The canvas he's painting is a mountainous vista

JELLICO - Pete Dye's tennis shoes are brown of dirt.
One of golf's most decorated and well-known course architects doesn't sketch 18 holes on a napkin then ask for a paycheck. He works upon the land he is commissioned to design.

His garb pays the price, but his steps create wonders. It's how the TPC Sawgrass came about. It's how a course 60 miles north of Knoxville will be born.

"I'll be doggone if I can see it (a course) on a piece of paper," said the 81-year-old Dye. "And nobody else can either. But you have to come (to the course) frequently and keep fooling around and work while it's being roughed in."

Dye and his son P.B. (Paul Burke) were in Jellico Monday for further development of their new 7,100-yard, par-72 Rarity Mountain course, tentatively scheduled to open in the fall of 2008. It will be part of a 5,000-acre resort and gated community.

Pete Dye has approximately 100 designs on his resume. P.B. has around 60. The two have churned out 18-20 together. Six holes have been "roughed in" at Rarity Mountain, and at least nine holes should be seeded by the end of this year.

"Somebody asks you, 'Well, what's it going to look like?' " said Pete Dye. "I can honestly tell you this man (P.B.) behind me doesn't know. Nor do I."
"It's like painting a picture. You do it as you go along." Given the results of Whistling Straits, Harbour Town Golf Links and Kiawah Island, the course should be a stunner.

"You can walk it," Pete Dye said. "That's pretty good for around here."
The mountainous canvas has the Dyes salivating over breath-taking views and future fall foliage. Neither saw that while living in the cornfields of Indiana.

"I always talk about the 18th hole at Pebble Beach," said Pete Dye. "It's a fine golf hole. The next thing out of bounds is Japan. When you play the 18th at Pebble Beach, you see the ocean and rocks and so forth. It's the same thing right here. The five or six holes we have opened up, you got these long views.

"This golf course may not be much different than what's in Columbus, Ohio, but the ambience is so different, much more dramatic. And that's 90 percent of it. We can make the golf course playable. The rest is already here."
Dye's past blueprints frequently perplex. He takes criticism like a daily vitamin. On occasion, he hears, "Why did you do that?" from PGA Tour players and Sawgrass members Vijay Singh and Fred Funk.

Even Tiger Woods called Dye's infamous island-green, par-3 17th hole at Sawgrass "gimmicky." The hole should have been on the front nine, according to Woods. Didn't bother Dye, the icon of course design. He simply told Woods to swap the pin at the 17th with No.8's.

"Water off a duck's back," he said. "It happens every day. Golfers are amazing people. They complain all the time. They'll come up here (to Jellico) and go up and down the hills and complain about the balls going off into the ravines. Right back they'll come. Keep coming.

"The Ocean Course at Kiawah. Very difficult course with all the wind in the world. They stand in line to play it." Rarity Mountain may need a waiting room.

http://www.knoxnews.com/kns/golf/article/0,1406,KNS_628_5602830,00.html

By Jesse Smithey, smitheyj@knews.com