The month of April was a little more challenging to the golf course construction crew. While we have still been very blessed with the amount of progress made year to date, we did encounter 8 lost workdays and over 9" of moisture in the past month. Here is a recap of what we have accomplished during ...

The history defies logic. How could so many epic golf courses originate in such a short span of time? Pine Valley, Pebble Beach. Cypress Point, Shinnecock Hills, Augusta National, Fishers Island, Los Angeles Country Club, Riviera, Winged Foot, Seminole, Crystal Downs, Cal Club, Shoreacres, San Franc...

The last week of March brought our first "weather days" of the spring 2024 season. The Sioux Falls area received some much-needed moisture around the Easter Holiday Weekend and a couple days off were needed to dry out the site. During this two week period, the focus of work included: Mass Earthwork/...

Just 60 days after turning the dozers off for winter, the crew from Soukup Construction was back at it on February 26th. Yes you read that right. February 26th. In South Dakota. The frost is out of the ground and the temperatures have been consistently mild. The team has been able to work unimpeded ...

Every great golf journey has its signature scenes. The moments in a four-hour round that prompt deep breaths, wide smiles and photos. Mapletøn Golf Club's prime views will be a great surprise to members, but one of the best spots — spoiler alert — is right where you start. From the back of the clubh...

The call came in October 2022. Trent Bruce didn't know the topic of Danny Amundson's meeting request, but he had a hunch. A decade earlier, the DGR engineer had lived next door to Amundson. He knew Amundson as a golf fanatic and a visionary. Now Amundson wanted DGR Engineering's help to execute a pl...

Sioux Falls' first new private golf club in more than 60 years is being planned on the northeast side of town just outside the city limits. Mapleton Golf Club would encompass 210 acres northeast of interstates 229 and 90, across from the South Dakota Veterans Cemetery and along Slip Up Creek.&n...

If might seem like golf course architect Scott Hoffman came out of nowhere with his design at Lost Rail, opened in 2022 outside of Omaha. However, he'd previously worked for over a decade with Tom Fazio, designing courses in the western U.S. He then worked with Tim Jackson and David Kahn for a numbe...

Lost Rail, a private, stand-alone golf club near Omaha, earned second-place honors in Golf Digest's 2023 Best New Private Course awards. It's a remarkable property of uplands and ravines, prairies and clusters of hardwoods. A namesake abandoned railroad line cuts through a deep gully in one corner o...

"The fourth largest country in the world by area and the third most populous, the United States of America comprises the forty-eight contiguous states between Canada and Mexico, along with Alaska in the north west corner of the continent and the island state of Hawaii in the Pacific Ocean, which bec...

On October 30th, 2023 the first dozer was unloaded at sunrise and work commenced at the 10th green. The beginning of construction was the culmination of fifteen months of intense planning and coordination along with the genuine excitement and support of the local community. The same afternoon, despi...

Lucas Schroder calls it a "sickness." Building a golf course from scratch may feel like a two-year marathon, but once you complete the mission? Once you finish that 10,000 piece jigsaw puzzle? You can't wait to do it again. Schroder, a general superintendent for Landscapes Unlimited's world-class co...

A simple gravestone in Woodlawn Cemetery marks an extraordinary life. Ralph J. Scoular lived 95 years and nine months — 1925-2020. The left side of the rectangular stone illustrates his World War II service in the US Army Air Corps. The right side shows a Sioux Falls project to which he contributed ...

Tom Jansa knows the local golf landscape like his own family tree. The executive director of the South Dakota Golf Association has done it all: Managed golf courses. Designed and built courses. Coached golf teams and standouts. He's a steward of the sport. Recently Jansa visited the state's top dest...

Five miles from downtown Sioux Falls, on the bank of Slip Up Creek, a cow pasture eases out of winter. Snowdrifts melt into dormant native grass. Deer hurdle barbed-wire fences. Birds shriek from towering cottonwoods. Near a ramshackle farmhouse, 50 years abandoned, a landmark stands tall. A silo. T...