How our staffers would spend $1,000 on GOLF’s Top 100 Courses You Can Play

You could play Shadow Creek in Vegas — but need to get a little lucky on the slot machines first. 

Or you could play George Wright 16 times — and have change left over.

But you could play them, and access is maybe the best part of GOLF’S latest list of the top 100 courses you can play in the U.S. You need no membership for these gems. Just money. And that got us thinking:

How would our staff spend a grand on the list?

Would we pay Shadow’s four-figure fee? Or Wright’s two? Our answers are below. For reference, we used the article headlined: “The Top 100 Courses You Can Play, ranked from most expensive to least,” which you can read by clicking here. (For additional reading, please click here for our list of the top 100 courses in the U.S.) 

How our staffers would spend $1,000 on GOLF’s Top 100 Courses You Can Play in the U.S. 

STAFFER: Josh Sens 

HOW YOU WOULD SPEND $1,000: A thousand bucks, eh? Is that supposed to cover my travel expenses, too? If so, I’m staying local in Northern California, buzzing down the coast from my home in Oakland to Pasatiempo ($385) in Santa Cruz, one of the rare Alister Mackenzie designs in the country that anyone can play. The course is set to reopen in mid-December following a green and bunker restoration project that I’m having a hard time wrapping my head around because it’s difficult to imagine how those greens and bunkers could get much better than they were. I’ll probably wait til late spring or summer for this outing, when the days are longer, which will give me time to play 36 on what is my favorite public course in California. From there, I’ll drive home (complimentary bed and breakfast), then get up the next morning and cross the bay into San Francisco for 18 at Harding Park ($125), a major championship host that happens to be a muni. The back nine, which loops along Lake Merced, is as good a stretch of golf there is in the city. This two-day itinerary will give me 54 holes on a pair of top-notch courses, each with a vivid sense of place. And it will leave enough in the budget for me to grab a burrito in the Mission district on my drive home, with extra guacamole, even. 

STAFFER: Dylan Dethier

HOW YOU WOULD SPEND $1,000: I started my own entry, but then I read Sens’ and I realized something: I’ll just double-up on his! The best golf trip is one that your buddy plans, after all. If that trip includes free lodging, 36 at Pasatiempo, an ocean view and a burrito? All the better. The only thing that concerns me is Sens’ wily game. Before long, I feel like he could be staring down a 4-for-3 par putt and I’d be down the extra thousand. …

STAFFER: Nick Dimengo

HOW YOU WOULD SPEND $1,000: Don’t get me wrong — playing any spot on GOLF’s Top 100 Courses is always incredible, but if I’ve got $1,000 to spend, I’m booking my tee time at Pinehurst No. 2. Sure, there are plenty of spots with oceanfront views and sprawling cliffs, but I’m choosing the home of the 2024 U.S. Open, where I saw firsthand how the layout gave the best players in the world all sorts of fits. How well would a mid-handicapper like myself manage Pinehurst No. 2, with its globed greens and tricky “native areas?” My guess is not great — but the best part about golf is the element of surprise, so maybe I’d shoot the round of my life and finally break 80 on the course where Bryson DeChambeau won his second major title.

STAFFER: Jessica Marksbury

HOW YOU WOULD SPEND $1,000: Am I the only person on staff who has yet to make the sojourn to Bandon Dunes? That needs to be rectified, stat! With four courses on the Top 100 You Can Play list (Pacific Dunes, Bandon Trails, Bandon Dunes, Old Macdonald — all ranked in the top 13!), I would try to maximize the value and get all four in for that $1K. That means playing in the offseason, when the prices are lower. Resort guest fees are highest from June through September, at $370 per round. But you can save quite a bit by visiting in April, when green fees are $235 apiece — and $235 x 4 = $940! A relatively smokin’ deal, to be fair, with room for taxes, too.  

STAFFER: Connor Federico

HOW YOU WOULD SPEND $1,000: This is a fun game! Let’s build an itinerary with as much variety as possible, and not a care in the world for lodging and travel costs. Variety in natural surroundings, architectural styles and cost will really add to our entirely hypothetical experience. Let’s start with the best bang for our buck. Black Mesa ($93) places us in the New Mexico desert, Rustic Canyon ($104) winds through Southern California mountains, Wild Horse ($75) provides vast views of the Nebraska Sandhills, and George Wright ($62) is a Donald Ross-designed muni just outside Boston. Spending less than $350 on four Top 100 Courses off the bat now allows for some real bucket list destinations. The Lido ($295), the epic C.B. Macdonald masterpiece revived at Sand Valley Resort, is a must-experience for any golf architecture nerd. After that, I’ll take the rest of my cash to the Oregon coast for a crack at Pacific Dunes ($370) and true links golf here in the U.S., bringing this trip’s grand total to $999.

STAFFER: Josh Berhow

HOW YOU WOULD SPEND $1,000: Since this is a fun exercise and it doesn’t have to make sense logistically — if you want those trips, I already created eight Top 100 road trips you can take — I want to get at least a few rounds in, which means Whistling, Pebble, etc., are out. I will splurge and spend $420 at Sheep Ranch, since it’s the only Bandon course I have yet to play, and then drop $265 at Chambers Bay (as you can see, I’m a sucker for a view). I’ll then head to South Carolina for a $120 tee time at Caledonia, and then finish off my itinerary with rounds at Lawsonia Links ($99) and Wild Horse ($75). That leaves me $21 to spend on a brat and beer.

STAFFER: Zephyr Melton

HOW WOULD YOU SPEND $1,000: I’d start my thousand-dollar splurge with a round at one of my favorite courses, Pasatiempo ($385) in Santa Cruz, Calif. With the remaining ~$600, I’d buy as much merch as I possibly could from the pro shop — I kid (kind of). The Loop at Forest Dunes ($195) has been on my bucket list for a while, so I’d have to knock that one out on this boondoggle. Assuming I could play the reversible course forward and backward on a single green fee, I’d have about $400 remaining. With that, I’d head to the sandhills of North Carolina for a round at Pine Needles ($305), one of Donald Ross’ most underrated designs. I’d take my final ~$100 down the road to Pinehurst and spend it on a quick round at the Cradle ($50), with the remaining funds going to cocktails on the porch overlooking No. 2’s famed 18th green. 

STAFFER: Jack Hirsh

HOW WOULD YOU SPEND $1,000: Knowing that each and every one of these courses is brilliant, I would start by splurging on a few premium courses before scattering the rest among the cheapest options to ensure I stretch that $1,000 as far as I can. To start, I’m going to make a trek out to Bandon because I have been on property once before and got to play only Bandon Trails as part of a tournament. So I will add Bandon Dunes, Pacific Dunes, Old Mac and Sheep Ranch to touch them all. Normally, this would be far more than $1,000, but we’ll go in March, when the rate is just $200 for resort guests, with a replay rate of $100. Sure, we could get cold, 40-degree days, but we have almost the same chance of getting sunny-and-65 weather. I’ll settle for anything in the upper 40s and 50s, though. We’ll spend two days, play 36 each day and get to tee it up at four Top 100 public courses for $600. Now let’s make that $400 last. We’ll start with the cheapest option on the list, George Wright in Boston ($62), as I am always partial to Ross munis, having grown up near Jeffersonville in PA. Next, we’ll go to Wisconsin and play Lawsonia Links ($99), the cheapest option on the Top 100 list, public or private. Finally, we’ll head over to the East Coast to play both Bethpage Black ($140) and Red ($90) during the week. That leaves us $9, which unfortunately will get you only a hot dog at most of these places, except maybe George Wright.

STAFFER: Nick Piastowski 

HOW WOULD YOU SPEND $1,000: What’s the price of postage these days? Whatever it is, just divide it by our number so I’d know how many letters I’d have to write to Chairman Ridley asking for Augusta membership. Kidding, kidding. I’m from Wisconsin, but have unfortunately yet to play Erin Hills ($455), so I’d start there. Then let’s go volume, because if this is on the company dime, I want max vacay, too. So we’ll play Wright ($62), Wild Horse ($75), Black Mesa ($93), Lawsonia (Links) ($99), Bethpage (Red) ($100) and Rustic Canyon ($104) — and have $12 left over, which we’d spend on a beer and a brat at the food shack at the turn at Lawsonia. 

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