Kapalua — Plantation Course

Kapalua's Plantation Course is the host of The Sentry, the PGA Tour's January season opener, and a Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw design routed across volcanic ridgelines 300 feet above the Pacific. The original opened in 1991, and Coore and Crenshaw returned in 2019 to renovate their own work, an arrangement that let them refine the design with three decades of perspective on how it played in competition and daily use.

The routing is the achievement. Rather than fight the volcanic terrain, the course follows it. Holes climb ridgelines, drop into valleys, traverse side-slopes, and occasionally deliver you to an exposed promontory where Molokai and Lanai sit visible across the channel. Elevation change from the highest point to the lowest exceeds 300 feet across the round, and that affects club selection in ways you'll need a hole or two to calibrate. Tee shots from elevated boxes carry farther than the yardage suggests; uphill approaches into exposed greens want more club than the card says. The northeast trade winds add a third variable.

The 2019 work restored natural contours that had softened over time, rebuilt greens to their original sizes, and replaced the turf with a more climate-appropriate grass. The course plays firmer and faster now, which suits the Coore and Crenshaw philosophy of using the ground game as a scoring option rather than demanding aerial approaches everywhere.

The par-5 18th, downhill with the ocean as backdrop, is the finishing hole that decides The Sentry. At 687 yards from the championship tees, it's among the longest holes on Tour, but elevation drop and prevailing wind make it reachable in two for long hitters. The green sits in a natural amphitheatre at the base of the slope, and the approach demands precise distance control on a putting surface that tilts away from you. The front nine plays through the interior; the Pacific becomes a constant from the 11th onward.