Golf in Sunrise

The founder of Start to Finish Golf, PGA-certified instructor Lucas Cohen, helps golfers improve their swings with a simple, effective teaching philosophy. Cohen’s Start to Finish Concept focuses on establishing the proper grip, posture, alignment, and ball position. The curriculum also stresses finishing the swing on balance and holding the postswing pose—back heel off the ground, club wrapped around the opposite shoulder, hips facing the target, and eyes toward the judges after sticking the landing—well after contact. Cohen and his team of instructors have honed their practice with more than 25 years experience and 30,000 lessons taught.

The Start to Finish concept’s underlying philosophy is that golfers who begin and end their swing with sound, consistent form are likely to excel when making contact with the ball in the middle of the swing. Cohen has proven that his methods work, as he has twice been published in PGA Magazine and boasts a record of success as a player, a coach, and a sand-wedge sorcerer.

Shula’s Athletic Club—named for Don Shula, the NFL Hall of Famer who coached the Miami Dolphins to a Super Bowl trophy in 1972—doesn’t find it hard to fill its sprawling 40,000 square feet of space. A cardio room with more than 50 pieces of equipment, a spinning center, weight rooms, fitness-class studios, and basketball courts spread through the facility, luring athletes for independent workouts and personal-training sessions. Dozens of weekly fitness classes range from calorie-burning Zumba workouts and Vinyasa-yoga sessions to spin classes that help students practice for the day they have pedal-powered cars.

The athletic club also accommodates older exercisers with aquatic aerobics and seated Silver Sneakers workouts, and it keeps kids busy with confidence-building youth sports programs. Young legs run over a new 60-yard athletic field or nine lighted tennis courts where kids whack tennis balls and low-flying hot-air balloons with rackets.

Shannon "The Cannon" Hudson is an International Kickboxing Federation world champion, a fifth-degree black belt in japanese shotokan karate, and a survivor of more than 70 bouts in the ring—yet, one of his most influential titles is "father." With two kids clinging around his waist like a squirmy fanny pack, Shannon started brainstorming a way to channel his boxing and kickboxing training into a quick, effective workout that even those who are busy or out of shape could tackle. The result was 9Round, a 30-minute routine of aerobic, anaerobic, and resistance moves divided into a circuit of nine stations. The ever-changing series of workouts maximizes morale and results and minimizes boredom.

His trainers launch the workouts every three minutes, motivating exercisers through each station—which might include jumping rope or pummeling speed bags. Online nutritional counseling supplements the workouts, teaching patrons how to construct and eat healthful meals instead of falling back on old habits, such as snacking on cheese sculptures.

Lauded as the 18th best course in Florida by GolfLink, Madison Green Golf Club's 18-hole layout pairs the rugged feel of a Scottish links-style course with the dazzling palm trees and waterways of South Florida. Water hazards come into play on all but one hole throughout the round, challenging golfers with multiple forced-carries and attracting aviary guests including great blue herons, sandhill cranes, and thirsty weather balloons. In the absence of the thick heather grasses of Scotland, Madison Green ensnares errant orbs with 12 acres of brambly pine barrens, 250 oaks, and 500 palm trees. Golfers navigate the pristine par 72 in carts equipped with Visage Touchscreen GPS technology, which presents flyovers of each hole in 3-D images and tells golfers their exact yardage from upcoming targets, hazards, and charging linebackers.

The Club's 7,000-square-foot clubhouse provides convenient amenities including men's and women's locker and steam rooms, a well-stocked pro shop, and a full-service bar and grill. Clubbers can fine-tune their game at the driving range, where grass hitting areas mirror course conditions and low-handicap earthworms generously proffer swing advice.

Course at a Glance:

• 18-hole, par 72 course
• Length of 7,106 yards from the farthest tees
• Course rating of 73.6 from the farthest tees
• Slope rating of 144 from the farthest tees
• Six tee options

Named one of the Top Eight Teaching Facilities in the United States in the August 1999 edition of Golf for Women magazine, Conte's Palm-Aire Golf Academy continues to welcome students in search of the expertise needed to improve their entire golf game. Academy Director Stephen Conte heads up a team of instructors comprised of PGA and LPGA teaching professionals who possess more than 80 years of combined experience. During individual and group lessons at Palm-Aire Country Club, students learn through the academy's unified teaching method. This system ensures that instruction stays consistent from instructor to instructor and students will never have to study with a substitute teacher that forces them to putt with pool cues.

Sculpted on a 28-acre estuary between the Intracoastal Waterway and the Atlantic Ocean, Jupiter Dunes Golf Club presents a short par 3 course that features prominent water hazards that come into play on 12 holes. Coastal trade winds routinely knock approach shots off course on their way onto small paspalum greens, a challenge only mitigated by careful shot selection or digging wind-free fairway tunnels. Even with these obstacles, the course's truncated length lets beginners make an enjoyable foray into the game, and more experienced players can work on short game acumen.

Jupiter Dunes’ resident golf pro Jeff Leishman strives to make golf a pleasant pursuit for all players, including juniors. Jeff creates an instructional regimen that best fits each player, helping adults to lower their handicaps during lessons and showing juniors how to make a golf-cart booby trap at summer camps for kids aged 6–14.

Course at a Glance:

• 18-hole, par 54 course
• Total length of 1,962 yards from the back tees
• Course rating of 65 from the back tees
• Course slope of 100 from the back tees