When Hurricane Helene swept through the French Broad River corridor in September 2024, Broadmoor Golf Links in Fletcher didn’t just flood: It drowned under roughly 20 feet of water. The storm completely destroyed the original Karl Litten layout, burying the greens, uprooting trees, and stripping the fairways down to nothing.
The rebuild wasn’t simply a restoration; the course was redesigned in several areas to better coexist with the floodplain. Led by Zeke Cooper of DreamCatcher Hotels (who operate the course) and the principals at Carlton Marshall Golf Design, the turf selections, drainage engineering, and green complexes were all reconsidered from the ground up. Broadmoor became one of the most ambitious golf course rebuilds in recent WNC memory and GolfPass has identified it as one of 2026’s most notable course renovations. The result is a course that plays differently than it did before Helene, with new contouring and updated infrastructure throughout. The renovated routing features wider landing corridors, strategic bunkering, new bentgrass green complexes, and three entirely reimagined holes.
Holes 10, 11, and 12 — now nicknamed “Cooper’s Corner” — were the most dramatically transformed part of the post-Helene redesign. Before the storm, this trio was widely considered the weakest stretch on the course. These were a pair of unremarkable par 4s in 10 and 11 (playing roughly 330 and 390 yards from the tips, respectively) followed by what Golf Crusade called a certified design disaster: The par-5 12th hole with two twisting doglegs that often forced a layup off the tee to an unremarkable 175-yard landing area. The hole was bordered by Cane Creek, largely a non-factor as it lurked along the left side for much of the hole, completely obscured by a dense tree canopy.
When Helene stripped away those trees, Cooper saw an opportunity. He proposed reversing the routing of the loop by swapping the old 11th green and 12th tee locations. The result is three genuinely distinctive holes: The 10th is now a risk/reward par 5 with a crossing tee shot over the lake, with Cane Creek fully visible. The 11th is a 376-yard par 4 playing backwards through the same corridor with the creek now exposed on the approach; the new green for the 11th was formerly the 10th green. And, finally, the 12th has evolved into a short par 3 playing straight across the lake to the old 12th green; it is now rated as the second-hardest hole on the course despite its modest length. The redesign dropped the back nine to a par 35, and the USGA has officially re-rated the course at par 71 with a new rating of 71.0 and slope of 129 from the tips.
The updated practice facility is a major upgrade — a massive modern hitting structure anchors a fully expanded short game area. If you’re a Broadmoor regular or have always wanted to play it, now is your chance to be among the first to tackle the new layout. Arrive with fresh eyes as the new routing and other changes make prior course knowledge unreliable.
Read more about the restoration of Broadmoor and other courses in Asheville on the comeback trail.
At the turn…
Local roots — Western Carolina University graduate J. T. Poston won the Memorial Tournament at Muirfield Village Golf Club in Ohio this past weekend. The Hickory, NC native has found professional success after his time competing for the Catamounts, where he won six times with two consecutive Southern Conference titles.
Exclusive brews — Looking for some refreshment after a round at Broadmoor? Head over to Sierra Nevada’s Mills River Taproom where they offer exclusive brews on tap, a beer garden, amphitheater, and a food menu that showcases local farmers and food artisans. Open daily with free music on weekends.
Blind uphill approaches: Why your club selection matters.
Many golfers who are new to WNC misplay uphill blind approaches for the same reason: They pick the club for the yardage on the card, not the yardage they’re actually hitting — and they aim at a flagstick they cannot see.
On a steep uphill hole — and WNC has plenty of them — you’re solving two problems at once before you even take the club back. The first is that you cannot see the full green, which means you cannot accurately read the flag position, you cannot see how the ball will feed to the hole, and you have limited visual feedback to help you calibrate. You are essentially firing at a number. The second is how the incline subtracts distance from every club in your bag, and it does so more aggressively than most golfers expect. Both forces are working against you simultaneously.
For every 10 yards of net elevation gain to a green in the mountains, add approximately one club of effective distance on severe uphill approaches. Effective distance is the flat-ground equivalent your shot needs to travel to reach the same target, adjusting for elevation change. An elevated green that measures 150 yards might need to play like 165 yards or more once you account for the rise. That adjusted figure is your effective distance, and it is the number you should use for your club selection, not the yardage on the GPS. At Black Mountain Golf Course in Black Mountain, the uphill par-3 8th measuring 165 yards reinforces proper club selection: A stock 165-yard shot will inevitably find the bunker protecting the front of the green. (Editor’s note: The front nine at Black Mountain Golf Course remains closed for repairs to damage suffered during Helene. It is expected to reopen in 2027.)
On a blind uphill approach, the temptation to under-club is compounded by the fact that you cannot see the result until you reach the green. There is no visual anchor pulling you toward a longer club; you are often looking at the crest of the slope or the front of the green. Local WNC golfers have learned this the hard way: They have climbed the hill after a seemingly solid strike only to find the ball has come up short or rolled back down the face of the approach. Visitors make that discovery more often, because they have not yet built the muscle memory that says take more club than feels right.
Residents of WNC have already tuned themselves to play at altitude — the extra carry has likely already been factored into their yardages and club selection. But if you are visiting from the flatlands or the coast, you will notice that at elevation you pick up roughly one additional club of carry for every 3,000 feet above sea level. And you will have less experience committing to a shot at a green you cannot see. So on a blind uphill mountain hole, you are making two separate club adjustments — one for the thinner air and one for the elevation gain — and you are doing both without a visual anchor to confirm the call.
There are three ways this plays out on WNC courses:
The yardage will lie to you — A yardage marker reading 160 yards uphill to a blind green at 4,000 feet elevation is not a 160-yard shot. The incline alone can add 15–20 yards of effective distance. Club up aggressively.
Short misses sting worse — On blind uphill greens, the false front or bank below the putting surface will reject underpowered shots back down the hill. A short miss at Champion Hills in Hendersonville might roll 30 yards off the green. There is rarely such a penalty for being one or two clubs too strong since most of the trouble into uphill greens will be found in the front.
Trust the effective distance, not your ego — The instinct to grip down on a longer club and steer the shot uphill is almost always wrong. Take the full club for the corrected effective distance and make your normal swing.
The hardest part of this shot is not the math. It is committing to a club that feels like it might be too much. Every instinct tells you to grip down, to steer, to protect against going long — but the uphill mountain green almost never punishes the long miss as severely as it penalizes the short one. When in doubt on a blind uphill approach, the adjustments for elevation gain instruct you to take the full club for the corrected effective distance and make your normal swing. Trust the math, take the extra club, and commit to the shot.
