Michael Benkusky

Profile

Michael Benkusky was an associate design for Lohmann Golf Designs when the company landed the private Canyata Golf Club project in Marshall, Illinois. It was Benkusky who oversaw most of the design and shaping work at Canyata, and at some point during or shortly after the assignment, he established his own design company Michael J. Benkusky, Inc, which gets the credit for the work done at Canyata.

Canyata appeared from nowhere onto the 2009 Top 100 rankings of America's best courses by Golf Digest, so interest has presumably spiked in Benkusky's work.

Truthfully, Canyata is a moderately interesting golf course that is both over-shaped and a little repetitive. The site is attractive enough and the course is maintained in mint condition, and the design team did well to hide all the cart paths. The client also created a special sense of exclusivity inside the grounds, but this isn't really one of America's elite courses.

It will be worth watching Michael Benkusky in coming years to see whether he gets much work out of the acclaim for Canyata.

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