Four courses over here I have never played 👀

The list

Four courses over here I have never played 👀

In order. And the fourth one breaks my own rule.

 

I only know the name because of Ohio

Number one, and it got there for a slightly strange reason.

Muirfield. The original one.

Growing up in America you watch the PGA Tour and every year you hear Muirfield Village. Jack’s place, in Ohio. And at some point you go, hold on. He got that name from somewhere.

So I want the original. The proper Muirfield. I have never seen it in person, I have never walked a single hole of it, and it is still comfortably number one.

Name recognition is a real thing and I am not going to pretend otherwise.

 

My dad has played it and he has not shut up about it since

Second, and this one comes with a family reference.

Ballybunion. You can see the problem.

My dad has played Ballybunion, and he puts it in the top courses he has ever played anywhere in the world. That is the entire endorsement. Coming from him, it is enough for me.

It looks incredible. The stories you hear about it are incredible. It is pretty much everything I want a golf course to be.

I just want to go and find out whether I agree with him.

 

Same list, same dad, same problem

Third, and the other half of the Irish pair.

Lahinch. 2 hours up the road, give or take.

Lahinch is the other one on my dad’s all time list. Two Irish courses, both from the same trip, both still sat there unticked for me.

They are up the road from each other on the map and about thirty years apart in my life so far. I would love to knock them both out in one go.

 

The one that breaks my own rule

Fourth, and the odd one out on the list.

Here is the thing about being American. You think golf over here and you think links. Coast, wind, dunes. That is the picture in your head and mine is no different.

Sunningdale is not that. Inland, heather and pine, nothing like the rest of my list. And every single time I see it I think that looks like an unbelievable amount of fun to play.

It made the list precisely because it does not fit it.

 

That is the list.

Muirfield, Ballybunion, Lahinch, Sunningdale. Three of them because of somebody else, one of them because it looks like a laugh.

P.S. 👀 Now do yours. Hit reply with your four and I will put the best ones in a future Brief.