It’s no secret but the stats do bear out that Torrey Pines South is no joke.
One of two golf courses – along with the North – that hosts the PGA Tour’s Farmers Insurance Open, the South is proving once again to be one of the toughest tests in golf.
So far in 2024, the Farmers field was 3 under during the first round Wednesday. In Thursday’s second round, the field of 156 was a combined 18 over, according to the PGA Tour’s ShotLink.
The South is the lone course in play for the final two rounds of the Farmers, so whoever reaches the finish line first there has earned his stripes.
Looking at the entire course stats from last season, Torrey Pines South was the highest non-major venue on the most difficult courses list.
StrackaLine offers a hole-by-hole course guide for the main layout used in the PGA Tour’s Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines.
Torrey Pines’ South Course in San Diego – the main layout used in the 2024 Farmers Insurance Open on the PGA Tour – was designed by the father-son duo of William P. Bell and William F. Bell and opened in 1957. The layout was extensively renovated by Rees Jones in 2001, and he made later refinements in 2019.
The first two rounds of the Farmers (Wednesday and Thursday) are split between Torrey Pines’ North and South courses, with the final two rounds (Friday and Saturday) on the South after the field is cut.
The South will play to 7,765 yards with a par of 72, while the North plays to 7,258 yards, also with a par of 72.
Thanks to yardage books provided by StrackaLine – the maker of detailed yardage books for thousands of courses around the world – we can see exactly the challenges the pros face this week on the South Course.
The 2022-23 season had 47 tournaments that were contested over 50 golf courses in eight different countries. Now that the season has concluded, the stats gurus at the PGA Tour have calculated the numbers to determine which ones were the most difficult.
Of those 50 courses, five had an average score of more than one stroke over par per round. Just one course was over par two strokes per round. Sixteen of the 49 had an over-par average. TPC Scottsdale’s Stadium Course, a par 71, had the average score closest to par at 70.98.
The golf courses which hosted the 2023 major championships check in at Nos. 1, 2, 3 and 6 on the list of most difficult venues.
What course proved to be the most difficult? What about the easiest golf courses? Check out this list below. Stats courtesy pgatour.com.
StrackaLine offers hole-by-hole maps for Torrey Pines’ South Course, site of the 2023 Farmers Insurance Open on the PGA Tour.
Torrey Pines’ South Course in San Diego – the main site of the 2023 Farmers Insurance Open on the PGA Tour – was designed by the father-son duo of William P. Bell and William F. Bell and opened in 1957. The layout was extensively renovated by Rees Jones in 2001, and he made later refinements in 2019.
The first two rounds of the Farmers (Wednesday and Thursday) will be split between Torrey Pines’ North and South courses, with the final two rounds (Friday and Saturday) on the South after the field is cut. In addition, the South course will host the final round of the APGA Tour Farmers Insurance Invitational on Sunday.
The South will play to 7,765 yards with a par of 72, while the North goes to 7,258 yards, also with a par of 72.
Thanks to yardage books provided by StrackaLine – the maker of detailed yardage books for thousands of courses around the world – we can see exactly the challenges the pros face this week on the South Course.
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Many of the world’s best players will travel to San Diego, California, next week for the Farmers Insurance Open. The stacked field will take on Torrey Pines North and South. Both courses will be used during the first rounds before the final two rounds are played at the South Course. Play will be held Wednesday through Saturday, to avoid NFL playoffs.
Half of the top 10 players in the Official World Golf Ranking will tee it up at Torrey, including 2017 winner Jon Rahm, who also won the 2021 U.S. Open at the same venue.
See the full field below.
Five of the top 10 players in the Official World Golf Ranking are committed to next week’s Farmers Insurance Open, led by 2017 champion Jon Rahm (No. 4), who also won the 2021 U.S. Open at Torrey Pines.
As the best players in the world prepare to begin another season, golf fans prepare to live vicariously through their heroes competing at courses around the U.S.
To help turn your TV daydream into a reality, Golfweek has compiled 10 courses from the PGA Tour schedule that anyone can play – if their pockets are deep enough.
All the courses on this list allow public access in some fashion, be it standard daily green fees, through a resort or by staying at an affiliated hotel. If there’s a will, there’s a tee time. Golfweek’s Best offers many lists of course rankings, with the list of top public-access courses in each state among the most popular. Each of the courses below is public-access, although greens fees at several of them go above $500 per player.
The hundreds of members of the Golfweek’s Best 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 averaged overall ratings are presented for each course below.
StrackaLine provides hole-by-hole maps for the PGA Tour event in San Diego.
Torrey Pines’ South Course in San Diego is the site for three of the four rounds in this week’s PGA Tour’s Farmers Insurance Open alongside the Pacific Ocean, which will be played Wednesday through Saturday.
The first two rounds of the event will be on the South Course and the North Course at the municipal facility, and the final two rounds will be played on the South after a cut is made. The South was home to Jon Rahm’s U.S. Open victory in 2021 and Tiger Woods’ U.S. Open title in 2008.
The South was designed by the father-son duo of William P. Bell and William F. Bell and opened in 1957. The course has been changed significantly over the years. While the Bells’ routing remains, all greens, tees and bunkers were redesigned by Rees Jones in a 2001 major renovation with later refinements in 2019.
Thanks to yardage books provided by StrackaLine – the maker of detailed yardage books for thousands of courses around the world – we can see exactly the challenges the pros face this week on the South. Check out the maps of each hole below.
Bandon Dunes, Jon Rahm at Torrey, and the Travelers Championship: This is my year in golf.
A year ago, as I sat down to write about my year in golf, the image of a bedsheet hanging off a deck at TPC River Highlands popped into my head.
It had been painted with the words “Hope, Love, Golf” during the Travelers Championship, the third PGA Tour event held after the re-start of the 2020 season. At that point, 18 million people in the United States had been infected with the coronavirus and 320,000 had died. As I type this, the Omicron variant has gained a hold, the Delta variant is still everywhere, holiday plans are being changed and it looks like we are in for another winter of wearing masks, encouraging people to get vaccinated (and boosted), and dreaming this will all go away. More than 50 million Americans have been infected, and 800,000 have died during this pandemic.
I achieved my goal of at least hitting balls outside every month of the year, which as a New Englander, is not easy. I made it back to Bandon Dunes and played The Sheep Ranch, got in another round at Winged Foot, walked behind Jensen Castle at Westchester Country Club as she won the U.S. Women’s Amateur, and was thrilled to see my wife take up the game.
David Dusek at Bandon Dune’s Sheep Ranch. “You want me to hit it where?”
It would be tempting to say that the best event I saw in person in 2021 was the U.S. Open at Torrey Pines South. Quibble all you like about the course, but as a venue, Torrey Pines is spectacular, and seeing Jon Rahm make sensational birdie putts on Sunday to defeat Louis Oosthuizen down the stretch, then kiss his 2½-month old son, Kepa, on Father’s Day when he realized he’d won was perfect.
But the next week, back at TPC River Highlands, was even better.
On a Sunday when Kevin Kisner shot 63, Marc Leishman signed for a 64 that put him into the lead at 12 under, Harris English and Kramer Hickok wound up tied at 13 under. As the late afternoon turned into a beautiful summer evening, they played the 18th hole, then played it again and again and again. Hickok arrived in Cromwell, Connecticut, as an unknown, but that evening the crowd ringing the 18th green was cheering his name, doing the wave and “staying hydrated” with local microbrews.
English won on the eighth playoff hole, but what made the scene even more special than the longevity of the playoff was Hickok’s reaction afterward. His parents had flown in from Texas, his wife, Anne, was there, too, and she’d brought Elvis, the couple’s black labrador retriever puppy.
After Elvis stole the show during Hickok’s post-round interview, the family was gathered near the clubhouse, nearly speechless and taking in the day. Duty called, and I chatted with Kramer about the experience. Then his wife approached and asked if I would take a few pictures of everyone. Seeing everyone’s pride in Kramer’s effort, his sportsmanship, and his genuine joy in nearly achieving his dream was inspiring.
The world would be a better place if we all had an attitude like Hickok’s. After giving his all and coming up short, even though he was tired, he didn’t complain or hang his head. He took joy in trying his best and surrounded himself with people who support and love him.
I’m thankful golf reminded me that’s what it’s all about.
SAN DIEGO – It lacked the fist-pumping reaction of Tiger Woods, but everything else about Mackenzie Hughes’ 63-foot eagle bomb at the par-5 13th was shades of Tiger on Saturday at the 2008 U.S. Open.
“I know Tiger was further right (in 2008), this putt was going right to left…the charge through your body when the ball goes into the hole and the crowd goes wild is kind of why we play,” Hughes told NBC’s Steve Sands after the round. “I’m getting goosebumps just thinking about it.”
That wasn’t the only goosebump-inducing moment for Hughes. The 30-year-old Canadian rode a back-nine 32 at Torrey Pines’ South Course to a share of the 54-hole U.S. Open lead with Russell Henley and Louis Oosthuizen. Hughes has missed the cut in six of his eight previous appearances in majors and has never finished better than T-40. Doesn’t matter – he’s got a tee time in the final group on Sunday at the 121st U.S. Open.
“You get goosebumps thinking about it, so I know I’m going to be nervous tomorrow,” he said. “I essentially played today around the lead all day. I think I was only ever a few back the entire day, so it felt – I think it’ll feel different tomorrow being in that last group, but you do the same things. You mentally tell yourself the same things, and I’ll be referencing my yardage book and my notes a lot. But yeah, I’m going to try and enjoy it lots, and yeah, embrace the moment.”
Hughes has one victory to his credit on the PGA Tour, and enjoyed his best season in 2019 when he finished in the top-30 in the FedEx Cup standings. His recent form has paled in comparison. He entered the week having missed his last five cuts.
“You kind of wonder when you’re going to get it back on track, going the right way, and so I got to Saturday, today, and just felt like, OK, the hard work is kind of done for me. I’m going to go have some fun and play golf.”
What else does he attribute his turnaround to this week? He moved his ball position forward and started hitting predominantly a cut. That and a couple of mental keys that he didn’t care to divulge have righted the ship and lifted his spirits.
“It’s really easy to get down and to be negative and to pout and feel bad for yourself, but I’ve been trying to do the hard thing, which is to be positive, glass half full, optimistic, looking for the progress, and that’s kind of a little bit what I’ve been working on,” he said.
It has finally paid dividends this week. Hughes signed for a 3-under 68 after getting up-and-down for birdie from a greenside bunker on the par-5 18th.
Is there any better slump-buster than winning a major? On Sunday, Hughes will have the chance of a lifetime.
Bryson DeChambeau carded his first bogey-free round in a major on Saturday using a strategy that has already won him one U.S. Open.
SAN DIEGO – Bryson DeChambeau isn’t giving up possession of his title as reigning U.S. Open champion without a fight.
The winner of the national championship at New York’s Winged Foot Golf Club in September is proving that his bomb-and-gouge brand of golf works from coast to coast. In his 67th major-championship round, DeChambeau posted his first bogey-free round in a major on Saturday at Torrey Pines’ South Course.
DeChambeau carded a 3-under 68 to climb within two strokes of the lead at the 121st U.S. Open, and vault into a tie for fourth place with Rory McIlroy (67). Only Louis Oosthuizen (70), Russell Henley (71) and Mackenzie Hughes (67), who share the lead at 5-under 208, are ahead of him.
DeChambeau continued to bash driver on nearly every hole – leading the field in driving distance – and it didn’t seem to matter that he hit only five of 14 fairways in the third round as he led the field in greens in regulation.
“Normally, you would say that he has to do better than that tomorrow,” said NBC’s Paul Azinger. “But I’m not sure he does. He’s had a zillion chances for birdie today.”
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Fellow NBC commentator John Wood agreed: “I think half of the ones that he missed were tactical. I don’t think he was trying to hit the fairway on those.”
DeChambeau got away with missing the first fairway, hoisting an iron from the right fairway bunker that peppered the flag and he opened with birdie. He got his next birdie after crushing a drive at the 534-yard sixth hole and wedging to 6 feet. One hole later, his erratic driver cost him a stroke as he drove right into a penalty area, but he dropped on a hardpan lie and managed to save par with a brilliant recovery to 6 feet. He had to scramble for par at Nos. 14 and 18, too, and used his length to his advantage in making his last birdie of the day at the par-5 13th.
“That’s what you’ve got to do. You’ve got to be really patient out here at these majors. It’s something that is not easy to do,” he said. “My first few goes at majors, I was not successful or anywhere near successful, and I feel like I’m starting to understand major championship golf and how to play it and how to go about managing my game, my attitude and just my patience level. If I can continue to do that tomorrow, I think I’ll have a good chance.”
That’s what DeChambeau was hoping for after struggling to 73 on Thursday, but he claimed he found something in his swing while he was sleeping and has improved his score each day – shooting 69 and 68 since his swing tweak. He said he’ll be ready for whatever challenge the course presents.
“If they make it hard and tuck pins, it’s going to be a very difficult championship. It’s going to be hold on to your horses. If they make some of the pins accessible and move the tees up like they did (today), you’re going to have to go at it,” he explained. “You just have to recognize the golf course in the moment, in the conditions at hand because if there’s no wind tomorrow or if there’s a lot of wind, that’s going to change a lot of factors, too. It’s about adapting on the spot.”
On Moving Day at the 121st U.S. Open, DeChambeau was on the mark.
