Caves Valley Golf Club, site this week of the PGA Tour’s BMW Championship as the second FedEx Cup Playoffs event, was designed by Tom Fazio and opened in 1991.
Just north of Baltimore in Owings Mills, Maryland, Caves Valley was recently updated – length was added, bunkers were renovated and the nines were flipped to promote better spectator views on the closing holes. It will play 7,542 yards at a par of 72 for the BMW.
Caves Valley ranks No. 4 in Maryland on Golfweek’s Best Private Courses list and is tied for No. 178 on Golfweek’s Best Modern Courses list for all layouts built in or after 1960 in the U.S.
The Baltimore area hasn’t been host to a PGA Tour event in decades, but Caves Valley does have a championship track record. Jerry Courville Jr. won the 1995 U.S. Mid-Amateur there, and in 2002 Don Pooley beat Tom Watson in a five-hole playoff there to win the U.S. Senior Open. Caves Valley also was host to the 2005 NCAA Men’s Championship won by Georgia and the 2009 NCAA Women’s Championship won by Arizona State.
Thanks to yardage books provided by Puttview – the maker of detailed yardage books for more than 30,000 courses around the world – we can see exactly the challenges that players face this week. Check out each hole below.