Golf in Avondale

Named to the PGA President's Council on Growing the Game in 2006 for his efforts with player-development programs, teaching professional Jason Magee aims to make the sport of golf more enjoyable through private and on-course lessons. Within his instructional domain at local Phoenix golf courses, he helps players of all skill levels to hone their entire games, from drives off the tee to putting on the green. Jason also helps players with the mental aspects of the game through instructional rounds, where he shares course-management strategies and debunks the myth that placing magnets in each hole the night before will facilitate holes in one.

At Scottsdale Golf Place, X-Golf simulators immerse golfers in a realistic replication of world-famous courses using accurate video analysis, high-definition graphics, and a 5.1 channel sound system. Golfers can play a round at Pebble Beach, St. Andrews, and Spyglass without having to put up with the exorbitant expense and secret handshakes needed to enter the courses. The simulator floor tilts to create uphill, downhill, and side-hill lies to reflect the player’s ball location on the course, and two video cameras play back swings for later review. With the available video playback, the simulator doubles as a teaching mechanism for Scottsdale Golf Place’s class-A PGA instructors, who use it to review a swing’s club path, ball-launch angle, and follow-through pirouettes.

Sculpted in the foreground of the Superstition Mountains, Mountain Brook Golf Club charms golfers with a 6,620-yard course that blankets the arid desert with immaculate fairways and greens. Water hazards, crushed-marble sand traps, and desert wilderness await balls that stray from their path due to an open clubface or the desire to snuggle a cactus.

The club's 12-acre practice facility blasts bogeys off scorecards with a full-length grass-tee driving range, a putting green, and two short-game practice areas where players can rehearse greenside chips, bunker shots, and approaches from as far as 100 yards. Brand-name golf apparel and equipment populates the pro shop, which sells merchandise emblazoned with the Mountain Brook Golf Club logo for those looking to obtain a souvenir from their round without having to adopt a rambunctious tumbleweed.

Course at a Glance:

• 18-hole, par 71 course
• Length of 6,620 yards from the farthest tees
• Course rating of 69.4 from the farthest tees
• Three tee options
• Scorecard

Amid the mountainous environs that surround Stonecreek Golf Club, golf pro Doug Grey of Maple Leaf Golf Academy calls upon more than a decade of teaching experience to help players improve any facet of their game. Depending on each golfer's needs, Doug can help straighten out slices and hooks, develop proper preshot alignment, or help players decide how to handle tricky situations, such as getting out of a tough lie behind a tree or distinguishing a golf ball from that hatching thing being protected by an angry goose.

Between Chris Fry, a PGA member and specialist in the biomechanics of the full swing, and Tyler Christensen, an expert on the short game, the instructors at Expert Golf AZ have specialty expertise that covers any and all aspects of the game. The teaching duo has conducted more than 40,000 private lessons, gaining a wealth of experience harmonizing swing changes to match individual body motions and abilities.

Students can take lessons at three courses: Silverado Golf Club, McCormick Ranch Golf Club, and Flagstaff Ranch Golf Club. At each of these locales, a menu of services range from private lessons—complete with V1 Pro video analysis and Flightscope X2 launch monitoring—to on-course coaching, reserved for serious golfers who need assistance with competitive strategy or someone to bring them orange slices at the turn.

Spending a day among both mountain and desert nature preserves may seem like the kind of scenic variety available only to the most intrepid outdoorsmen, but at Lookout Mountain Golf Club, it’s all in a day at the links. The 18-hole, 6,535-yard course plots an emerald path through the rugged, scrupulously preserved Sonoran Desert terrain in an area surrounded by the red-rock faces of the Phoenix Mountain preserve and covert chupacabras training to be caddies. Though the desert looms on the perimeters of most holes, the course also boasts one water-kissed hole on the back nine.

Operated by the Pointe Hilton Tapatio Cliffs Resort, Lookout Mountain Golf Club rests alongside several first-rate dining options and spa and salon facilities. In addition, the resort’s 547 two-room suites offer modern amenities including in-room WiFi, two televisions, and hypobaric chambers for sand wedges who have their backs snapped in half during an on-course fit of rage.