Home on the range at stunning Mount Juliet
From the warm welcome to the top-class facilities and picture perfect course, the Kilkenny estate offers the ideal environment in which every golfer can flourish
IT’S easy to fall in love with Mount Juliet and if you don’t believe us, just ask the pheasants who share the beautifully manicured grounds with all manner of wildlife from hare and deer to pine martens and the occasional golfing rabbit.
“Once the shooting season comes around from November to March, we get a lot of migrants,” explained Estate Manager Pat O’Reilly with a chuckle as we sit in the spectacular new clubhouse with his deputy Martin Lehane and former Ryder Cup captain Paul McGinley looking out on the splendour of it all.
“We like to encourage the pheasants so we put feeders for them in winter and believe me, they know where they are looked after because when the shooting season starts, they have a lot of friends around!”
Welcoming all visitors to the beauty of Mount Juliet and the joys of the game of golf is the essence of Mount Juliet, where the “Paul McGinley Golf Academy” and the accompanying practice facilities at the pristine and recently redesigned driving range, offer everyone from elite players to total beginners the perfect environment in which to flourish.
“We are really excited about what we have here,” McGinley said. “We have the Golf Academy up and running and then there’s the sheer quality of the Jack Nicklaus golf course here, which is validated by the great winners it has produced from Tiger Woods and Ernie Els to Sam Torrance, Nick Faldo and Bernhard Langer.
“When Tetrarch Capital bought Mount Juliet a few years ago, they invited me to come in to extend the Academy and re-do the driving range.
“In short, we came to raise the bar of the golf facility and we are very excited about where we are going.”
With more than €5 million invested in the entire estate over the last three years, it’s fair to say that Mount Juliet, a former Irish Open and WGC-American Express venue, is right back where it belongs in the upper echelons of great Irish golf resorts.
The Paul McGinley Golf Academy even has echoes of the driving range at Augusta National with a split fairway design offering golfers the chance to hit with real purpose rather than aimlessly bashing balls into the blue yonder.
“We’ve also introduced a Director of Golf in Matt Sandercock, who was the head assistant at Sunningdale for seven years,” McGinley explained.
“I saw how good he was and believed he should be in a senior job, so he moved here with his young family and is running the Academy and the golf shop and teaching alongside our other PGA professional Sean Cotter.
“Our next stage is to revamp the indoor facility on the range, creating swing studios where members can go in the winter and Matt will have all the bells and whistles in terms of technology, video
and Trackman. We are really excited about what we have going forward.”
The Academy attracts top young Irish players such as Robin Dawson, Mark Power, Mount Juliet’s touring professional Gavin Moynihan and another promising young Kilkenny professional in Luke Donnelly.
But the real focus is on visitors and golfers in the local community and Sandercock, who is AA PGA Professional and Trackman certified coach, is passionate about what they are trying to achieve,
“What we are trying to do is make the Academy accessible for everybody and build the youth in the area and work up from there,” he said. “We have the hotel here and the great leisure facilities.
“If you are looking for the level of coaching I offer, you can tie that in with the gym and the leisure centre, which are all right here on site. With that in mind, we’re going to start a Scholarship System to nurture all the talent in the area, offering them the best tools – the best range with the best range balls and the best facilities you could hope to enjoy.
“It’s an attractive place to come and learn, perhaps just take up an Academy membership when we launch that in January. It will cost around €250 and you will have credits on your range card and have full access to the driving range, the chipping greens and the putting greens.
“It allows you to enjoy a premium product in a part of the country where there are not many places of this standard. The arrival of Adare is great for us because it shows that it’s not all about links golf in Ireland and there are some wonderful parkland venues.”
Bedford, who coordinates the maintenance of all Tetrarch’s golf properties, believes Mount Juliet is now back to its very best and he’s looking forward to the next stage of its development.
“Since we took over in 2014 it’s gone very well and we get people from all over the country coming down for the Mount Juliet experience,” said Bedford, a veteran with more than 30 years experience in the golf course maintenance and design industry.
“We have around 440 members right now and added a layer of corporate members with the Albatross or Eagle packages who are starting to enjoy the new clubhouse and the Hunter’s Yard which now has 93 rooms and the Hound Restaurant.
“We have rescoped the Academy and the next step is the building where the fitting bays and teaching studios will be located. So we are constantly looking at ways to improve.”
With its 180-capacity ballroom now catering for intimate weddings and 498 acres of grounds lovingly tended by Estate Manager O’Reilly and his deputy, Martin Lehane, it’s all about quality and detail.
From top-level coaching and club fitting to fine dining and top of the range leisure facilities, including angling on the lakes or a stretch of the River Nore, it’s a special place for that special golfing occasion.
No stone is left unturned in the search for excellence. And no pheasant unloved.