69 that he felt the course should have greens that were significantly smaller than the (admittedly enormous) ones on Dunas. We should not go overboard here: Torre is not Pebble Beach. The greens average just under 500 square metres (5,000 square feet), on the petite side by modern standards, but hardly miniscule, although the green on the short par-four twelfth, one of the course’s standouts, is really quite small. As befits a smaller set, they are generally rather subtly contoured, though the eighth hole, one of my favourites on the course, has a green that falls away rather sharply in its back segment. Torre is actually quite a subtle course all round. In stark contrast to the Fazio plan, which included an enormous earth move, the total was just over 200,000 cubic metres. Other standout holes include two of the par fives, the ninth, which plays from a significantly elevated tee, and asks the golfer to avoid a single pine tree in the middle of the landing zone, and the uphill eleventh, at which the player can drive safely left, guaranteeing it will be a three-shot hole, or take on the carry of a large sandy waste to the right, giving the opportunity to get home in two. Torre is, obviously, very new – at the time of my visit, the course was not even in its soft opening phase – and the scars of construction are very visible on the land. This led me to what, at first, was my main criticism of the course, that the waste sand areas were extremely stark and visually distracting. I thought initially that it was excessive complexity in the edge of the waste areas that bothered me – and certainly the waste on the home hole, where I first formulated the thought – is extremely curvy. I don’t necessarily take the view that waste areas must have very straight, Dye-like lines, but in general when obviously artificial features dominate the visual space, it bothers me. However, on a second trip round the course, I realised that was not the issue, and a subsequent conversation with Vihljalmsson confirmed it. The fact that the corridors were cleared of trees “ As befits a smaller set of greens, they are generally rather subtly contoured” TORRE AT COMPORTA Photo: James Hogg At the request of Sergio Garcia, Torre’s greens are smaller than those on the Dunas
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