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England · Heathland

Sunningdale Golf Club

Sunningdale, Berkshire, England

The 10th fairway of the Old Course, seen from the green.
The 10th fairway of the Old Course, seen from the green. Wojciech Migda, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Architect
Willie Park Jr (Old, 1901); Harry Colt (New, 1923)
Par
70
Length
6,627 yards
Type
Heathland
Access
Private members' club
Championships
Women's British Open (4 times); Senior Open (4 times, last 2025); Walker Cup 1987

Willie Park Jr, twice an Open champion, laid out the Old Course on heathland at Chobham Common; it opened in 1901, a year after the club was formed. Harry Colt, who was the club's first secretary, built the New Course in 1923, and the two make thirty-six holes on sandy ground among pines and heather. The Women's British Open has been played here four times — Karrie Webb in 1997, Se Ri Pak in 2001, Karen Stupples in 2004, Jiyai Shin in 2008 — and the Senior Open four times as well, most recently in 2025, when Pádraig Harrington won with 264. The Walker Cup came in 1987.

In 1926, qualifying for the Open, Bobby Jones went round the Old Course in 66: thirty-three strokes and thirty-three putts, every hole played in three or four. That card is what people still bring up first. The Old is 6,627 yards and the New 6,729, both par 70. Park built hazards you can see and have to decide about — cross bunkers set on the diagonal, ditches, banks of heather across the line — and Colt, who kept working on the Old after Park, moved the fourth, seventh and twelfth greens to where they sit today. The halfway hut stands behind the tenth green, in full view from the tenth tee, and a sausage sandwich there is as much a part of the day as the golf.

Sources

Facts: Wikipedia · the club's own site.

Photographs: 1. Wojciech Migda, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons · 2. Wojciech Migda, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons · 3. James Emmans, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.