The DK Tour

Every year, while the PGA Tour rumbles across America, my own personal golf tour bumbles around Scotland and northern England. Britain’s golfing ethos is fundamentally competitive: unlike the USGA handicapping system, the UK system relies entirely upon scores formally signed and attested in competition, and the number and variety of tournaments anyone can enter is vast. So, to the regular medal events at my home club of Dunbar I also add a mix of open competitions at great and good courses both local and distant. The cost of entry is always much lower than a normal green fee, and if I play well I can hope to win cash prizes or pro shop vouchers with which to fund future exploits. And I can redesign my itinerary every year, subject only to my sense of adventure and good-natured negotiations with my wife.

 

One of the self-appointed “majors” on my tour this year was the Esmond Trophy at North Berwick, a competition I discovered this spring while leafing through a stack of tournament entry forms in the Dunbar locker room. I played my strokeplay qualifying round on a Saturday morning, and I didn’t do well: with only the top 32 net finishers advancing to matchplay, my 82 (net 78) on a fairly calm day seemed hopelessly poor. I told my wife she could make plans for Thursday evening, when the second matchplay round was scheduled; meanwhile, on the Sunday I drove up to Cruden Bay – one of my favorite courses in Scotland – for another open event, and on a windless day I failed to break 90. I hadn’t played that badly for at least a decade.

 

Thoroughly depressed, during my long drive home from Cruden Bay I resolved not to touch my clubs for at least a week. But at lunchtime on Monday, I checked my voicemail and discovered my first-round matchplay tie in the Esmond Trophy was that evening at 5:48. Ha! I resolved to use the faulty swing I had and not the perfect swing I wished I had…and what do you know, I started winning, and winning big: 4&2, 6&5, 4&3. Babysitters were frantically called after each victory. My wife’s congratulations came through increasingly gritted teeth.

 

Two weeks later, I was in the Sunday morning final, playing a 19-year-old local on a golf scholarship to a junior college in Waco, Texas. Back and forth we battled as our gallery – now including the baroness who would present our trophies – steadily grew: all square with three to play, with a stroke due to me on the 16th I pushed my tee shot out of bounds. Careless and stupid. After I hit two poor shots at 17, the match looked over; then I hit my miracle putt, and at least one more hole looked assured. Alas, my three-footer was slippery and fast, and I never fully committed to the left-to-right break. My ball edged the hole and slid past, and I turned to shake my opponent’s hand. I was gutted…but as is usually the case on my competitive travels, I’d more than gotten my money’s worth.

 SIDEBAR: Open Cases

 

Only members of golf clubs in East Lothian may enter the Esmond Trophy at North Berwick, but most of my favorite opens are truly open to anyone subject to certain handicap limits, and you can design a great golfing holiday around any of these events I’ve entered in the past (dates and entry fees are for the 2013 season):

 

Silloth-on-Solway – Gents Open (27 April, £28 for 36 holes)
This under-visited and under-appreciated linksland gem on the northwest Cumbrian coast makes a great place at which to kick off the new golfing season.

 

Gullane No. 1 – Scratch Open (22 June, £26 for 36 holes)
Gullane makes an elegant local qualifying venue when the Open Championship is at Muirfield, and on a windy day it is an incredibly demanding test of driving: last year I lost no fewer than 12 golf balls in deep rough during my first 11 holes.

 

The Golf House Club – Elie & Earlsferry Links Championship (10 August, £20 for 18+ holes)
Elie is a thoroughly pleasant and picturesque seaside course in Fife, and this open has a unique format: everyone plays 18 holes in the morning, but after a qualifying score is determined, only the best finishers make the cut to play again in the afternoon.

 

Royal Dornoch – Carnegie Shield (11-17 August, £90 for 54+ holes)

Cruden Bay – Challenge Cup (16-19 July, £50 for 72+ holes)
Both of these great linksland events feature 36 holes of strokeplay, after which the best scratch and handicap golfers qualify for up to four or five rounds of matchplay; non-qualifiers may still enter consolation strokeplay competitions. (Similar events are also held in towns like St. Andrews, Carnoustie and Montrose, while Royal Dornoch and Cruden Bay each host separate one-day opens throughout the season.)

 

Royal Aberdeen – Men’s Open (22 September, £50 for 18 holes)
What better way to wind down your season than at the site of next year’s Scottish Open (and the 2005 British Senior Open)? Good September weather cannot be guaranteed, but Royal Aberdeen remains very playable in any conditions, and its magical front nine is among the great duneland tests in the world.

 

Nike Golf Matchplay Championship (June to September – £25 to enter)
A UK-wide competition detailed at www.matchplay.co.uk – in summary, four local matchplay (net) rounds are followed by a regional stableford final, with each regional winner getting a free trip to the Algarve for the 72-hole Grand Final in January.

 

My list is Scotland-centric because I live in Scotland, but many other great courses across the UK and Ireland host similar open events for individuals and pairs – if you like competitive golf and are interested in playing a particular course, a little online research can yield large rewards.