By Jason Bruno
Pasatiempo has always been a must-play for Golden Age design enthusiasts visiting the Bay Area, and the recent restoration by Jim Urbina has brought renewed attention to Alister MacKenzie’s home ballpark. The course is on our shortlist of the finest public access courses in America, with the back 9 being regarded as one of MacKenzie’s best inward sides. Now, with the recent restoration finished, it’s yours to experience.
This plaque is positioned on the path beside the sixth fairway, where MacKenzie spent the last five years of his life (his house still stands today, on the left about wedge distance from the green).
Marion Hollins
Any discussion regarding Pasatiempo would be remiss if we didn’t make mention of the visionary to which we should all be thankful – Marion Hollins. Around the world, Cypress Point and Pasatiempo are well known; these two remarkable designs would not exist if it weren’t for Hollins. Aside from being the founder of the Pasatiempo, Hollins managed the development of Cypress Point Club. It was Hollins who invited Bobby Jones to the opening of Pasatiempo in 1929, where MacKenzie and Jones commiserated over their adoration for the Old Course in St.Andrews. It is widely thought that this was where the genesis of an agreement to partner in the design of Augusta National was conceived. A historical assist from Hollins.
In January of 1928, Hollins announced that work would begin on a real estate and sports facility (just 30 miles to the north of Cypress Point) consisting of an 18-hole championship golf course, clubhouse, swimming pool, tennis courts, steeplechase track, and a beach club on the Monterey Bay. She hired Dr. MacKenzie to design the golf course with the intent to build the finest course west of the Mississippi. The foundation of the property is sand, set on the hills overlooking the Bay. World events in 1929 kept Pasatiempo from becoming an exclusive club, and perhaps it all worked out for the best, because today, Pasatiempo remains a public-access (semi-private) facility. The area surrounding the course is a residential community that offers very few views of the water, but if you look beyond the fourth green from the tee, you can catch a glimpse of the Bay in the distance.
Project
Jim Urbina’s involvement with Pasatiempo spans several decades. In the late 90s, Urbina and Tom Doak undertook a greens restoration that took place over 10 years, one hole at a time. Since that project began nearly 30 years ago, the greens had lost many pin positions due to years of top dressing, bunker splash, and the shrinking of several surfaces. Back then, the club’s inability to close the course meant the restoration of the bunkers and greens had to be done over a longer period, which wasn’t ideal for ensuring uniformity and consistency. For this recent project, Urbina and his team began on the front nine in April 2023, and they completed the back nine in December 2024.
The recent restoration brought Urbina a lofty task, return the greens and bunkers at Pasatiempo to their original Alister MacKenzie 1929 design. The project was performed with several key players – Theisen Downing of Earthsculptures, Brett Hochstein and Justin Mandon (Pasatiempo Golf Course Superintendent). With the course open a full year now, Head Professional Ken Woods recently offered up his thoughts, “We are really happy with how the finished product came out, Jim and his team did a fantastic job – especially on the greens, where we have reclaimed so many hole locations. It’s the best I’ve ever seen it.”
The 222 yard third hole (200 from the middle tees) is one of the finest and most demanding long par 3 holes in American golf. Playing steeply uphill, a high soft fade works best here. None of the legion of bunkers is a good place to be (unless you want to study and admire Brett Hochstein’s exquisite craftsmanship in restoring the finest details on every MacKenzie sandscape at Pasatiempo). The slope off the left hillside will give an assist if the shot is properly placed. Once on, your work has just begun on this treacherous green. Take a 3 here and smile on your walk to the next tee.
The project was more of an archaeological dig than a typical restoration project. Going down to find the original dimensions, soils, and contours created by MacKenzie and Robert Hunter, Urbina, along with Hochstein, Mandon, and the team did a masterful job of bringing back what was presented in 1929, but with improved modern-day agronomic surfaces. The new greens are (Poa-free) Bentgrass, an equal mix of Pure Distinction/Pure Select varieties, and, as Ken Woods mentioned, the surfaces now have several more possible hole locations, allowing the course to present different challenges from day to day.
The par 3 eighth hole features a green complex sprawls in every direction, which may have had the highest priority of restoration (due to a lack of legit hole locations). The green fits so perfectly into its surroundings, and provides the biggest probability of 3-putt due to its multi-levels and numerous contours. The new iteration has well over a dozen proper hole locations, whereas the previous had fewer than a handful.
Back 9 images from September 2025 Visit
The restored 10th, my personal favorite design on the property, this gentle dogleg left takes you slightly uphill on the tee shot, then descends on the approach to a lateral green that wraps around a linear swale that features a series of bunkers that will wreck your scorecard.
The 392-yard eleventh presents a quandary; the tee shot is to a severely uphill fairway that dares you to get close to the barranca (that acts as a hazard and bisects the hole into two separate parcels). Achieve the aggressive play, and you’re rewarded with a shorter approach and a far better angle into the green that also plays uphill, and is presented on a diagonal orientation to the line of play. Sideboards will feed the ball towards the center of this heavily contoured green
Another exceptional display of Mackenzie’s greenside bunkering reveals itself on the approach at the 532-yard par-5 thirteenth.
The Barranca down the left side on the par-4 fourteenth fairway presents a unique contour rarely seen anywhere in golf, and makes the hole more complex, when you consider this is the proper angle into the green.
The par-3 fifteenth is only a short iron, but it plays differently depending on hole placement; for example, this far-right hole location is wrought with pitfalls in every direction.
The 387-yard sixteenth features a blind tee shot up and over a rise, then follows with an approach to a triple-tiered green that’s guarded by a deep barranca that hugs the entire right side of the green complex. Thick foliage to the right and a boundary road on the left side take care of anything wayward. MacKenzie acknowledged that this hole was always a favorite of his, featuring a green that may be his boldest of them all.
The 169-yard par 3 eighteenth is a rare one-shotter finale that requires a well-struck shot to another multi-tiered surface over the Barranca. There aren’t many places to properly miss here, but left or right are places where a save is possible. Anything short or long likely will present diminishing returns.
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Pasatiempo has always been a must-visit for Golden Age aficionados making the journey west, and now with the Urbina restoration, the “Good Doctor’s” home park has a much-needed renewal. I consider Pasa a “one-of-one” public golf experience and should be at the top of your bucket-list… or if it’s been a while since your last visit, get back to experience the new bentgrass greens, they’re absolutely pure.
For more info: https://www.pasatiempo.com/
