# The Best Ron Garl Golf Courses in America Source: https://thecourserankings.com/blog/the-best-ron-garl-golf-courses-in-america/ [The Course Rankings](/) Architect Rankings A golf ball beside the hole on a green. Photo: PattayaPatrol, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons Ron Garl is a Florida architect in the fullest sense, and his catalog in this dataset runs to 22 courses across seven states, Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, and Wisconsin, with Florida holding the overwhelming share. His first design, Continental Country Club in Wildwood, dates to 1978, and his range inside one state's golf tells the story: island greens became a signature he returned to for decades, at Heathrow, at Sapphire National, at Summerfield Crossings, at Fiddlesticks twice in one round. His Fort Myers work anchors [our Fort Myers ranking](/blog/the-best-golf-courses-in-fort-myers-fl/), and his Sarasota work, led by University Park, appears in [our Sarasota ranking](/blog/the-best-golf-courses-in-sarasota-fl/). The best eight: ## 1Fiddlesticks Country Club Fort Myers, Florida, 1982, a private 36-hole club, and the championship credential at the top of Garl's record: the Long Mean course hosted the 2022 U.S. Women's Mid-Amateur Championship and the 2010 U.S. Senior Women's Amateur. Two USGA championships at one Garl course settles the argument about whether his work can hold an elite field. Long Mean plays par 72 at 7,077 yards and finishes with island greens at the par-4 ninth and the par-5 18th, Garl's signature device placed where a championship is decided. The second course, formerly the Wee Friendly, reopened in January 2019 as the Loch Ness after a full Kipp Schulties renovation at 6,645 yards. Fiddlesticks is No. 1 here because the USGA has voted for it twice. ## 2Sapphire National Golf Club Sapphire, North Carolina, 1998, the mountain outlier in a Florida catalog, and a public one: the only 18-hole course in the Highlands, Cashiers and Sapphire region open to the public without a hotel stay, holding a 4.5-star rating from Golf Digest. Par 70 at 6,724 yards from the black tees. The par-4 13th, one of the most photographed holes in North Carolina, plays 410 yards beside a waterfall, its approach climbing about 50 feet to one of the smallest greens on the course, and the par-3 15th has, yes, an island green. A Florida architect went to the mountains and built the region's public standard. That is range. ## 3Ocala National / Golden Ocala Ocala, Florida, 2006, Garl's famous concept course: replica tribute holes modeled on Augusta National, St Andrews, and others, including versions of Augusta's Amen Corner holes, set in Ocala horse country. It hosted the LPGA Coates Golf Championship in 2015 and 2016, which gives the concept a competitive record and not just a curiosity value. Private, with limited outside play. Golfers argue about replica golf on principle. The LPGA played two championships on it, which is the strongest reply the concept has ever received. ## 4Heathrow Country Club Heathrow, Florida, 1985, private, in the Lake Mary area, a former LPGA event host in the 1990s and host of nine U.S. Open qualifiers. Par 71 at 6,888 yards, with water hazards on 16 holes, a statistic that explains the qualifier history: this course identifies ball-strikers. The signature is the 117-yard par-3 12th with an island green, Garl's device at its most distilled, a wedge shot with no bail-out. Short, wet, and exacting. Heathrow is the purest Garl in the catalog. ## 5Azalea Course at Lakewood Golf Club Point Clear, Alabama, at the Grand Hotel resort on Mobile Bay, a Perry Maxwell course reworked within Garl's body of work, now part of the Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail as its Point Clear resort course. The Azalea hosted the U.S. Senior Women's Amateur in 1974 and 1986, plays par 72 at about 7,500 yards from the back tees, and its signature 14th is a 545-yard par 5 finishing on an island green in a four-acre pond. Resort access at the Grand Hotel. Maxwell bones, Garl's hand, an island-green finisher at championship length. The layers earn the spot. ## 6Crown Colony Golf & Country Club Fort Myers again, 1987, private, and home to a genuine first: Crown Colony was the first course in the United States built with Seashore Paspalum hybrid grass throughout the entire facility, a turf experiment that later became standard practice on warm-climate courses. It co-hosted the 77th Florida Open Championship, set up as a par-71 layout at 6,815 yards, and plays par 72 at 7,013 yards for daily golf. Garl's second Fort Myers entry in this list, with an agronomic legacy most architects never touch. ## 7Victoria Hills Golf Club DeLand, Florida, 2001, public, routed through mature oak and pine forest with elevation change unusual for Florida and, in local reviews, no two holes alike. Sandy soil gives it a Carolina feel, and it is regularly listed among Central Florida's best public values. Victoria Hills is the public golfer's Garl: the full design vocabulary, forest, elevation, variety, at public access and moderate pricing. ## 8Eagle Creek Golf Club Orlando, Florida, 2004, Garl with Howard Swan, near Lake Nona, a public course with Scottish-style sod bunkers that has hosted PGA Tour Q-School stages. Par 73 at 7,198 yards, the only par-73 course among the Lake Nona area publics, the front nine playing par 36 and the back par 37. A Q-School venue in a public wrapper, closing a list that began with Garl's first design in 1978 and reaches a 2006 LPGA host along the way. The concession: Garl's island greens and replica holes can read as gimmicks to golfers who prize restraint, and on his weaker residential work the devices repeat. Dated is the charge, and the repetition gives it some evidence. But two USGA championships at Fiddlesticks, the region-defining public course in the North Carolina mountains, an LPGA-tested concept course, and the first paspalum course in America describe an architect with more ideas than his reputation credits. Garl built Florida golf for the people who moved there to play it, and forty years of full tee sheets from Wildwood to Fort Myers say they are still coming. **Reader responses are open.** Please cite a specific hole, a price, or a round you have played.