Mark Hollinger, ASGCA and JMP Golf Design Group have completed Jian Lake Blue Bay Golf Club, a 7,555 yard championship seaside resort golf course located along the southeastern coastline of China’s Hainan Island.
After many months of anticipation from initial planning, construction, turf grow-in thru final completion, the newest international standard, resort golf course on Hainan Island officially opened for play on January 2, 2012. Jian Lake Blue Bay Golf Club, developed by the Shaoxing Jian Lake Group (the developer of #6 ranked Jian Lake Golf Club in Shaoxing City), in collaboration with the renowned residential developer, Greentown China Group from Zhejiang Province, is a 7,555 yard championship seaside resort golf course located directly along a spectacular stretch of oceanfront property near the town of Lingshui, along the southeastern coastline of China’s Hainan Island.
Mark E. Hollinger, principal golf architect and partner of Belmont, California’s JMP GOLF DESIGN GROUP, has been working for the past four years completing something quite special for a new generation of China’s resort golfers. “I am very pleased with the seaside tropical environment and interesting character of this golf course. I believe it will present something very unique and different for every type of resort golfer and serious travelling player. This tournament-tough, seaside, 18-hole, par 72 golf course was built to the highest possible international golf standards and the level of detail throughout the course is truly world-class”, says Hollinger.
Blue Bay features four sets of tees per hole, with super smooth and lush singular-turf Sea Isle 2000 Paspalum putting surfaces, fairways and roughs. There are numerous sprawling sand dune waste areas complemented by volcanic stone walls and red sand bunkers, clear blue lakes, as well as native beach grasses, native coconut palm trees and colorful bougainvillea landscape plantings bordering many of the holes. With wind being a major factor in how each golf hole might play from season to season, Blue Bay is considered a tropical links-style golf course. This bold design style features wood timber sleepers, pot bunkers, and fast and firm turf conditions with elevated putting surfaces designed to allow for bump and run style approaches played under the wind which further enhances the links character.
Blue Bay is one of 4 new JMP courses slated to open in 2012 within China, and is destined for consideration as one of China’s very best resort courses.
The stylish and uniquely modern golf clubhouse was designed by US-based architect Dahlin & Associates, and features well-appointed locker rooms, an elegant open-air ocean view bar/lounge, and extensive pro shop. The clubhouse and surrounds were creatively landscaped in a custom tropical style by James Nicolay, based in Honolulu, Hawaii. A new 400-room Westin resort hotel in currently under construction next door, which overlooks much of the golf course, the wide beach and the South China Sea.