Come along for the full 18 at Belvedere Golf Club in Michigan.
CHARLEVOIX, Mich. – The past several weeks at home in still-steamy Florida have me dreaming of golf in different climates and some of the cooler places, both literally and figuratively, I have visited in recent months. In my mind, I keep hitting on the spots that offer a classic vibe, a great course and just a perfect atmosphere for golf.
Belvedere Golf Club in northern Michigan ticks all those boxes. Nestled inland between Lake Michigan and Lake Charlevoix, its nines divided by a two-lane road, Belvedere is a step back in time with a central ridge that keeps balls rolling up and down hills the entire round.
Built by William Watson and opened in 1927, the layout was restored by Bruce Hepner starting in 2016. Hepner and longtime course superintendent Rick Grunch (who has since retired) received a blessing when Watson’s original drawings were uncovered in an old building nearby, giving them the blueprint for a restoration. The greens were returned to their original dimensions, their internal contours paired with frequent runoffs to keep players on their toes.
The back nine at Belvedere Golf Club in Charlevoix, Mich. (Golfweek)
Belvedere ranks No. 6 in a very stacked Michigan on Golfweek’s Best list of top public-access courses in each state, and it also ties for No. 192 among all classic courses built before 1960 in the U.S.
Rankings aside, it’s just a very cool place to spend a day. There’s the right-sized clubhouse, its pro shop lined with photos of top professionals who have ambled through. It’s a private club that accepts some outside play, and it’s the type of course that surely makes every guest ponder a membership application. The peak guest green fee for walkers is listed as $125 in 2023, and the offseason rate is half that – a bargain for the experience.
I was lucky enough to play it for the third time this summer, and the experience was too good not to share. So here goes: photos of every hole at Belvedere, with multiple shots of some holes.
The U.S. Women’s Open is reaching parity with men’s majors when it comes to host courses.
This is a special year as elite women golfers have the chance to experience two great courses for major championships in the United States: Baltusrol’s Lower Course for the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship and Pebble Beach Golf Links for the U.S. Women’s Open.
That’s back-to-back majors on two major-worthy layouts over the span of three weeks in June and July, with the Women’s Open slated this week.
It wasn’t always this way. Women’s major championships have a checkered history of course selections.
The U.S. Women’s Open, for example, for decades was played for the most part on a slate of courses that in no way measured up to the layouts on which men’s majors were contested. In most years, with only a sprinkling of exceptions, the greatest women players in the game played less-than-stellar courses – many host sites were solid regional or local tracks, but world-beaters they were not.
Things began to change in the mid-1980s, as the Women’s Open moved with greater frequency to courses ranked among the top 200 in Golfweek’s Best rankings of either classic (built before 1960) or modern (built in or after 1960) layouts. Women’s Open course selection peaked in 1992 at Oakmont Country Club in Pennsylvania, which hosted the event again in 2010.
As measured by average rating, course selection has continued to improve over the past 20 years. Golfweek’s Best utilizes more than 800 raters who evaluate courses according to 10 criteria and then offer an overall rating of 1 to 10. Their votes are averaged to compile various course rankings lists, including the modern and classic lists. In general, any course rated above 6 would be considered by most players to be a nice local or regional course, and in most cases a course rated above 7 would be worth traveling some distance to play. A layout scoring higher than 8 is among the top 60 or so courses in the world, and only seven courses in the world rank above 9 points – Oakmont is among those seven.
The average rating of the host courses for the U.S. Women’s Open has improved in each of the past three decades. For the period of 1993-2002, the average (using the 2022 Golfweek’s Best ratings for data) was 6.924. It improved to 7.100 in 2003-2012, and it climbed a bit more to 7.195 for the 10 Women’s Opens of 2013-2022. Compare that to the average of 6.277 from 1973-1982.
And course selection only continues to improve. Starting this year with Pebble Beach (using the 2023 Golfweek’s Best ratings for data), the lineup of announced sites for the U.S. Women’s Open scores an average rating of 8.36 among Golfweek’s Best raters. That’s in line with men’s championships and a far cry from the days when the Women’s Open might be played on a course that hardly anyone in the next state over had ever heard of.
Each of the sites announced to host future Women’s Opens is ranked inside the top 100 Golfweek’s Best modern or classic courses in the U.S. Three of the sites – Oakmont (No. 6 in the 2023 ranking of classic courses), Merion’s East Course (No. 7) and Pebble Beach Golf Links (No. 10) – rank among the top 10 classic courses in the United States. Another four – Los Angeles Country Club’s North Course (No. 14 in the 2023 rankings), Pinehurst No. 2 (No. 17), Riviera (No. 18) and Oakland Hills’ South Course (tied for No. 22) – rank among the top 25.
It’s been a long wait for course selection for the premium women’s golf event to catch up with that of the men, but things are certainly headed in the right direction.
The Lido at Sand Valley opens to limited resort play this month.
NEKOOSA, Wis. – One of the most anticipated courses openings of recent years didn’t start with a golf architect’s vision or a developer’s financial plan. This project started with a video game created by a Chicago-based financial consultant and eager golf historian who dabbles at length in no-longer-existing golf courses as a hobby.
Peter Flory (@nle_golf on Twitter, with the handle standing for no-longer-existing courses) has never built a golf course, but he’s played plenty – his list of courses played is enough to send even a golf travel writer into fits of envy.
More importantly, he dreams of playing historically significant courses that have been lost over the decades, plowed under for redevelopment or, occasionally, simply abandoned. Flory is also one of the best hickory golfers in the country, collecting and often utilizing a vast store of antique clubs so that he can appreciate how classic courses played in the era in which they were built.
One course topped his list of interest: The Lido, designed by Golden Age architects C.B. Macdonald and Seth Raynor on Long Island in New York and opened in 1917. The course, reputed to be the toughest and among the best in the world at the time, was plowed under by the U.S. Navy in World War II. Including an 18th hole inspired by Alister MacKenzie’s entry in a course-design contest, the Lido featured many of the classic template holes such as the Redan, Biarritz and Punchbowl that are still in use today.
Peter Flory, the golf history buff whose digital reproductions of the famed Lido led to the course being rebuilt at @Sand_Valley, makes his first own-ball birdie (on the tough 11th) at his dream course brought to life. @golfweekpic.twitter.com/Jc2K7sl2W6
Flory researched the Lido at length, discovering photos and historical narratives that provided insight not only to how it was built, but how it played. His goal was to re-create the course in a video game for his kids and friends to play.
He never imagined it would become a real course again. But this year, thanks to Flory’s efforts, a new Lido opens at Sand Valley in Wisconsin. Built by Tom Doak’s Renaissance Golf Design firm, the new Lido is a painstaking recreation of the original on Long Island. A few tees and greens have been shifted a few degrees to accommodate safety in an modern era where golf balls travel much farther, but the new Lido was designed to be as close to the original as possible.
How close? When asked if it’s down to the inch, Flory has said, “Maybe even better.” Using digital tools undreamed of at the time of the original course’s inception, Flory and Doak efforted to re-create every hump, hollow, bunker lip and green slope from the original course.
It was all made possible because of the interest of fans of classic golf architecture, including Sand Valley developers Michael Keiser Jr. and Chris Keiser, the pair of brothers who greenlighted the project in Nekoosa, Wisconsin. They already operated two highly ranked courses at the resort – the eponymous Sand Valley and Mammoth Dunes – but they were looking for a cool idea for another parcel of land just across the street.
The result of the video game, the research and the financial investment opens to limited resort play June 28. The Lido is mostly a private club, but there will be tee times available to resort guests at select dates and times. Check with the resort for details.
Flory – who now serves as a panelist and ambassador for the Golfweek’s Best course-rating program – shares more insight in the Q&A below.
Golfweek’s experts have ranked the Top 200 courses built before 1960, such as Augusta National, Pebble Beach and more.
Are you a big fan of Golden Age golf architecture? You’re in the right spot. Welcome to the Golfweek’s Best 2023 list of the Top 200 Classic Courses opened before 1960 in the United States.
The hundreds of members of our course-ratings panel continually evaluate courses and rate them based on 10 criteria on a points basis of 1 through 10. They also file a single, overall rating on each course. Those overall ratings are averaged to produce these rankings. The top handful of courses in the world have an average rating of above 9, while many excellent layouts fall into the high-6 to the 8 range.
To ensure these lists are up-to-date, Golfweek’s Best in recent years has altered how the individual ratings are compiled into the rankings. Only ratings from rounds played in the past 10 years are included in the compilations. This helps ensure that any course in the rankings still measures up.
Courses also must have a minimum of 25 votes to qualify for the Top 200 Modern or the Top 200 Classic. Other Golfweek’s Best lists, such as Best Courses You Can Play or Best Private, do not require as many votes. This makes it possible that a course can show up on other lists but not on the premium Top 200 lists.
Each course is listed with its average rating next to the name, the location, the year it opened and the designers. The list notes in parenthesis next to the name of each course where that course ranked in 2022.
After the designers are several designations that note what type of facility it is:
The traditional links courses find spots of honor on this ranking of the best classic courses in Great Britain and Ireland.
Welcome to Golfweek’s Best 2023 rankings of the Top 50 classic courses in Great Britain and Ireland – built before 1960 – as determined by Golfweek’s Best raters.
The members of our course-ratings panel continually evaluate courses and rate them based on our 10 criteria. They also file a single, overall rating on each course. Those overall ratings on each course are averaged to produce a final rating for each course. Then each layout is ranked against others in Great Britain and Ireland to produce the final rankings.
From links layouts to parkland courses, these are the best courses built before 1960 in Great Britain and Ireland.
Welcome to Golfweek’s Best rankings of the Top 50 Classic Courses in Great Britain and Ireland – built before 1960 – as determined by Golfweek’s Best Raters for 2021 (pictured atop this story: Royal Dornoch in Scotland).
The members of our course-ratings panel continually evaluate courses and rate them based on our 10 criteria. They also file a single, overall rating on each course. Those overall ratings on each course are averaged to produce a final rating for each course. Then each course is ranked against other courses in Great Britain and Ireland to produce the final rankings.
The top 200 classic golf courses built before 1960. The list includes Augusta National, Shinnecock Hills, Pebble Beach and Pine Valley.
Welcome to the Golfweek’s Best 2021 list of the top 200 Classic Courses, built before 1960 in the United States.
Each year we publish many lists, with this Top 200 Classic Courses and the accompanying Top 200 Modern Courses lists being the premium offerings. Also extremely popular and significant are the Best Courses You Can Play State by State and Best Private Courses State by State.
The members of our course-ratings panel continually evaluate courses and rate them based on our 10 criteria. They also file a single, overall rating on each course. Those overall ratings on each course are averaged together to produce a final rating for each course. Each course is then ranked against other courses to produce the final rankings.
To ensure these lists are up-to-date, Golfweek’s Best in recent years has altered how the individual ratings are compiled into the rankings. Only ratings from rounds played in the past 10 years are included in the compilations. This helps ensure that any course in the rankings still measures up.
Courses also must have a minimum of 25 votes to qualify for the top 200 Modern or the top 200 Classic. Other Golfweek’s Best lists, such as Best Courses You Can Play or Best Private, do not require as many votes. This makes it possible that a course can show up on other lists but not on the premium top-200 lists.
Each course is listed with its average rating next to the name, the location, the year it opened and the designers. The top 100 courses also note in parenthesis next to the name of each course where that course ranked in 2020. After the designers are several designations that note what type of facility it is:
PACIFICA, Calif. – Golfers around the world dream of playing Cypress Point, the ultra-exclusive Alister MacKenzie masterpiece on the Monterey Peninsula that weaves through sand dunes and forests before finishing alongside the crashing waves of the …
PACIFICA, Calif. – Golfers around the world dream of playing Cypress Point, the ultra-exclusive Alister MacKenzie masterpiece on the Monterey Peninsula that weaves through sand dunes and forests before finishing alongside the crashing waves of the Pacific. For decades it has been counted among a handful of the world’s greatest courses – and if given the opportunity, many a golfer would happily sacrifice a month’s pay to tee it up at Cypress Point.
Or visitors can play another MacKenzie coastal gem 100 miles north on Highway 1 for $54. That “other” MacKenzie is Sharp Park, a San Francisco-owned muni located in Pacifica, a beach town about 10 minutes south. Sharp opened in 1932, just four years after Cypress Point and one year before MacKenzie’s Augusta National. And while Sharp Park is still a fantastic course to play, it’s time to restore one of his municipal greats.
Sharp Park’s history is as interesting as the course itself. The land was donated to the city of San Francisco by the Sharp family in 1917 with the stipulation that it be utilized as a “public park or playground.” John McLaren, creator of Golden Gate Park, envisioned using the property to supplement the existing layouts at Lincoln Park and Harding Park, which were packed with avid golfers. McLaren hand-picked Dr. MacKenzie to design Sharp Park and gave him free rein to indulge every architectural impulse the seaside site had to offer.
MacKenzie considered seaside links land to be “easily the most suitable for the game,” and regarded St. Andrews – where he served as consulting architect early in his career – as the ideal golf course. He authored “The Spirit of St. Andrews” and famously charted the Old Course’s unique double greens and fairway bumps, hollows and hidden bunkers. His detailed map, first published in 1924, remains in print to this day.
In 1914 he assisted mentor H.S. Colt in designing St. Andrews’ Eden Course alongside the Eden Estuary northwest of the Old Course. But ironically, MacKenzie himself designed very few seaside links – only five of his more than 50 courses worldwide. In addition to assisting on the Eden Course, MacKenzie remodeled links at Seaton Carew on England’s northeastern coast (1925) and Old Tom Morris’ Lahinch (Ireland, 1927). Only Cypress Point and Sharp Park were his own original seaside links creations.
Sharp Park (Courtesy of R. Brad Knipstein Photography)
MacKenzie was intent on recreating a Scottish links at Sharp Park. In 1930 he announced Sharp would be “as sporty as the Old Course at St. Andrews and as picturesque a golf course as any in the world.” He laid out the course and entrusted colleagues Chandler Egan, Robert Hunter Jr. and Jack Fleming to carry out the work.
The good doctor and team took full advantage of the coastline and dunescape on the west half of the property by laying out holes in varying directions to highlight natural features. Consider the stretch of holes two through eight:
No. 2 – Drivable par 4 playing west toward the Pacific with headlands in the distance.
No. 3 – Long par 4 playing north on the beach.
No. 4 – Short par 3 playing northeast with green set among dunes and mountain backdrop.
No. 5 – Short par 4 playing north along the edge of a lagoon (a version of MacKenzie’s famed Lido hole).
No. 6 – Medium par 3 playing west into the prevailing wind out to the beach.
No. 7 – Long par 4 playing south on the beach.
No. 8 – Long par 4 dogleg right playing south in the dunes with headlands in the background.
Away from the shore, the team needed to get more creative as the flat artichoke fields that occupied the site were not as compelling for golf as the coastline. Laguna Salada – the dominant water feature adjacent to the shoreline – was converted from a brackish marsh to a freshwater lake. MacKenzie designed holes around the lake. Dramatic greens, flamboyant bunkering and rumpled fairways provided character for the easily walkable layout. The original 10th hole was a mirror image of the 5th – another design that produced a version of MacKenzie’s Lido hole. As the course took shape, local writers hailed it as “a second St. Andrews.”
A poster showing the original layout of Sharp Park
Over the decades the story of Sharp Park has taken some twists and turns, but the ethos of the property, and the enjoyment of those who play it, has never waned.
In 1941 major storms damaged the beach holes. Rather than rebuild them, the city created four new inland holes. In subsequent decades, the sequencing of the course changed, certain holes were shortened and greens shrunk into ovals. Cart paths or trees now sit where clusters of bunkers once dotted the landscape. Thankfully there was never a major redesign or renovation that altered the original landforms of the greens or bunkers.
In 2011 a federal lawsuit filed to protect habitat for the San Francisco garter snake and California red-legged frog threatened to close the course for good. Local golfers, led by Richard Harris and Bo Links, assembled a team of lawyers, environmental experts, philanthropists and volunteers and won an eight-year legal battle to keep Sharp Park an 18-hole course, open to all at a modest greens fee.
Thanks to the community, when you walk out to the first tee today you can still feel the sea air. You can still hear the laughter and camaraderie of locals aged 5 to 95. And you can still see the subtle contours and hillocks crafted by MacKenzie.
No. 18 at Sharp Park (Courtesy of R. Brad Knipstein Photography)
Now that the course has been saved, those of us who love Sharp Park and understand its history believe it is time to restore MacKenzie’s municipal masterpiece.
Due to litigation, environmental regulations and politics, a large-scale restoration hasn’t occurred, but we have plans to do preservation maintenance work so a future generation can enjoy this historic legacy. I have been working with course designer Tom Doak, the Alister MacKenzie Foundation and San Francisco Public Golf Alliance, along with city officials, to figure out what can be done, when and how. In the meantime we are doing what we can to showcase MacKenzie’s artistry. Last year our team used a 1931 irrigation map and historic aerial photos to flag out the original dimensions of several greens. The grounds crew has mowed out the edges of two of them so golfers can see the undulation and size of MacKenzie’s original putting surfaces.
In May thousands will descend upon San Francisco to watch the world’s best tee it up at the PGA Championship. Local leaders will proudly tout TPC Harding Park as the city’s crown jewel. No doubt they will highlight investments made to the municipal course in the early 2000’s, largely at the urging of former USGA president Sandy Tatum.
All the while, just 6.5 miles away sits Alister MacKenzie’s greatest municipal course, a linksy layout on the Pacific with infinitely more character just begging to be restored. Hopefully the city will take the approach it did 90 years ago at Sharp Park (and 20 years ago at Harding Park) and invest in golf. The community and the game deserve such.
