The club that would become Royal Aberdeen Golf Club in Aberdeen, Scotland, was founded in 1780. It was a city club until 1888 when it relocated 2 miles up the coast to Balgownie. After 126 years, the world’s 6th oldest golf club will host the European Tour’s Scottish Open in 2014. The pros will find what links lovers have known for years that there is no finer outward nine in the game as there is at Royal Aberdeen. Read more “Video #12: Royal Aberdeen Golf Club, Aberdeen, Scotland”
Truly it’s remarkable that the game of golf continues to revolve around the course that gave it birth over 600 years ago. It’s all the more impressive when you consider that aside from some new tees and an irrigation system, nothing’s changed all that much at the world’s 4th ranked golf course since 1764 when 22 holes were reconfigured to 18. Meanwhile the game and its players have gone from the Stone Age to the Space Age, and yet, in July of 2015 the Old Course at St Andrews will host the Open Championship for the 29th time – a run that began in 1873.
Read more “Video #11: The Old Course at St Andrews, Scotland”
They don’t make them like this anymore. North Berwick (pronounced “bear-ick”) was founded with six holes in 1832. A seventh was added sometime before 1868 when three more were built and one taken away. The resulting nine holes stood unchanged until 1877 when the addition of nine more produced eighteen that no one particularly cared for. At 4,841 yards it was too short even for hickories so an extension to 6,095 yards was completed in 1895 which was stretched to 6,464 in 1932 where the club stands today. It will host its sixth Final Qualifier next summer when the Open is played at Muirfield.
Golf dates to 1793 on the site where Kingsbarns Golf Links is found today, overlooking the North Sea 7 miles east of St Andrews. Everything changed in 2000 when Kyle Phillips reinvented links golf with the opening here of the game’s first “modern classic” links layout.
Read more “Video #9: Kingsbarns Golf Links, St Andrews, Scotland”
Tom Doak will point out that proper course routing follows the same path a person would take on a walk through the original property. In 1926, Tim Simpson agreed. His redesign of Old Tom Morris’ work at Cruden Bay produced a circuit that meanders all over the place. Golf Magazine’s world #83 was Read more “Video #8 / Cruden Bay Golf Club, Aberdeenshire, Scotland”
