Yahoo Sports The Myrtle Beach area is home to dozens of golf courses. Tell us your favorite here
You’ll see many things in the Myrtle Beach area if you look at it using Google Earth.
The Grand Strand is home to vast stretches of homes along the ocean, forests, wetlands and golf courses. You’ll notice the courses because the grass that makes up each one is slightly greener than other parts of the map. Indeed, the Myrtle Beach area’s image as a vacation destination is partly due to its golf courses.
Myrtle Beach’s first golf course, Pine Lakes, opened in 1927. Nearly three decades later, it served as the birthplace of Sports Illustrated. In the 21st century, the PGA Tour hosted a tournament in Myrtle Beach. Vacationers and tourists play round after round at the links along the Grand Strand each year, about 3.2 million, according to Visit Myrtle Beach.
Indeed, the Grand Strand has seen an increase in golf rounds played in recent years. Tracy Conner, the executive director of The Myrtle Beach Area Golf Course Owners Association, said that the market runs a centralized database that tracks the number of rounds played by golfers.
Beginning in 2021, Conner said that every year since has been a record year. Despite a four percent drop in rounds played in the first three months of 2024, Conner said that projections this year anticipate 2024 will be a better year than 2023.
Despite its success, the area’s golf economy has had concerns recently, as golf courses along the Grand Strand have closed in recent years or will get redeveloped. Conner said it’s hard to know if more courses will close or the number of golf courses in the area will remain steady in the coming years. However, Conner added that golf course closures are not a symptom of the overall health of the Myrtle Beach golf economy.
“Each of those golf courses is a small business, and that golf course owner will make a business decision that’s in his best interest,” Conner said. “Myrtle Beach is as strong as it ever has been in really the 70 years of existence.”
While every course is different, the Grand Strand itself helped several courses become what they are today. Tim Cate is an expert on turning undeveloped properties into mazes of obstacles for golfers to try and solve. A course designer with 35 years of experience throughout the Carolinas, Cate developed Thistle Golf Club in Sunset Beach, N.C., and Bald Head Island Club, ranked within the top 20 best public golf courses in North Carolina, according to Golfweek Magazine.
Cate, who is also involved in the renovation project at the Sea Trail Golf Resort in Sunset Beach, N.C., said dunes, wetlands, and marshes always influence course design, as opposed to some courses where the topographical features must be added.
“All you need to do is enhance your golf course,” Cate added. “Because it’s going to be beautiful.”
One example is the Dunes Golf & Beach Club, whose 13th hole stretches around a lake, and much of the course sits close to the ocean or near the Singleton Swash. Head Golf Professional Dennis Nicholl said in January 2024 that the course’s layout, which opened in 1948, was largely due to the nature of the property itself.
“It (took) a lot longer back then to build courses; they had to use the natural lay of the land,” Nicholl said. “We had one bulldozer building this golf course back in the late (1940s). It was different. From the irrigation systems and everything.”
Courses also keep the characteristics of their designers, too.
Of golf courses along the Grand Strand, the work of the late designer Mike Strantz stands out for Cate, whose work Cate referred to as “artistic.” Cate said Strantz, who designed True Blue and Caledonia Golf & Fish Club, didn’t create courses on paper first.
“Nobody got any plans,” Cate said.
Instead, Cate said Strantz would go to the property and draw a picture of the holes for the course shapers to begin work. Cate also cited Strantz’s work at Tobacco Road Golf Club in Sanford, N.C., and Bulls Bay Golf Club near Charleston as some of Strantz’s best work.
“Some of the creativity and ingenuity of the Mike Strantz work is just unparalleled, even with some of the best architects today that are doing some of that same style,” Cate added. “Hardly anything did anything like that.”
Many golfers have a favorite course where they’ve played their best rounds, and we want to know your favorite.
The Sun News wants to know readers’ favorite golf course to play along the Grand Strand or just over the North Carolina border. Voters will have one week to vote for their favorite.
If your favorite golf course isn’t a selection choice on our list, please email us at sneditors@thesunnews.com
It is the second year Sun News readers have voted for their favorite golf course. Here’ were readers’ top five courses in 2023:
Prestwick Country Club
Tidewater Golf Club
Dunes Golf & Beach Club
Caledonia Golf & Fish Club
Wedgefield Country Club
