The Tournament Players Club (TPC) in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida is, arguably, the Mecca of Golf in the U.S. Located in the development of Sawgrass, the TPC is just down the drive from Tour headquarters. As the Tour's "home" club, the TPC boasts two terrific Pete Dye courses, the Valley Course and the Stadium Course, which hosts The Players Championship in late March. The Championship has become known as "The Fifth Major."

The Stadium Course

Opened in 1982, the Stadium Course became a sensation and a topic of considerable controversy for its departure from traditional design. It was the first course of its kind, featuring mounds, high banks and earthen amphitheatres specifically designed to accommodate larger golf-ravenous crowds.

Former Tour Commissioner Deane Beman pioneered the concept of stadium golf, recognizing the crescendo of ringing cash registers in football-game size crowds. Though it continues to be controversial as a style of golf course architecture, stadium golf has grown enormously since 1982 and now the Tour owns, operates or is building no less than 32 other stadium courses around the U.S.

Beman, who captained the Tour's move from Washington, D.C., to Ponte Vedra Beach in 1979, also had the foresight to establish a permanent home course for the PGA Tour. In a land deal coup on a par with the purchase of Manhattan from the Indians, Beman bought the 400-acre TPC property from Fletcher Land Co. for a mere $1.

But the Fletcher Brothers weren't dummies. In the late '70s, they knew that a world-class golf course hosting a "major" championship would be a major draw to the area and give a boost to the sagging real estate market. A specific goal at the time was to pump new life into Sawgrass Country Club and community, which is also part of the Sawgrass development and which lies directly across A1A, a major north-south highway, from the TPC.

A fine traditional golf course of 27 holes, Sawgrass CC hosted The Players Championship before it moved permanently to the Stadium Course. It also hosted the Mazda Senior Tour Players Championship before that event moved briefly to the Valley Course and later to Dearborn, Mich., its permanent home.

Despite its raised profile from these tournaments, the golf course and community failed financially and was put into receivership. Eventually, it was acquired by Arvida, a Disney company. Now Sawgrass CC is a flourishing equity membership club, and homes in the community are fetching top dollar.

As for the Stadium Course, Beman's choice of Pete Dye as designer was no less brilliant than his previous decisions. As Dye's resume confirmed, here was a superbly imaginative course architect who could do wondrous things with pans and bulldozers.

Notwithstanding the controversy that first greeted it, the Stadium Course is a marvel in golf course design, engineering and construction. [The same can be said for the entire TPC property, which, in addition to the two golf courses, includes a superb clubhouse and a first-class practice facility including an airport size driving range behind which is a line of furling flags, golf's version of the U.N.]

Prior to construction, the TPC site was a forested lowland far more suited to hunting and alligator habitat than golf. Drainage was a major hurdle, especially after the completion of A1A, which effectively dammed the site on the east. The problem was resolved by a network of constructed lakes and canals which meander prominently through the property, providing both drainage and ample irrigation water.

This network is a principal feature of the course, as water comes into play on no fewer than 16 holes, including the signature 17th. This famous short par 3 with its island green was not part of the original routing plan. When Dye finished designing the first 16 holes, he had no space for 17, only the lake separating #16 and his route for #18. Like #13 at Harbour Town, Dye's wife Alice stepped in with an idea--to put the green out in the lake. Now one of the most widely photographed holes in golf, #17 provides great tournament drama and not a little heartache. Yet, as Dye told me in 1998, "17 was an accident."

Lake construction, of course, provided the earth for the mounds and amphitheatres, including the tiered grass seat structure around the #1 tee box that looks like a miniature football stadium. In some places, like behind #18 tee box, banks rise up 15 feet high or more and resemble the haunches of slumbering behemoths. The relocation of huge volumes of dirt also allowed Dye to create fascinating elevation changes. For example, the tee boxes on #4, #5 and #16 sit substantially higher than fairway level.

Aside from accommodating fans, mounds are strategically placed to make life miserable for the wayward. For example, the large 8-foot high berm left of #12 fairway blocks a view of the green from that side of this fine 342-yard dogleg left hole. And elsewhere, like on #5, some of the greenside sand and grass bunkers have high lips, obscuring pin placements from the wrong approach.

Though the course, at 6937 yards from the back, does not require Olympian distance, precision is essential to score well here. Most of the tee shot landing areas are extremely narrow, pinched in to 25 yards by high rough, mounds, waste bunkers, water, trees or a combination of all these. Dye designed the abundant live oaks on the site to play a critical role on a few holes, notably #16. On this 496-yard risk-reward par 5, a tall oak front and left of the green catches shots even slightly off line left. The lake immediately right of the green catches right-leaning shots like a preying mantis catches his supper. Here Dye is saying, "How are your nerves? You can get home in two, but you will have to hit a career shot."

Nerves aside, the golf course is superbly conditioned and visually stunning. While every hole is artistically exciting, #9 is an artistic and strategic masterpiece. It is a 582-yard double dogleg that is golf?s equivalent of Paris Island. From the tee box in the woods, you drive to a wide landing area flanked on the right by a waste bunker and lake. A creek bisects the fairway about 350 yards out. The fairway bends to the right about 300 yards from the tee. Depending on the wind, the second shot requires a medium iron to fairway wood to a tiny bull's eye target guarded left and right by oaks. There is also another large waste bunker on the left. If you hit too far left on the fairway, the oaks completely block the approach to the green. From 130 yards out, the fairway bends back to the left to a small, severely sloped green guarded by sand and high-lipped grass bunkers that resemble bowls of wire clippings.

So what's playing the Stadium Course like? While target golf enthusiasts will be in hog heaven here, the traditionalists will squeal all the way home. If you mix in the wind, the course is a famished bear on amphetamines. Bring your "A" game, plenty of patience, and a dozen sleeves of golf balls.

The Valley Course

Players, especially those with healthy self-esteem, are likely to find the Valley Course much more enjoyable to play. It has all the classic Dye features--mounds, water, trees, and devilish green and fairway contours--but the Valley Course is a kinder, gentler layout.

The greens fees are pricey ($244 in high season on the Stadium Course) but the TPC has no trouble filling its tee sheets. The service at the club is first class, from the pro shop down to the attendants, all golfers themselves. As a private membership club, TPC access is restricted to guests of members and the Marriott at Sawgrass Resort.

The Marriott

The resort is a high-end Marriott hotel of 348 rooms and 160 adjacent villas. Located a minute's drive from the TPC on PGA Tour Blvd., the hotel, with its four-story high atrium, includes meeting facilities, a health club, tennis facilities, a golf shop (where you can reserve tee times on the TPC and other area courses), and two restaurants including the award-winning Augustine Grill, specializing in seafood including the tastiest lobster bisque this side of Maine.

Back of the hotel, an outdoor bar and very attractive pool/spa complex overlooks a wooded lagoon. Across the lagoon and between the black pines, oaks and a few red maples, you can see the beautiful par-3 13th hole of the Stadium Course.

As a Marriott guest, you also have access to Marsh Landing, an enjoyable and not too taxing layout in the gated community of the same name; Queen's Harbor, which some consider to be one of the finest courses in the area; Oak Bridge; and Sawgrass Country Club.

Sawgrass Country Club

Sawgrass CC was designed by Ed Seay, now the lead designer with the Palmer Design Group. In the 1980s, Seay redesigned several holes including the finishing holes of the West 9, which served as the back nine of the Tournament Players Championship course before the tournament moved to the players' club.

Built on flat, coastal terrain, Sawgrass CC has interesting elevations and is liberally bunkered, though Gardiner Dickenson was requested a few years ago to come in and remove some 70 bunkers.

The West's finishing holes flow along a large lake and are some of the best I have ever played. They include the treacherous 210-yard 6th over water to the green smack on the water; the short but narrow 370-yard 7th, the 430-yard 8th; and the majestic par 5 9th, whose green also lies right next to the lake. The holes provided ample drama in earlier Tournament Players Championships and when the tournament moved across the street, many Tour players, especially Tom Watson, was disappointed at first, for Watson loves the course.

A Note: The Marriott at Sawgrass Resort was comfortable, friendly and very convenient, but for a golf addict, it lacked one essential amenity: The Golf Channel. According to Marketing Director Chris Bracken (when I was there in late 1998), the resort had decided not to get the Golf Channel because it was too expensive. He said his first priority was to get The Weather Channel after he was besieged with complaints about that omission. The hotel added The Weather Channel to its TV menu in mid-February.

For Marriott reservations, call 800-457-4653.

Photos courtesy Marriott at Sawgrass Resort.