6 Design Traits of Residential Community Golf Courses
What architects do—and don’t do—when creating residential community golf courses It’s hardly a revelation to say that golf course architects are charged with delivering attractive, compelling designs with every new course they construct. In the case of courses for residential communities, however, there are some different considerations at play. Because each development is unique, requiring […]
6 Mostly Undiscovered U.S. Golf Destinations
You might picture long-established centers like Scottsdale, Myrtle Beach, and Palm Springs when asked to think of a golf destination. They could obviously get by without it but, for most people—certainly LINKS subscribers, anyway—the golf is really what you go for. Or you might be imagining Bandon Dunes, Streamsong, and Sand Valley, built for no […]
The Oldest Course in Every State
Identifying the oldest and still operating course in each of the 50 states has all the makings of a good detective story WHAT: I thought it would be easy to identify the oldest golf course in each state. Silly me. The first step was defining what we were looking for, which is a course that […]
Nine Must-Play 9-Hole Courses
According to the National Golf Foundation, there are nearly 15,000 golf facilities in the United States, with 9-hole courses accounting for more than a quarter of that total. Yet, 9-hole courses get little love. Nobody trumpets its “Championship 9-hole course.” Still, 9-holers definitely deserve more respect. After all, the very first U.S. Open in 1895 […]
Best Public Golf in South Florida
From the outskirts of Ft. Lauderdale to Boca Raton and greater Miami, compelling rounds of public golf await across all of South Florida. Here, we spotlight six noteworthy courses to seek out the next time you visit the southernmost stretches of the Sunshine State. Osprey Point Golf Club (Boca Raton) While it might be difficult […]
Ireland’s Best Golf Hotels
The Emerald Isle is home to dozens of drool-worthy golf courses. From one end of Ireland to the other (and for this story, I’m including Northern Ireland), the golf opportunities on offer are simply world-class. And when you’ve finished with your golf for the day, Ireland’s devotion to good times—its legendary craic—makes your evenings as […]
America’s Top 10 Munis
The chief requirement for making this list is that the golf course must be owned by a municipality. We’re judging here on the quality of the design, test of golf, scenic appeal, and tournament lore. For best-value munis? We’ll leave that for another time. Here then are the 10 best municipal courses in the U.S. […]
12 of Golf’s Scariest Watery Graves
Whether you call them water hazards or penalty areas, golf’s lakes, rivers, streams, and oceans often become final resting places for our errant shots. You can recover from deep rough or a bunker. But there’s no coming back from a water hazard unless it’s a very shallow one and you’re feeling especially courageous. Here’s a […]
Pete Dye’s 9 Scariest Holes
Tiger Woods once asked me, “Has anybody ever built harder courses than Pete Dye?” I replied, “Nobody has ever built courses that are more visually intimidating than Pete Dye.” Tiger shot back, “Exactly.” Indeed, Dye himself stated, “My overall philosophy is to make the hole appear more difficult than it really is.” In reality, Pete […]
10 Great 18-hole Courses on Fewer Than 100 Acres
In January 1930, just 14 weeks after the Wall Street crash and the catastrophic collapse of the U.S. stock market, course architect Alister MacKenzie set sail from Hoboken, N.J., bound for Buenos Aires. During a roughly eight-week stay in South America, the Scotsman designed, or suggested improvements to, at least six courses in Argentina (including […]
