LANDMAND’S GOLF PANORAMA

One of the world’s best new courses is right here in Nebraska

Story by Kim Carpenter // Photography courtesy of Landmand Golf Club

In January, Golf Digest described it as “golf’s hottest new course.” Sports Illustrated labeled it the “best new public course.” And Golf.com went even further, calling it “Nebraska’s newest gift from the golf gods” that boasts a “course of biblical proportions” akin to “riding a rollercoaster.”

These are a lot of superlatives for a course that modestly bills itself as “The Farmer’s Golf Club,” but that humble sobriquet belies the grand, dramatic— some would even say daunting—sweep of Landmand Golf Club, 18 public holes located in the Loess Hills of Homer, Nebraska, just 20 miles from Sioux City on the Missouri River.

Danish for “farmer,” Landmand has belonged for four generations to the Andersen family, who farm corn and soybeans in the surrounding region. The 588 acres, however, proved too rugged, challenging, and wild to cultivate. The rolling landscape was simply too tough to tame into obedient agriculture, and as a teen, Will Andersen, now 39, talked with his friends about how the vast property would make an ideal golf course.

“I got big into golf in high school,” he revealed. “We thought this land would make for an extreme course and be so much fun.”

Flash forward to 2019, and Andersen started making that idle teen dream a reality. He tapped Rob Collins and Tad King as architects for the project after other architects balked at the idea of even attempting to transform the land into a golf course. The duo, the founders of King Collins Golf, had already garnered attention for their nine-hole Sweetens Cove Golf Club, built on a floodplain in Tennessee’s Appalachian Mountains. It opened in 2015 and quickly became hailed by Golfweek as the state’s No. 1 ranked public access course.

Collins and King were intrigued by the challenge. “Working with them was just a hunch. We hit it off really well,” recounted Andersen. “There was an immediate kinship spark between them and my family.”

It was good there was a strong bond. Three months into the project, midwestern snow began to fly. Then came COVID. Neither of those, though, stood in the way of the massive land clearing necessary for the landscape’s transformation.

“When Rob and Tad came in, it was all prairie grass. There were no trees,”

Andersen recalled. “With the elevation changes, it wasn’t playable. It was such an extreme property.”

So extreme, he said, that the architects “had to smooth a lot.” That smoothing involved bulldozing at least one million cubic yards of earth to make way for shaping, irrigation, and planting pest resistant, durable blue and ryegrass on the fairways, which complement the panoramic sweep of land. For the greens, the architects turned to creeping bentgrass, which provides for an ideal putting surface.

When asked to describe the end result, Andersen paused. “I would say massive. This has never existed before. It fits the topography. The property is big and vast, and the fairways and greens match the land. They just fit—it’s like they’re meant to be there.” and connecting fairways that span more than 150.

Forget delicate country club courses.

And Landmand’s greens? The average size is more than 14,000 square feet. Some stretch more than 20,000. The par-3 fifth hole boasts a 25,000-squarefoot putting green; the 17th is a boggling 34,000. For perspective, Pebble Beach putting greens are around 3,500 while Augusta National’s are slightly over 6,400. In terms of hazards, golfers can forget sand traps. On Landmand, you’ll have to maneuver around Cornfield Corner when playing holes eight, nine, and 10.

Andersen, of course, has personal preferences when it comes to his own course. “Number two is my favorite. The way it sits—it’s one of the more natural holes out there. Number one is up and down, but two is on a hillside. You can see it, and you feel the play exactly as you envision it.

“Number nine is the most challenging,” he continued. “It’s a very wide fairway, and you have to be in a special part of the fairway to hit it onto the green.”

One of the real winning characteristics of the course, emphasized Andersen, is what it’s not. “The atmosphere is not like a golf course at a country club. There is not pretentiousness.”

Landmand is big—roughly three times the size of an average golf course. It’s also bold and filled with the kind of challenges only midwestern topography carved billions of years ago by Ice Age glaciers can deliver: rolling dunes, slopes, ridges, valleys, bluffs, and basins. Formidable gusts of wind combined with changes in elevation soaring up to 150 feet make Landmand a cut above other courses. Golf enthusiasts might liken the course to the vaunted St. Andrews in Scotland, but nothing compares to the sheer scale and challenges presented by fairways that are at least 80 feet wide (some go as high as 100)

What has the public reaction been? Golfers agree with all the golf publication assessments. When Landmand opened in September 2022, memberships sold out within days. Tee times were not far behind. This year is similarly on track. Andersen said that although tee times sell out fast, cancellations do occur, so he recommends checking the website daily for openings.

The success of this first year has been humbling for Andersen, who remains grounded to his farmer roots. “There has been something so surreal about this,” he observed. “It’s nice to get the accolades. I really can’t explain it and put it into words. It’s been so gratifying.”

For more information, visit landmandgc.com