Tiger Woods' 18 Holes in Baja Have Put Our Plans for Dubai on Hold
by: Tal Pinch
Tiger Woods 18 Holes in Baja Have Put Our Plans for Dubai on Hold On the cusp of returning from knee surgery (although he reportedly hasn't started swinging his clubs just yet), Tiger Woods is still busy as ever. With his second child on the way, Woods has already introduced his newest baby to the fairway-aiming world. The baby's name is Punta Brava, a new par-70 all-luxury course located about 65 miles south of San Diego. It?s not the first such project Woods has unveiled, but it could be the most interesting. With his first pet project, Tiger Woods Dubai, slated to become the Arab world's top-tier golf resort thanks to its private residential lots and fine dining courtesy of chefs like Guy Savoy, Punta Brava has a lot to live up to. The fact that it's a short ride from the Mexican border already endears it to the typical high-end golfer, who may not be looking to fly halfway around the world to play 18 holes, even if it does have a private spa bungalow on site. With water within site of every hole, Punta Brava already features a backdrop superior to Dubai's. We initially expected Dubai (which has a reputation for making a four-star property look like the Chelsea Hotel circa Sid Vicious) to crush any other property in terms of luxury amenities. But with the plans just being revealed, it looks like Brava might be more than just a gorgeous course. Aside from the requisite upscale clubhouse, spa, and fine-dining, the new Woods project also features an intriguing combination of residential lots, villa residences, and villa hotel, each of which is expected to offer high-end amenities for the clientele, who will have the intriguing option of accessing the property via either air, land or sea. Alright, so it looks nice, but Dubai is going to look nice too once it's all done. But Brava does seem to have a Tiger Woods signature on the course that his first private golf resort is lacking. During his Brava press conference, Tiger gushed over some of his favorite holes in a way nobody really seems to be doing with Dubai. He mentioned eight separate shots in which you'll have to blast your ball over water (which is cool) and a No. 12 that he thinks looks remarkably like No. 8 at Pebble Beach. What's more, he told the Wall Street Journal that he'd be buying a home at Brava too, a home that the native Californian will arguably be seeing more than his Dubai club. With an estimated 2011 opening and sales beginning immediately, you've been given fair warning.