The Golf Course at Adare Manor

John Patrick McManus bought the Adare Manor estate in County Limerick for a reported €30 million in 2015, then had Tom Fazio rebuild its golf course through 2016 and 2017. Robert Trent Jones laid the original out in 1995, on 840 acres beside the River Maigue, under a house the second Earl of Dunraven began rebuilding in 1832: Tudor Revival, and a Calendar House with 365 windows and 52 chimneys. The Irish Open came in 2007 and 2008, and the J.P. McManus Pro-Am in 2005, 2010 and 2022. The Ryder Cup follows on 13–19 September 2027.

Fazio kept the order of the holes and changed everything else. Every green and every tee was rebuilt from scratch. The strange part is underground: SubAir units sit beneath each putting surface, moving air through the root zone to dry it and steady its temperature; the bunkers are lined with Capillary Concrete; the fairways and roughs are sand-capped. The greens are Pure Distinction bent. Every item on that list is about getting water out of the ground. Caddies are compulsory, and there are 7,509 yards of par 72 for them to read. Hotel guests get the tee sheet first, and what is left goes to visitors, season depending.