The KPMG Women’s PGA Championship venue is drawing mixed reviews. 

The year’s third major championship is being contested at Fields Ranch East at PGA Frisco, a 6,604-yard par-72 just outside of Dallas, Texas. It’s a new $50 million facility built by the PGA of America at its headquarters, with the intention of staging many future majors, including the men’s 2027 PGA Championship (it also hosted the 2023 Senior PGA Championship). 

This week, however, some rounds are taking over six hours in brutal conditions—and former world No. 1 Stacy Lewis criticized the setup to Golfweek. 

“Today it was just hole locations again, on sides of hills,” said Lewis, who missed the cut. “Then you throw the wind in there, there was no way to stop it on No. 8 again today. We should be playing the front of that tee, probably 120 yards … can’t hold the green.”  

Only 25% of the field has hit the green on that hole, which has seen groups wait nearly 25 minutes on the tee box. 

“I was trying to go long and right of that pin,” U.S. Women’s Open champion Maja Stark said after Round 2, “but it was howling right to left, and you don’t want to get stuck in the bunkers because they’re so deep. So I was kind of—I knew that I was going to end up in that place. That’s just major golf. 

“It’s very annoying when it’s like that, but it's just the mindset switch you need to have.”

The second-round scoring average was 76.012, one of the highest ever for a major in the last decade. 

Regardless of its difficulty, some players aren’t a fan of the layout. 

“This golf course is quite boring,” Angel Yin said after the first round. 

Why is that?

“It’s just kind of repetitive,” Yin said, “and there are challenges, but it’s very subtle. The back nine gets really repetitive on the tee. Yeah, I mean, not something that’s controversial. I was like shocked. Did I say something that’s going to drop the ball? Maybe (course designer) Gil [Hanse] will give me a call.”

Maintaining focus during a long round on a gruelling course is not easy, but for a major championship, that’s expected. And some groups, like Lexi Thompson’s, were put on the clock on Friday, adding another challenge to an already difficult test. 

“It happens,” said Thompson, who is four strokes off the 6-under lead entering Round 3. “I mean, we fell maybe a hole behind. I didn’t think that we were playing—I mean, we were playing slow. It took three hours to play the front nine. But it’s a difficult golf course. Pins are tough, and some holes are just really par holes that you can't really hold greens, and some holes you have to pitch out. So it’s a difficult golf course to play quickly, safe to say.”

Not everyone, though, is lambasting the setup. 

“I think you can be rewarded for good shots,” Madelen Sagstrom told Golfweek. “You definitely get punished for bad shots, so that’s good. It’s in beautiful condition.”

It seems that opinion strays from the masses, though. 

“We had such a good run with this championship at very good golf courses and then we come here,” Lewis said. “The issue of this all too is, make us look good. We’re trying to get more people to watch women’s golf, and to watch us play golf, and setups like this, they don’t help us.

“And this is when we have our biggest stages, network TV and all of that, and we’re making very good players look silly.”

With the Women’s PGA set to return to Frisco in 2031, there’s plenty of time to implement changes, if the PGA of America wishes.

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This article was originally published on www.si.com as 'Boring' KPMG Women's PGA Championship Course Generating Mixed Reviews .

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