Korda’s record-equalling Major victory was won on a course with bunkers newly constructed with the ZLine bunker liner system
THE WOODLANDS, Texas – Nelly Korda’s victory in the recent Chevron Championship at Carlton Woods outside Houston was her fifth straight tournament win (and her second Major title), equalling the LPGA record previously held by Nancy Lopez and Annika Sorenstam. Between the 2023 and 2024 iterations of the tournament, the bunkers on the Nicklaus Signature course at Carlton Woods were reconstructed using the ZLine bunker liner system.
“We have known for some time that we needed to redo the bunkers on the Nicklaus course because of their age, the effects of storm damage, edging, and contamination,” says club director of agronomy Tim Huber. “We took the decision to renovate as far back as 2021, but with the Chevron tournament coming here in 2023, we obviously had to plan the project carefully, so we scheduled it for after the 2023 championship. The 2023 Chevron ended on April 23, and we started the rebuild on May 1. Chris Cochran of the Nicklaus company oversaw the work, which was carried out by contractor Sanders Golf. The build wrapped on Nov.1 last year, and the course was perfect for the championship last week.”
The Nicklaus course opened in 2001, the first of Carlton Woods’s two 18s, and the bunkers were initially lined with a textile liner, but Huber says that two decades in the ground had left this practically non-existent.
“There were traces of the liner left under the bunkers, but it was in no sense a barrier, and there was no way it could be patched, so it had to be replaced,” he says. “I chose the ZLine system because it has a long lifespan and is extremely resilient – it carries a fifteen-year warranty and even if you use a mechanical rake in the bunkers you’d have a hard time tearing it – because it is very competitively priced, and because it is low visibility.
“We chose ProAngle sand from Ohio, which is a very high-performance sand, and is very white. ZLine customized the liner to match the sand color, so if by chance a small amount of liner gets exposed on the face of a bunker, there’s no way the golfer would notice, and there’s no UV degradation.“I think ZLine is flat out the best bunker liner on the market,” he adds.
“High performance sands are great, but they are extremely expensive – especially when they have to be transported a long way, which is the case for us as we simply don’t have good sands available locally – and if you are going to install them, you need to be very confident that your bunkers won’t contaminate and will keep the sand in place – you need to trust your liner.
“The bunkers were great during the tournament, and I’m confident they will continue to be great for our members.”
