Review: Legends Golf Resort - Heathland (Part 2)

It's time to take a look at the back nine at Legends - Heathland, go here to see the front.

The tenth hole is a fairly long par 4, playing nearly 440 yards. The fairway doglegs pretty significantly from right to left, and is narrowed in the landing zone by a cluster of three bunkers left and tall grass right. Obviously, you can play short of that into the wider part of the fairway, but you'll be left with a 200-yard second shot, which is less than ideal. The second shot is pretty wide open though, with just one small bunker front left, and the green itself is on the larger and flatter side.

The tenth hole.

Approaching the tenth green.

The tenth green.

The eleventh hole is a mid-length par 4 that features a bit of visual deception on the tee shot. If you look at the right side, it appears the three fairway bunkers are extremely close together and that there's not much room to hit your drive. In reality, however, the first bunker is separated from the other two by more than a hundred yards, and in actuality none of them come into play. Not by much, anyway. The fairway is actually pretty wide open. A solid driver will leave just a wedge or short iron into a long, narrow green that's surrounded by fairway. So, despite the drive that looks quite difficult, the eleventh is really an excellent birdie opportunity.  

The eleventh hole.

Approaching the eleventh green.

The eleventh green.

The twelfth hole is a fun little, not quite short par 3, playing 160 yards over a creek. The water, happily, isn't in play unless you do something really bad off the tee, but the two bunkers (which look very good carved into the fairway) left of the green are. The green also slopes significantly from back right to front left, so if you can, it's best to be below the hole. It's nothing revolutionary, but the hole looks really good, and I like it quite a lot.

The twelfth hole.

The thirteenth hole is the only par 5 on the back nine, and thankfully, it's a good one. Certainly miles ahead of the seventh. The tee shot isn't too hard, as the fairway gets very wide once you get past the fairway bunker, but technically there is O.B. left and water right. Things get much more interesting on the second shot, as the stream from the previous hole cuts across the fairway here at a diagonal, ensuring that no matter how good or bad your drive was, you'll have a decision to make on the second. Do you take the risk and carry as much water as you can to give yourself a short third? Do you play safely out right and leave a full wedge for the third? Or do you play even safer and stay short of the creek, leaving a long iron into the green? The decision is made a bit less portentous by the green being basically unguarded, so even if you do have 200 yards left into the green, you do still have a decent chance of hitting it. Still, this is a good hole and a fine example of how to use water in a strategic, nonpunitive manner.

The thirteenth hole.

Approaching the thirteenth green.

The thirteenth green.

The fourteenth hole is a mid-length par 4 and a bit incongruous on a golf course that otherwise pretty solidly embraces strategic design. This is essentially target golf; hit the fairway, then hit the green. It is a little more nuanced than that, as you do get a slightly better angle if you head down the left side on the drive, which is closer to the O.B. line. However, this green's pretty big, so you're not exactly punished if you hit the drive down the right. Sure, that front bunker is big and intimidating, but there is space to work with and this is not a very long hole. Even if you use a 3 wood, you should have a short iron second at most.

The fourteenth hole.

The fourteenth green.

The fifteenth hole is 345 yards, making it a solidly short but not driveable par 4. The decision to be made on the tee shot is pretty clear: Either challenge the bunkers and sandy waste in the corner of the dogleg, leaving just a pitch into a huge, undulating green, or bail out right, giving yourself a full, potentially blind wedge for the second. It's not the most subtle hole in the world, but the thrill of hitting a big drive over all that sand is intense. It's no less dramatic than the equivalent carry over a pond or lake, but without the all-or-nothing prospect of losing your golf ball. You can absolutely recover from a failed attempt to clear the sand; I did just that and still made par. If it was water, I'd be staring double bogey in the face. In fact, the golfer is more likely to attempt something unwise on this hole precisely because they have the ability to recover, and that's what makes this hole so fun.

The fifteenth hole.

The fifteenth green.

The sixteenth is a 460-yard par 4, and is Heathland's most memorable and probably best hole. Alternate fairways don't always work; it's very easy to have one of the options be clearly superior, making the other fairway mostly a waste of space. And while that seems to be the case here, as the left-hand fairway is pretty clearly the inferior option, it's not so clear cut. The right-hand fairways narrows as it goes along, bringing the water more into play the longer you want to hit your drive. And while the left fairway offers an inferior angle, you can still hit driver down the left side and leave a short iron into the green. You'll just have to carry a large bunker framed by railroad ties (Tom Doak did work for Pete Dye, so it's not as odd a reference as you might think) on the second shot, which you won't have to do if you hit your drive down the more dangerous right side. 

After all that, the green itself seems almost like an afterthought, and while it doesn't offer anything that Heathland hasn't already presented, it is a challenging and undulating green, and it nicely caps off a very interesting hole.

The sixteenth hole.

Approaching the sixteenth green.

The sixteenth green.

The seventeenth hole is the longest of Heathland's par 3s, playing nearly 220 yards. The green is very large, especially when it comes to width. It's also very undulating, with multiple distinct sections to it. There are three bunkers around the green, one on each side and a larger one in the middle, positioned about 15 yards short of the green. All this combines to make a hole that surely plays very differently day to day, depending on where the hole is cut. The central bunker is likely always a factor, but it becomes much more so when the flag is in the center of the green, like it was for our round. The two bunkers on each side were a peripheral hazard for us, but when the flag is out left, suddenly the left bunker becomes the main threat while the right bunker is completely irrelevant, and vice versa. So, despite having minimal trouble and being incredibly wide, this is actually a pretty clever hole. 

The seventeenth hole.

The seventeenth green.

The eighteenth hole is not the longest par 4 in the world at 430 yards, but what it lacks in relative distance it more than makes up for in bunkering. This is by far the most well-bunkered hole on the course, with seven lining the landing area. You can, of course, lay up short, but you'll have 200 yards on the second shot. That's not ideal in the best of situations, but even more so here as the final green is both slightly elevated and surrounded by seven more bunkers. Theoretically, you could hit it with a long iron, but practically ... good luck. Oh, and this is also a tricky green to putt, with multiple ridges running through it. If you want to close out the round well, you need to challenge the bunkers on the drive, and if you can pull it off, the green is fairly receptive to short irons and wedges. 

The eighteenth hole.

Approaching the eighteenth green.

The eighteenth green.

If there's one thing about the Heathland course I can say with absolute certainty, it's that it's a whole lot better than Moorland next door. Okay, that's hardly fair. Heathland is a very good golf course, with the closing stretch from 15 onward in particular being particularly strong. And while I'm not sure it really captures the essence of British heathland golf, it does feel distinct from typical Myrtle Beach fare. There's minimal presence of the classic Lowcountry hazards: swamp, water, and housing; if you make a big number, it's because you took that number of shots, not because you took three penalty strokes. 

Of course, you probably won't be making many big numbers, because Heathland is, quite frankly, a pretty easy golf course. Sure, golf is golf, and golf is never easy, but it does feel like Heathland is fighting with one hand tied behind its back. Look at holes like 4, 7, 10, and 11; they all feel like they're missing something. Four and seven? Missing strategy on the tee shot. Ten and eleven? Greens that are super easy to hit. This relative lack of difficulty is good for pace of play; our round here took nearly an hour less than it did at Moorland – and rest assured, both courses were equally packed – but it's less good for making Heathland feel special. Tom Doak absolutely could have built a better, tougher, and more interesting golf course, but that wasn't what he was told to build. He was told to build a good course, not a great one. And that's what he did.  

In the end, Legends - Heathland is a solid option for the average Myrtle Beach golfer, relatively flattering on the ego, and not horrendously overpriced. Yeah, $120 is a lot, but people pay that same price to play Moorland, which is worse, and it's significantly less than Myrtle Beach's other heavy hitters. Just don't come into the round expecting something along the lines of Pacific Dunes, Ballyneal, or Tara Iti, and you won't be disappointed.