will share a clubhouse with Streamsong Black, putting 2 courses at each of the main clubhouses, and in order to do so he had to move mountains (dunes) of land around huge lakes in Central Florida, but in the end, it all worked out.
Getting Around David McLay-Kidd’s New Streamsong Golf Course
Here is how the final layout of DMK’s course came together at the Streamsong Resort. If you look to the right of the image where the red line starts at hole #1 we can go from there:
Cass Anderson / Streamsong
On that map, you can see the 1st hole for the 5th Streamsong Course will be located just to the west of the practice range and practice green off the Streamsong Black clubhouse.
Those practice facilities were already in place and it always made the most sense to make that clubhouse multi-use. However, if you look at that map and see how Streamsong Black abuts the route, it’s easy to see how it looked impossible at first to envision the routing. But DMK is a genius at his craft and moving heaven and earth wouldn’t stop it all from coming together.
I am a born-and-raised Floridian. I was born at a hospital less than 50 miles from Streamsong as the crow flies. And walking the yet-to-be-named Streamsong Fifth Course with David McLay-Kidd, I was struck with how, despite it being set on former Mosaic phosphate mine land, the views in every direction were pristine and untouched Florida land in ways you simply do not see anymore. Florida has exploded with development over the past several decades, and it is so rare to be able to look off into the distance at nothing but wilderness for as far as the eyes can see.
Which brings me back to the title of this article… Streamsong is playing chess, not checkers. Every other premier golf resort on the East Coast that offers world-class golf to the public are properties with homes on the course(s). They all have real estate.
Think about it. There are homes around the Kiawah Island property. Pinehurst? Real estate all over. The same can be said for pretty much every premier publicly-accessible golf resort in America except for two: Bandon Dunes Golf Resort and the Streamsong Golf Resort. At every other top-tier publicly accessible golf resort with you will inevitably encounter homes on the courses.
And just to be clear, I’m not talking about 18-hole or 36-hole resorts. I am referring to golf resorts with 3 or more courses designed by the best golf course architects on earth and of those, there are only two that are littered with homes, Bandon and Streamsong. This is, of course, another piece in David McLay-Kidd’s 5th course completing the puzzle in East Coast golf domination for Streamsong.
Where Does The Streamsong 5th Golf Course Fit With Blue, Red, Black, and The Chain?
Cass Anderson / BroBible
At dinner that evening with David, I asked him what success would look like to him with this 5th course project at Streamsong. Whether it be commercial, financial, course rankings, or what.
He didn’t have to think about it much at all because it was clearly a thought that’d had been simmering. He told me that success to him would be those moments when he was at the Streamsong Resort, up at the rooftop bar or at the steakhouse, hearing players talk about their rounds and debating which course they loved the most and which one they’d love to play again next.
He believes his course will be an immediate contender for the best course at Streamsong for both low and high handicappers and one that golfers will be champing at the bit to play again.
Views From Above
Cass Anderson / BroBible
Walking the new Streamsong course with the architect felt like a privilege reserved only for wealthy individuals. It was a crash course on ‘insider knowledge’ on the course, how to play each hole, and what to avoid if you don’t want to put a huge score on the scorecard.
While the course is still coming together and the grass is growing, he was still able to describe each hole, how it should be played, and we even got to hit a shot on the par-3 12th hole while trying the course’s new signature food, a Scotch Egg made with Chorizo. The Scotch Egg is an homage to David, who was born in Johnstone, Renfrewshire, Scotland.
The course will come to life in the months ahead, but these aerial photos from Streamong blew my mind. And they really drive home how this golf course sits on the edge of the abyss. If, like me, you enjoy hitting shots into unencumbered views and not into greens flanked by McMansions, this course is going to blow your mind:
Provided by Streamsong Golf Resort
As you can see, the dunes are there as they are on Red and Blue. The land was already all out there primed to be used from the days when it was a Mosaic phosphate mine.
Provided by Streamsong Golf Resort
One of the people in our group would ask DMK about his love of short par-4s as signature holes on his courses. The 6th hole is just 353 yards. The 11th is 351 yards.
David loves these style holes where long hitters can risk it all and go for the green, facing certain death with a wayward drive. And older, shorter, higher handicapper golfers can play strategically. He believes the short par-4 is one of the great equalizers in modern golf and it is something he thinks about constantly while playing golf with his elderly father:
Provided by Streamsong Golf Resort
How can you not fall in love with those views?!
Provided by Streamsong Golf Resort
At this point, we don’t have a specific opening date for the Streamsong 5th course. But we do know it will open next year. The grass is in. Everything’s growing. Tweaks are being made.
David McLay-Kidd was there weekly throughout the life of this project, from the time when he had to walk out there in snake gaiters to prevent rattlesnake/cottonmouth bites, from the time he was walking down cleared out trails without realizing they were actually hollowed out grass areas from massive alligators sliding through between lakes, all the way up to the nearly finished golf course that it is now.
When this course opens, Streamsong Golf Resort will be able to offer four world-class 18-hole publicly available courses, three already ranked 33rd or better in United States, and The Chain, which is a 19-hole short course designed for match play. I actually played The Chain on the final morning of this trip and was reminded of just how fun that style of golf is. There are no pars, the lowest score wins the hole, and whoever won/has honors picks the next tee box. There are multiple holes where you can hit driver. It’s fantastic.
When these five courses come together at Streamsong, with the facilities they have out there…top-tier luxury lodge, steakhouses, clubhouses, shuttles, the spa (don’t skip this!!), gym, staff always willing to help, and some of the best largemouth bass fishing in Florida… It is hard to imagine why guys would pick any other resort on the East Coast for annual golf trips among friends.
Stay tuned for more on the Streamsong 5th Course as it comes together this year!
