Manassas, VA Outdoor Activities

Course designer Tom Clark of Ault, Clark, & Associates earned Pleasant Valley Golf Club a 4.5-star rating from Golf Digest, whose editors applauded the architect’s creativity in the site’s rolling hills and dense hardwood forest. Clark’s 18-hole brainchild allows players to tee up from one of four tee boxes and test their mettle against the par 72 course, taking care to avoid the water in play on six holes and the grassy meadows that lie outside the fairway borders. Players can bookend their round with a warm-up session on the range and a cooldown at the grill, helped along by a club sandwich, a Gatorade, or a glass of ice water dumped on an overused foot wedge.

Course at a Glance:

• 18-hole, par 72 course
• Total length of 6,915 yards from the back tees
• Course rating of 73.5 from the back tees
• Course slope of 137 from the back tees
• Four sets of tees per hole
• Scorecard

Every year, the NCAA men's basketball tournament is a three-week saga of single-elimination suspense, where athletic juggernauts must fight for their records and overlooked programs have the chance to shine. In 2006, the George Mason Patriots penned their own March Madness Cinderella story by unseating powerhouses Michigan State, North Carolina, and Connecticut to become the lowest seed ever to advance to the Final Four. The Patriots' historic run left fans gasping for air and basketballs everywhere reaching for the nearest pump before the team finally bowed out to the eventual champions, Florida, in the national semifinal.

Though the Patriots' Final Four berth garnered tremendous national attention, George Mason's athletic prowess extends beyond the basketball court. In their proud history, the Patriots have won NCAA championships in multiple sports, including men's indoor track and field and women's soccer.

Sculpted into the rolling hills of Northern Virginia and designed by prolific course architect Dan Maples, South Riding Golf Club’s course plots a challenging path through mature timbers and glassy waters. A fleet of golf carts equipped with GPS technology helps players navigate the 7,148-yard chain of fairways by giving them the distance to upcoming hazards, greens, and blitzing linebackers emerging from the rough. Streams and ponds ripple throughout the course, including on the par-3 13th hole, where golfers are faced with a forced carry over a pond situated between tee and green. The club’s grass-tee driving range, short-game area, practice bunker, and putting green allow players to nurture their relationship with their putter, wedges, irons, woods, or modified soup ladles. When not conquering the course, duffers can take advantage of South Riding's modern clubhouse, fully stocked pro shop, and staff of golf instructors.

Course at a Glance:

• Designed by Dan Maples
• 18-hole, par-72 course
• Length of 7,148 yards from the farthest tees
• Course rating of 74.8 from the farthest tees
• Slope rating of 140 from the farthest tees
• Five tee options (including blended tee layout)

In 2002, Mike Southard took a leap of faith worthy of The Dukes of Hazzard. He left a career in the elevator industry and decided to pursue his true passion: stock-car driving. Southard launched Try It Racing and On Track Racing Experience, determined to share with others the thrill he had felt many times in the victory lane of late-model stock-car races. His business has grown from a few humble events and clients each year to a fully packed schedule at some of the country's longest running and most renowned racetracks. Some things haven't changed, however—you can still find Southard behind the wheel of the two-seat ride-along car, taking patrons around curves and straightaways at top speed.

Adrenaline fiends satisfy their cravings while driving or riding around tracks such as Orange County Speedway, where industry legends Jeff Gordon and Scott Riggs have burned their share of rubber. A professional photographer and in-car video cameras can capture the excitement at each event, memorializing guests' wide-open eyes, exhilarated smiles, and high-intensity games of I Spy.

Since 1973, skaters have been sailing effortlessly across Fairfax Ice Arena’s spacious, icy surface during public skate sessions, figure skating–lessons, and hockey leagues for all ages. At the family-owned arena, a staff of dedicated skating coaches guides students while calling upon experience from the St. Petersburg State Ballet on Ice, Disney on Ice, and the lesser-known On Golden Pond on Ice. The arena is open throughout the year, hosting a full hockey and figure skating–pro shop in addition to its Arena Café.

Course architect Gary Player remarked that Raspberry Plain, once an 18th-century plantation, “was made for a golf course.” Inspired by this ideal setting, he dreamed up the links-style course at Raspberry Falls Golf & Hunt Club, whose meandering brooks, stone walls, and stacked-sod bunkers evoke Scotland, while its vista of the Catoctin Mountains remind players they’re in Virginia. Farther south, Augustine Golf Club's award-winning course rivals Raspberry Falls’ natural beauty with its distinctive par 4s sculpted by Rick Jacobson. Although the greens at Augustine declined for a few years, recent renovations have restored the course to its former glory, once again luring golfers to its babbling streams and forest.

These golf havens have more than picturesque views in common—they are two of six award-winning courses united by Raspberry Golf Management’s portfolio, which stretches from Virginia to Pennsylvania and skips over to Arizona. Gary Player’s design team for Raspberry Falls included Tim Freeland, who went on to design two of the firm’s other courses: Royal Manchester Golf Links, whose bentgrass fairways sidle up to the Susquehanna River, and Old Hickory Golf Club, a parkland-style course crisscrossed by Beaver Creek. The management company's other gems include The Legacy Golf Resort, where cowboys used to ride their rocking horses around a 7,500-acre ranch, and Bull Run Golf Club, which sprawls across more than 450 acres of meadows and woodlands at the foot of the Bull Run Mountains.