Montreal winters are not kind to golf handicaps.
Just ask Bertrand Quentin. By the time October rolls around, he’s usually battled his way into single-digit territory. Then winter hits, courses close, and six months later he’s starting over.
“It’s a cycle,” Quentin told GOLF by email. “I’ll fight my way down to a single-digit handicap by October, only to wake up as a 12-handicap when the season finally opens in May. That six-month layoff is a real momentum killer.”
For golfers in cold climates, the options are familiar: install a simulator, book a winter golf trip, or simply wait it out. Quentin chose a more radical path.
His solution is called Megalodome Golf — a massive indoor golf complex unlike anything currently in existence. Plans call for it to open outside Chicago in late 2027.
The concept went viral this week after images and details began circulating on social media. The renderings looked futuristic: a sprawling, Arizona-style golf environment complete with palm trees, cacti, water features and sandy waste areas — all under a series of interconnected domes. The site is in Oswego, about an hour west of downtown Chicago, though Quentin said he can’t yet disclose the exact location.
Despite the name, Megalodome has nothing to do with prehistoric sharks. It’s about scale.
Indoor golf, of course, isn’t new. Facilities like the SoFi Center in Florida, home of the TGL league backed by Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy, have pushed the concept forward through simulator-based competition. But Quentin insists Megalodome is fundamentally different.
“Put simply, there is nothing else like this in the world,” he said.
The plan features four massive domes. Three will house a nine-hole executive course — six par-3s and three par-4s, playing to a par of 30 — designed by Montreal-based Huxham Golf Design. The course will be built on artificial turf engineered to bounce, roll and react like real grass. A fourth dome will be dedicated to a full practice facility.
The scale is hard to miss. The practice area will include a short-game complex and 50 hitting stalls, with a range stretching more than 275 yards. A clubhouse will sit between the course and practice facility, offering sightlines Quentin said will extend roughly 900 feet in each direction.
“The scale is truly unprecedented,” Quentin said.
Quentin, a 65-year-old forest engineer, traces the idea back seven years, when a friend first planted the seed. What followed, he said, has been an “intense journey” from concept to concrete planning.
Ambitious ideas require ambitious funding. Quentin said he and his partner, Alain Desrochers, are preparing to launch a $50 million investment fund and are already in advanced discussions with major financial groups. He believes the project is on track to meet its 2027 opening target.
Chicago was a deliberate choice. It’s a massive golf market with a long offseason — exactly the problem Megalodome is designed to solve. And if the first location succeeds, Quentin sees no reason it couldn’t expand to other cold-weather cities.
For now, though, the focus remains on bringing a slice of desert golf to the Midwest — inspired by a style of golf Quentin knows mostly by reputation.
“I would like to play there,” he said of Arizona, “but it’s very expensive, I’ve heard.”
