At 4:30AM the alarm clock went off and instead of my usual slap at the snooze bar I happily jumped from bed and started the day. After getting cleaned up and dressed I hopped in my car and drove to the airport in order to make my 6:46AM flight to New York’s LaGuardia airport. Fortunately, my plane took off on time and by 8:00AM I was safely on the ground in my destination.
Read more →
In the late 1990s David McLay Kidd was hired by Mike Keiser to design and build a golf course on a section of the 1,200 acre parcel of land he owned along the rugged coast of Oregon. Building a golf course in such a remote location was a HUGE leap of faith on Mr. Keiser’s part as the “Build It And They Will Come” philosophy was not exactly a tried and true business model at the time. However, like all great entrepreneurs, Keiser did not let the critics and detractors discourage him and he forged ahead with his project.
Read more →
After we finished up at Pacific Dunes in the morning the big question over lunch was if we really wanted to go back out into the severe weather for our second 18 holes of the day. We were tired from fighting the wind, we were soaked completely to the bone and the weather wasn’t really showing much sign of letting up. Of course in the end there was really no debate. If you’re not golfing at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort than you had better be sleeping because there isn’t much else to do.
Read more →
My group arrived at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort on the evening of Tuesday June 1, 2010 and were scheduled to start playing the next morning on Pacific Dunes. More than half our group was here for the first time and all of us were extremely excited as we walked out of McKee’s Pub that night after dinner. On the way back to our rooms we discussed the forecast for bad weather and hoped that as usual the weather predictors would be wrong.
Read more →
The Olympic Club was founded in 1860 under the name San Francisco Olympic Club and is recognized as the oldest athletic club in the U.S. At the time of inception the club focused on physical fitness as golf hadn’t yet made it across the pond. In 1918 The Olympic Club took over the struggling Lakeside Golf Club and introduced golf to its members at a new location on Lake Merced separate from the downtown clubhouse.
Read more →
Please just let me find it . . . Is that really so much to ask? . . . Just give me a chance . . . All I’m asking for is a chance. These thoughts raced through my head as I walked to the left side of the 18th hole at San Francisco Golf Club. The 18th hole is a 508 yard par 5 and I REALLY would like to make a birdie here.
Read more →
Back in 2007 when I started this Top 100 madness I began telling my family and friends about my quest in hopes of making some contacts that would be able to help me along the way. When I told my Dad he suggested that I get in touch with his friend Jim who lived in San Francisco, was a very avid golfer and had played a number of Top 100 courses over the years.
Read more →
There was but one goal for my trip to The Honors Course in Ooltewah, Tennessee. The sole thing I wished to accomplish for this trip was to simply not drive past the entrance to the club. That’s all . . . see the turn, make the turn. No u-turns . . . no mulligans. Easy, right?? Beautifully simple, yet inexplicably complex. Every person I had talked to about The Honors Course had told me two things. First, that I must turn left at the giant propane tank and second, that I would miss the turn and drive right past the entrance.
Read more →
Now that I’m nearing the halfway point on my quest to play the Top 100 golf courses in the U.S. things are beginning to get a little more interesting. The low hanging fruit is starting to vanish and I’m beginning to see just how difficult a challenge I have set myself up for. One of the questions that I get asked regularly is “What are the toughest courses to gain access to”. The few public courses on the list are the only bona fide easy ones, and the rest vary in degree of difficulty when it comes to arranging play.
Read more →
Located just outside of Philadelphia, Aronimink Golf Club was incorporated 1896. In the early years the expanding club outgrew a couple of sites in Philadelphia before eventually settling in their current location, Newtown Square, in 1926. With 300 acres of freshly acquired land, the club hired well known golf course architect Donald Ross to lay out their new golf course. Legend has it that Ross was upset from having one of his course designs rejected by another Philadelphia area club and vowed to create a masterpiece at Aronimink that could not be duplicated.
Read more →
Recent Comments