9 Best Par Threes on the Open Championship Rota

Ever since eight competitors first encountered Prestwick’s 167-yard 3rd hole—called Tunnel (Red)—at the inaugural Open Championship in 1860, par threes have played a significant role in the outcome of golf’s oldest major tournament. Only 12 holes then, Prestwick expanded to 18 holes in 1882, then fell off the Open Rota after 1925, but its challenging […]

18 Exceptional Golf Courses in the Shadow of the Open Championship Venues

Open Championship Courses

“Why then the world’s mine oyster, Which I with sword will open.” —The Merry Wives of Windsor Smiling at these words, you put down your book of Shakespeare and fall into a deep sleep. Now begins a remarkably vivid dream that fuses the quote with your other favorite subjects: golf and travel. The dream begins […]

From St. Anne’s to Royal Liverpool: England’s Golf Coast

It’s a bit fresh today,” a member said cheerfully, referring to the wind. (My transcription of his remark is based partly on lip-reading: the gale made hearing unreliable.) The course we were playing—St. Annes Old Links, on the Lancashire coast in northwestern England—has a few small water hazards, of which the largest is smaller than […]

Ben Wright: Greeted at the Gate

Euphoria marked my first-ever golf assignment, covering the 1954 British Open for the Manchester Daily Dispatch. Time can’t obscure the tingle I felt when the cab dropped me off at Royal Birkdale’s front gate that day. I had no qualms with our press headquarters, a nissen hut left over from World War II and outfitted […]