Living the Life At Peacock Gap
Marin's Bayside Classic Does the Renovation Thing With Stunning Results

By Andrew Hidas

Anyone keeping pace with Northern California culture knows the phrase "only in Marin"-it's a fantasy, a caricature of the well-heeled county and its idiosyncrasies. Fortunately for Marin golfers and others close enough to get there on any given day, "only in Marin" achieves a luminous, deeply appreciated reality when applied to the fully renovated Peacock Gap Golf & Country Club.

"In the '60s and '70s, this was a major social and recreational hot spot in Marin," says Peplinski. "Bob Hope, Bing Crosby, Clint Eastwood-they all came out here when they were in the area. Billy Casper was the touring pro, Johnny Miller won the state high school championship here, Ray Floyd still holds the course record (63), and on the tennis courts, we saw Pancho Gonzales, Rod Laver, and the club's touring pro Ken Rosewall, who was ranked No. 1 in the world. We had swim teams, rugby teams.

"All that fell away over time, but our goal is to bring it back, with the rebirth of a tradition. We're 15 miles from downtown San Francisco, but with generally much better weather, in a gorgeous location, with a walkable and challenging course. The time is right for more of a whole-family, whole-life kind of golf club."

Says Richardson, the author of three thinking-person's books on golf course design: "We wanted to honor the original vision of Billy Bell, keeping the positives while updating the course to make it a more interesting and less predictable play.

"Bell was known for his great routing schemes, which we kept largely intact. We focused on removing trees, varying bunkers, and other features to make it less formula-driven. The idea was to make a statement about greens and approaches, more along the lines of classic European or Eastern U.S. courses, blending it all with the surrounding landscape."

Once all the greens were redesigned and holes 5 through 8 and 17 were rerouted, the course was again ready for prime time in late November 2007. By then, Richardson had accomplished one of his most important and overt goals, which was to refashion a venerable course that is now better played, in Bobby Jones's oft-cited phrase, "between the ears."

"It's more about the greens and the short game now," Richardson says. "Golfers have a lot more choices here than they used to have, but members tend to hold the cards, because they've worked on and solved a good number of the puzzles that perplex public players and guests."

Like all other artistic endeavors from symphonies to novels to movies, golf courses require varied pacing, Richardson continues. "We wanted to create differences in intensity and rhythm, with lulls followed by crescendos and conflict. Just like in movies, which can't be all car chases or romantic scenes or snappy dialogue. Early in the course here, players can feel kind of peaceful and almost secure. Then at holes 6 and 7, we hear them saying, 'Geez, where did this come from?' That's when we know they're fully engaged."

A new fishbone drainage system has already kept Peacock Gap open this winter on days that would have left the former course looking pretty much like the swampland it had been in the 1700s, when Miwok Indians ambled over to gather shellfish, clams and mussels from their nearby abodes in what is now China Camp.

Artful, well-drained new bunkers have replaced the seasonal ponds the old bunkers used to become in winter, and a computer-controlled, weather-sensitive irrigation system now keeps (just the right amount of) water going where it's needed.

A fourth tee placement now sees the course playing from 4,800 to 6,261 yards. Tricky "potato chip" greens range from 7,640 feet on No. 6 down to 4,650 on No. 11. The NCGA (for men) and WGANC (for women) recently updated their ratings on the course, to (black tees) 70.0/122 for men, and 73.4/130 for women. Both groups will re-rate the course in spring, 2008, based on actual play.

What hasn't changed are the multiple generations of golfers who continue to test themselves against what the course's own literature describes as its "purposefully devilish" nature.

That angels dance close by, ready to assist in every golfer's strenuous efforts to reach the Kingdom of Par, serves only to reinforce the widely-acknowledged fact that golf and theology are hopelessly and forever intertwined, traveling buddies on the long and undulating road to salvation. The happy news is that Peacock Gap is once again a major feeder into that road.