The Beauty of Plan B

“I don’t know, I just like penguins.”  We were pressing Alex Lenz for an answer. In 2022, when he was 8 years old, Lenz won a contest held by the owner of a new golf course called Old Barnwell. In addition to 18 holes in the rolling hills of Aiken, South Carolina, Nick Schreiber and his team were developing a course for kids. For the final hole, they asked a group of them to submit their own hand-drawn designs, and Lenz emerged victorious on the strength of his penguin-shaped bunker and a grass ramp that launched tee balls onto a green. Now, nearly four years later, the Kids’ Course at Old Barnwell is an essential ingredient in one of the game’s most talked-about clubs, and we’d brought cameras and microphones to interview Alex about it—specifically, the penguins.

“When I was thinking of the bunkers, I thought of a penguin,” Alex, now nearly 12, deadpanned with typical preteen insouciance. “Then I just made a penguin, I guess.” Whatever high hopes we had for our big sit-down with Alex deflated with every short answer. In the end, when the cameras clicked off, we had a good laugh with him and his father, Jeff, about it. There are few ironclad rules in dealing with kids, but one is to be ready for anything. At some point, there will be a situation where your child will set fire to whatever expectations you had. (Sometimes literally.) But every parent, including Schreiber, also finds out that these moments can produce some of life’s greatest joys—because when the smoke clears, what’s left can be more meaningful than we even imagined.

Schreiber’s father didn’t grow up with much, but he built an extremely successful real estate business. He and his wife settled in the northern suburbs of Chicago, had eight children and, despite not needing the money, expected every one of them to get a summer job. And so, when he turned 13, young Nick pointed his bike in the direction of the Old Elm Club. He picked up his first loop and fell instantly, forever in love. It was the classic caddie experience: He couldn’t get enough of the game, and he absorbed bigger life lessons about accountability, communication and how to interact with powerful people. He is still fond of saying it was the best job he’s ever had.

The gig he found as an adult was in HR software, and while it was a lucrative one, something was wrong. Upon selling the company he co-founded, Schreiber checked himself into a rehabilitation program.

“I had a substance-abuse problem that I hid for a long time,” he says. “So, I had to go get myself right.”

When he emerged, Schreiber was in his mid-30s and didn’t know what to do next. But he kept returning to his time as a caddie. He and his wife decided that whatever he did, it would be in golf. And in order for him to remain happy and engaged, the project had to have some kind of mission, some kind of impact on the community. Meanwhile, their 11-month-old son was quickly teaching them that flexibility would be key—because plans will change.

So, despite initially dreaming about a public course near where he lived in Charleston, South Carolina, Schreiber and his wife kept having to reshape their vision. Land costs forced them to abandon the full public course idea. Then they considered a par-3 version, but Schreiber said something that size wouldn’t have delivered the “economy of scale” they wanted for their mission.

Eventually, they hit on the idea of an “inclusive private club.” Schreiber will be the first to admit that sounds like an oxymoron, but it aligned perfectly with their goals. A private course would give them the option to essentially use it as they saw fit, whether for fundraising events or community days. Beyond that, a committed national membership could provide the financial wherewithal to think big. A new dream began to take shape: Build a private golf club worthy of the great courses Schreiber had the fortune of playing, while keeping the member costs relatively low in exchange for participation in the club’s philanthropic activities.

“The mission at Old Barnwell is pretty simple,” Schreiber says. “Bring people together through golf by being more inclusive. And not just women or people of color. We mean beginners and families, too.”

It all sounded great, but then things got real: None of this would work without a site that had potential for incredible golf, and designers who could realize it. Schreiber’s passion for the game over the years got him deeply interested in course architecture, and he already knew who he wanted to work with. Being the nontraditionalist he is, the names weren’t the standard fare.

He messaged Blake Conant, an associate at Tom Doak’s Renaissance Golf who made his name working on Medinah’s No. 1 course, Bel-Air and Pinehurst No. 10, among many others. Conant informed Schreiber that another one of his targets—Brian Schneider, who has worked with Doak for more than 20 years and was the lead associate on jobs including Barnbougle Dunes, the Lido and Dismal River—lived in the Charleston area. Within 18 months, the three of them began having informal conversations about what kind of land would suit the club best, which turned into Schreiber visiting sites and reporting back to Conant and Schneider, which led them to a 575-acre parcel in Aiken. Schreiber had his doubts, but Conant and Schneider immediately saw something special. Off they went. Sort of. Once again, grand plans took a turn.

“In my mind, there was an 18-hole golf course and a second, shorter course that [Conant and Schneider] referred to as a ‘holiday’ course that would be more like 6,500 yards or 6,200 yards, maybe par 68,” Schreiber says. “That was always how I saw it going. Then they brought up the idea of a kids’ course.”

From the start on the main course, Schreiber had encouraged his team to challenge design norms. He would be as hands-off as possible while they experimented with drawing from a wide variety of influences ranging from the traditions of National Golf Links of America to the roller-coaster ride of Pinehurst No. 10. When the course opened in fall 2023, the result was near-universal praise. Golf Club Atlas raved that it was “a captivating, new expression in the world of golf architecture.” Today, Old Barnwell is rapidly moving up nearly every major ranking system. 

Go record a score somewhere else. The Kids’ Course is 15 holes of Willy Wonka-esque whimsy, where pint-size players are nearly as likely as golf balls to roll up and down the hills.

Conant and Schneider envisioned the adjacent Kids’ Course to be a more creative extension of the main one. The strip of land they plotted out was ideal, but, more importantly, they thought the course fit perfectly into the mission-based ethos of the club. Schreiber said the idea “clicked immediately.” It was a nod to places like the Children’s Course at North Berwick Golf Club in Scotland, which Schreiber always loved. More practically, it would be the place where Old Barnwell could host local First Tee kids, Youth on Course events and whatever else they dreamed up.

Conant and Schneider set to work. But they didn’t interpret Kids’ as something simple and flat for beginners. To them, it meant letting their imaginations run loose like a child’s: wild humps and bumps that could have come from a cartoon monster’s back; steep berms more fitting for a toy race car; winding greens reminiscent of the slides in the board game Chutes & Ladders; an actual tunnel leading into a green, like some kind of putt-putt hole magically enlarged.

“At one point, Blake sent me a Craigslist listing for a grain silo that was not too far down the road,” Schreiber says with a laugh. “And he said, ‘You should buy this.’ Apparently, he wanted to put a green inside of it. They had some pretty wild ideas going on.”

Then, their cherry on the ice-cream sundae: a design contest for the final hole. Schneider was putting the finishing touches on the re-creation of the Lido, a fabled C.B. Macdonald creation that was lost to history in its original location in New York and brought to life in Wisconsin as part of the Sand Valley complex. The original Lido’s 18th hole was based on a now-legendary hole-design competition in 1914 run by Country Life magazine. It was won by an enterprising young architect named Dr. Alister MacKenzie, and the acclaim launched his career. Schneider and Conant thought their version of the contest would be an Old Barnwell twist on a classic golf story. Schreiber loved it and reached out to club members for submissions. But, once again, he had no idea what was coming next.

“I thought that maybe they would incorporate parts of a design,” Schreiber says. “There was no way they would actually build an entire hole. So when they chose Alex’s submission, I was like, ‘That’s really cute. I’m sure he’s excited about it, and maybe they’ll do something with that ramp.’ I definitely never expected the penguin bunker.”

The power of golf: No matter where his life takes him, Alex Lenz can always say that he had a hand in designing one of the most memorable holes at an incredible club.

In fact, Conant and Schneider loved the penguin bunker so much that they added a second one when they built the hole. They also invited Alex and his dad out to the job site so they could see the penguins come to life and how a misplaced tee shot right or left off the ramp would land in the belly of a flightless bird.

The finished product is 15 holes and 2,190 yards of Willy Wonka–esque fantasy. Schreiber loved it but worried that the whole experience might be too hard for beginners and too tricked-up for his diehard members. He took his two young sons out for a look and learned another lesson about kids, expectations and accidental joy.

“Neither of them were old enough to golf, or super into the game,” he says. “But I immediately gained a new appreciation for all the hills [Conant and Schneider] built, because my kids loved rolling down them. And I’m not even joking—I thought, ‘If rolling down those hills is the hook to get them closer to golf, then this is a win.’”

When Schreiber put clubs in their hands, the boys got the biggest thrill out of banging balls up the side of the first green and watching how fast they would come back down the hill.

“They weren’t even putting toward the hole, but they didn’t care,” Schreiber says with the “my kids are ridiculous, but they are so damn cute” laugh that every parent knows well. “And that opened my eyes.”

It inspired Schreiber to lean even further into the full childhood experience, and he brought in what has to be the most extensive course-adjacent tree house in golf history. It’s a good bet that even the most hardened adults playing the final three holes of the Kids’ Course look into the trees on the left and think about giving those three platforms and what Schreiber says are 85 feet of suspension bridges a try.

“I think it was my son Henry who said it would be cool to have a park here,” Schreiber says. “And we thought it was a great way to go above and beyond, and make the kids who come out here even more comfortable.”

The final touch? A scorecard that encourages players to use face emojis for how they felt they did on the hole—Meh, Better, Best!—rather than numbers based on par.

Schreiber says some members have turned their noses up at the whole thing. No official scores, no posting to GHIN, green complexes that are more Six Flags than standard. But some of the club’s better players have realized that the course offers myriad chances to be creative and work on shots they can’t practice anywhere else.

Ever focused on its mission, Old Barnwell has partnered with the ANNIKA Foundation and now provides access to that program’s five aspiring female professionals. Schreiber says those young ladies spend just as much time, if not more, on the Kids’ Course as the big one. They love the vibe, but, more importantly, they rave about how it helps their short games.

Youth on Course kids are there on Wednesdays and Sundays, and First Tee of Aiken players get the course on Tuesdays and Saturdays. Sometimes there’s a birthday party. Young caddies can always be seen on property through Old Barnwell’s partnership with the Evans Scholars program. Schreiber will be the first to say there is much more work to be done, and that this was never even close to the path he’d envisioned toget there, but the Kids’ Course is well on its way to becoming more meaningful than
he ever expected.

Even for kids like Alex Lenz, who right now might be too cool for a boring game like golf. Late in the interview, we asked what he hopes people feel when they launch their ball off his ramp, over his penguin bunkers. “I don’t know,” he said, smile faintly curling as he looked away. “Happy and stuff.”