The site of this year’s PGA Professional Championship, this private golf community in South Carolina’s Lowcountry is also debuting a Sports & Lifestyle Campus
No stranger to hosting championship events, Belfair boasts two acclaimed Tom Fazio-designed courses, both perennially ranked among the best residential courses in the country. For more than 12 years, this private golf community, located just off Hilton Head Island, hosted the Players Amateur, which produced winners including Rickie Fowler, Bill Haas, and Brian Harman. In 2013, Belfair was the site of the South Carolina Open. This spring, their picturesque Lowcountry setting and the millions of dollars they have invested in enhancing their courses will pay off handsomely as they host the 52nd Annual PGA Professional Championship. The world’s largest all-professional event, the Championship will be played April 28–May 1 on both the East and West courses with the final two rounds held entirely on the West course and broadcast live on Golf Channel.
“We are truly honored,” says Ken Kosak, Belfair’s general manager and COO. “We are passionate about golf. We have six retired PGA professionals that call Belfair home. To have championship competition return to Belfair is something that our members and staff are very excited about and proud of.”
Kosak says more than 560 volunteers have signed up and the event could not take place without their help and support. Luckily, the golf courses, always in stellar condition, will require very little—beyond enlarging the rough—to get tournament ready. The 312 contestants will be treated to an incredible stretch of finishing holes on the West course that run along the marsh and Colleton River.
But the PGA Professional Championship is just the start of an exciting year at Belfair. In early summer, they expect to open their Sports & Lifestyle Campus, a $7.75 million project that includes expanded fitness facilities, a new indoor pool (already open), and activity rooms for the more than 30 clubs within the club. With an emphasis on entertaining, the campus will also include a bistro equipped with an indoor/outdoor bar, an additional firepit, and a splash pad and new playground for the kids and grandkids.
Whether you’re headed to Belfair for the Championship or to check out what it would be like to be a member, you’ll enjoy arriving. You won’t find another entrance quite like the majestic Avenue of Oaks, a half-mile canopy of century-old, moss-draped live oaks that leads to the clubhouse.
