Lost Farm – believe the hype

Last month Aussie Golfer published some stunning images we obtained of the new Lost Farm golf course being built in Tasmania. It is the most talked about opening of a golf course in Australia and may well become Australia’s best golf course.

David Newbury at Golf Industry Central wrote this following article in anticipation of the opening of Lost Farm in October.

The Barnbougle Lost Farm golf course in Tasmania hasn’t even opened yet it is already receiving rave reviews. A soft opening has been schedule for October, but that hasn’t stopped some golf observers predicting it will rival its next door neighbour Barnbougle Dunes – Australia’s top-ranked public course.

Elizabeth Sattler, the course’s marketing manager and daughter of landowner Richard Sattler, said most of the work on the Lost Farm course had been completed.

“At the moment we are giving the fairways of the course a chance to ‘grow in’,” she said. “The coming months will provide us with an opportunity to allow the grass to knit to establish a foundation, ensuring the dunes are stable and the fairways are in top condition for golfers.”

The soft opening in October will be followed by the official opening in December, which will coincide with the opening of the clubhouse, restaurant and bar, well-being centre and on-course lodge accommodation. Sattler said she had heard rumours the Lost Farm golf course would rival Barnbougle Dunes.

“The sand dunes on the Lost Farm course are more dramatic than the land on which Barnbougle Dunes was designed, which means that the courses are quite different given their close proximity,” she said. “The courses will certainly complement each other because both Doak [designer of Barnbougle Dunes] and Coore and Crenshaw have the same philosophy – to utilise and the natural contours of the land to design a course which complements the surrounding landscape.

“Will the Lost Farm be better? I will have to let golfers pass their own judgement to which is the better golf course.”

The American design team of Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw painstakingly sculptured Lost Farm, a links course, set among dramatic coastal dunes in Tasmania’s northeast. “The site at Barnbougle Lost Farm is very special,” Bill Coore said. “For a golf architect, opportunities to work with a piece of land like the dunes of the Lost Farm don’t come along very often. To turn down this project would be like a professional golfer passing up the opportunity to play in one of the majors because it was too far to travel.”

“People are always asking if the Lost Farm will be better than Barnbougle Dunes, but there is no way it could be. What it will be is different. We have aimed [at the Lost Farm] to build a golf course that complements the first course,” Coore said. “What Richard Sattler [owner of the land) has done with the clubhouse precedent at the Lost Farm has to be seen to be believed. It really is going to be a spectacular place to visit.”

The Lost Farm golf course has holes that play along the coast and holes that play inland and is a mix of all angles. “I think it’s quite a good mix and it certainly won’t be boring,” Sattler said. “We have aimed to create course that is fun for golfers of all standards – not just those with a low handicap”. Sattler said Coore and Crenshaw had taken the windy environment into consideration and had widened some fairways.

So, how will the Lost Farm course stack up against the Tom Doak and Mike Clayton-designed Barnbougle Dunes? Lost Farm designer Bill Coore hopes that they will be akin to one another. “Our aim is to have golfers in friendly banter with their colleagues regarding which is the better course,” he said.

FOOTNOTE: Coore and Crenshaw have built 20 holes at the Lost Farm course.

More images of Lost Farm