Beau Welling: Person of Interest

Beau Welling

For years, the unofficial title of “golf’s most interesting man” has belonged to Miguel Angel Jimenez. But let us make the case for Beau Welling. Consider the course designer’s extensive range of interests and accomplishments. He is a great fan of the arts and sits on the board of the Carolina Ballet Theatre. During the […]

Classic Course: Quaker Ridge

With its gently rolling terrain, stately trees, and intimate playing environment, Quaker Ridge epitomizes Westchester County parkland golf. The course’s routing is Muirfield-esque—the holes of the front nine run counter-clockwise around the club’s perimeter, embracing the clockwise homeward nine—allowing for a highly satisfying exploration of the property. Jimmy Demaret once said that Quaker Ridge could […]

Coore & Crenshaw’s 5 Best Public Golf Courses

At Trinity Forest Golf Club, just nine miles southeast of downtown Dallas and venue for the AT&T Byron Nelson Classic, PGA Tour players got a dose of Golden Age-style course architecture. Used to more predictable, formulaic designs where stock shots and a fixed method get the job done, competitors were asked to think about lines, […]

Fifth Time’s the Charm at Shinnecock Hills

By Jeff Silverman   When the latest edition of the U.S. Open rolls across the fields of Shinnecock Hills in June, canny assessors of architectural handicraft should notice a variety of amendments since the USGA last brought its carnival to town in 2004. You remember 2004: That was the year the fairways were about as […]

Shinnecock Hills U.S. Open Preview

By Adam Schupak   SOUTHAMPTON, N.Y. — As soon as the great, rambling white-and-brown gabled structure that is Shinnecock Hills Golf Club pops into view, hearts pump for golfers as if on a first date with a beautiful woman. Golf’s original clubhouse, a Stanford White design, dominates the surrounding landscape on the south shore of […]

Playing Shinnecock Before the U.S. Open

By Ian Critser   Through a welcome twist of fate, I recently found myself sitting on the porch at Shinnecock Hills after walking 27 holes, a mere month before the 2018 U.S. Open. Driving up Tuckahoe Road, the iconic Stanford White clubhouse dramatically reveals itself as you crest a hill. Stepping inside, it feels as […]

Short and Sweet: 9-Hole, Par 3, and Short Courses are the Future

short courses

Nine-holers, Par-3s, and other abbreviated courses are all the rage–and could be the secret to reviving golf Former U.S. Open champion Geoff Ogilvy missed the cut at the 2009 British Open, but that didn’t prevent him from making lasting memories that week. Each day, after practice and following his first two rounds at the Ailsa […]

First Peek: Stoatin Brae

By Graylyn Loomis The newest course at a Michigan resort is a coming-out party for a team of up-and-coming designers When Jon Scott, owner of Gull Lake View Resort in Augusta, Mich., wanted to add a sixth golf course to his family’s property, he turned to Tom Doak, who lives about three hours north in […]

Classic Course: Somerset Hills Country Club

By Tom Ierubino   Hidden away in Bernardsville, N.J., seven miles from the USGA’s headquarters in Far Hills, Somerset Hills is a place where time seems to stand still—but in a good way. There are no cart paths, and most of the golfers walk. The understated clubhouse is more about utility than grandeur. The same […]

The Essential: Tom Doak

Growing up in suburban Connecticut, Tom Doak would accompany his father on business trips to places like Pebble Beach and Harbour Town, where he caught the golf bug. He later traveled extensively throughout the British Isles on a Cornell University post-graduate scholarship, paying particularly close attention to the Old Course at St. Andrews, studying it […]