Bandon Dunes is best golf resort; TPC San Antonio buoyed by PGA Tour

Golfweek magazine recently confirmed something most of us already knew. The best golf resort in America is the Lodge at Bandon Dunes. In the magazine’s annual list of top 100 resort courses in the United States, Golfweek ranked Bandon Dunes’ courses in three of the top six, including the No. 1 and No. 2 spots overall.

The magazine’s top-ranked course is Tom Doak’s Pacific Dunes, which might be my favorite course in the world, though it’s been awhile since I’ve played it. Old Macdonald, a more recent addition to the Oregon resort, comes in at No. 2, and the Bandon Dunes Course at No. 6. And in case you were wondering, Bandon’s other course, the Ben Crenshaw-Bill Coore-designed Bandon Trails, came in at No. 11.

No doubt, this solidifies Bandon Dunes as the country’s best resort, but I was more intrigued by some of the newcomers on the list, a couple of which I got to visit in 2011.

Among them is the TPC San Antonio’s AT&T Oaks Course at No. 40. It’s amazing what the PGA Tour can do for a course’s reputation. Designed by Greg Norman with Sergio Garcia, not only is the Oaks Course the new site of the Valero Texas Open, but it’s also one of the toughest venues on the PGA Tour. The 2011 winner, Brendan Steele, won at 8-under-par, the same score that captured this year’s PGA Championship, the last major of the season.

Another newcomer on the list is TimberStone Golf Club in Iron Mountain, Mich. I played that one in 2011, too, and witnessed a hole-in-one on the 17th from the club’s general manager, Chris Mazzoni. (When do I get one?)

California has the most courses on the list with 12, led by Pebble Beach Golf Links at No. 3. Like Bandon Dunes, Pebble Beach Golf Resort has multiple courses on the list, including Spyglass Hill at No. 8.

Hawaii is next with eight courses. Best course in Hawaii, according to the list, is the Plantation Course at Kapalua. We’ll be seeing that one next week as the PGA Tour opens in paradise with the Hyundai Tournament of Champions.