One of two golf courses within North Berwick

North Berwick

The Royal Burgh of North Berwick is a seaside town in East Lothian, Scotland. It is situated on the south shore of the Firth of Forth, approximately 25 miles east of Edinburgh. North Berwick became a fashionable holiday resort in the 19th century because of its two sandy bays, the East Bay and the...

, the West Links is by far the more renowned. It regularly holds various championships and is used as a qualifying venue when The Open Championship

The Open Championship

The Open Championship, or simply The Open , is the oldest of the four major championships in professional golf. It is the only "major" held outside the USA and is administered by The R&A, which is the governing body of golf outside the USA and Mexico...

 is held at Muirfield

Muirfield (Scotland)

Muirfield is a privately owned links which is the home of The Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers. Located in Gullane, East Lothian, Scotland, overlooking the Firth of Forth, Muirfield is one of the golf courses used in rotation for The Open Championship.Muirfield has hosted The Open...

 (most recently 2002). It was opened in 1832 and occupies a place at the centre of golfing history.

History

The area which is home to the course today - a strip of land adjacent to the beach and extending westward over 2 miles from the edge of the town centre to the nature reserve at Yellowcraigs

Yellowcraigs

Yellowcraigs, less commonly known as Broad Sands Bay, is a coastal area of forest, beach and grassland in East Lothian, south-east Scotland. Yellowcraigs is designated as a Local Nature Reserve and a Site of Special Scientific Interest...

 - has been used for golf for at least 400 years, although early participants were not welcomed by local landowners or authorities. The course was officially opened in 1832 with 6 holes, necessitating competitions to be played over 3 rounds. After a period of expansion which began in 1868, the course featured 18 holes by 1877 and was extended to a "full length" of 6095 yards in 1895. The last major alteration to the course was masterminded by Ben Sayers

Ben Sayers

Bernard "Ben" Sayers was one of the most successful early professional golfers...

 in 1932, since which time the layout of the course has hardly changed. Today the course measures 6,420 yards.

Clubs

Four golf clubs are based at the West Links - the North Berwick Golf Club

North Berwick Golf Club

The North Berwick Golf Club , at North Berwick, East Lothian, was founded in 1832. It is the 13th oldest golf club in the world and only St Andrews hosts a club which has played continuously over the same course for longer. Although the NBGC was the first club in the world to allow female members,...

 (founded 1832), Tantallon Golf Club (1853), Bass Rock Golf Club (1873) and the North Berwick Ladies Golf Club (1888). The North Berwick G.C. is the 13th oldest club in the world and only St. Andrews has a club which has continuously played over the same course for longer. In 2005 it voted to give ladies full rights as members for the first time - ironic as it was originally the first club in the world to allow ladies to become members.

Holes

Its signature hole is thought by many to be the 15th, "Redan

Redan

Redan is a term related to fortifications. It is a work in a V-shaped salient angle toward an expected attack...

", a par-3 which starts with a blind tee-shot over a valley towards the green which is perched on a hill beyond and tilted away and to the left. The design of the hole has been copied on several newer courses around the world, particularly in Japan. One of the earliest copies of the Redan hole is the 7th at Shinnecock Hills, famous for the trouble it caused players during the 2004 U.S. Open. The Redan at North Berwick is preceded by an heroic stretch of three holes: The 12th hole "Bass" which requires a knowledgeable tee shot in order to afford the best angle into the green, the 13th hole "Pit" where an ancient stone wall fronts a relatively small green, and the blind-approach 14th hole "Perfection" which can yield a wide range of scores even in ideal conditions. The 16th hole "Gate" features a divided green, with two raised surfaces divided by a punishing valley, a rare feature in the golfing world because of the lack of courage among modern architects to propose such a hole to golf course developers.

Facilities

The North Berwick Golf Club and the Tantallon Golf Club both maintain clubhouses, the former with the prime location off the 18th green and the latter just over the road. Both clubhouses have changing rooms and dining facilities. As part of "The Sayers Project", the NBGC is planning to expand their clubhouse to include better leisure facilities. They also intend to incorporate the David Huish

David Huish

David Huish is a Scottish professional golfer, perhaps best known for being the halfway leader of The Open Championship in 1975.-Personal life:...

Pro Shop into the main building and use the site currently occupied by the shop for state-of-the-art practice bays and swing analysis technology.

At the far end of the course there is a practice area within the loop created by the 8th, 9th, 10th and 11th holes. The area features a driving / iron play field (no automatic ball retrieval) and a multi-hole putting green.