Golf

Bear's Best Golf Club Details

• Opened:
  2001.
• Course designed by:
  Jack Nicklaus.
• Course Management:
  Adam Owen.
• General Manager / Director of Golf:
  Ladonice Waldrep.
• Head golf professional:
  Pat Mastandrea.
• Course Record:
  Briny Baird and J.L. Lewis, 63.
• Tee Time Policy:
  Reservations are accepted up to 60 days in advance. Rates vary from $195-$245 depending on the day of the week.
• Course Map:
  Click here.

Bear's Best Golf Club Review

A host site for the 2004 Michelin Championship at Las Vegas, Bear's Best is ranked 4 1/2 stars by Golf Digest. Designer Jack Nicklaus modeled the course after some of his best work, including PGA West in La Quinta, Calif.; Desert Mountain in Scottsdale, Ariz.; Las Campanas in Santa Fe, N.M.; La Paloma in Tucson, Ariz.; Bear Creek in Murrieta, Calif.; and Old Works GC in Anaconda, Mont.

From the back set of four tee boxes, Bear's Best measures 7,194 (rating/slope: 74.0/147), and there's a great variety in hole distances, directions and topographical twists and turns. Overall, generous fairways are the rule, and there's more sand than rock in the surrounding desert, making it possible to find many of even the most errant shots.

Water comes into play on just two holes, the first and last, which are perhaps the course's most beautiful and most intimidating. On the 413-yard, par-4 first hole, there's water all along the left side from the elevated tee to the elevated green, which is narrow, set at a tough angle and fronted by three deep bunkers. The 463-yard, dogleg-right, par-4 18th (PGA West's 18th hole at La Quinta) features water and white sand all along the right side. The green also is set at a diagonal and surrounded by bunkers. The rest of the course gets its teeth from more subtle challenges.

The real golf at Bear's Best comes on and around the impeccably manicured bentgrass greens, which variously feature every type of challenge. Three or four bunkers (both sand and grass) guard most greens, which are typically placed at difficult angles; or else they're multitiered, or they buck and undulate severely. Greenside shot choices are as varied as all the holes of the course itself. Bailout areas are often shaved to give the player free reign. Lob? Putt? Chip and run with a fairway wood or iron? And even if one lands in any of the course's more than 75 bunkers, there's often a good chance of getting up and down. With white-jumpsuited caddies available to make the rounds with guests, the sand is as dependably well groomed as it is consistent, like the whole Bear's Best experience.

Course statistics: