The Course

For more course information hole by hole click on the Golf House Club logo on the right hand side of the page and go to course information.

To card a good score playing links golf, isn’t so much about power but the ability to “craft your way around the course”. Never is that more evident than playing round the Elie course – at just over 5768 yards it might not seem long with four par 5’s and three par 3’s, this is a real challenge. Add a stiff breeze off the Firth of Forth and any shortcomings in your game will be quickly exposed.

The opening hole requires a blind tee shot over the hill some 50 yards off the tee, potentially un-nerving for those who have never faced such an extraordinary opening shot.

The 3rd is one of the real crackers on this course – a par three with an elevated tee, with views across the Firth of Forth to Muirfield, down to, some 148 yards away a green, with a pronounced slope from right to left, a large bunker on the right edge of the green, another on the left and out of bounds just behind the green.

The raised road running diagonally across the 8th makes this hole one of the hardest on the course, not only dramatically narrowing the entrance to the green but also playing tricks with your eyes and seemingly foreshortening the depth of the green.

Holes 10-13 combine all that makes golf such a wonderful game – beauty, difficulty and fun. An attempt at the green off the tee at the short 10th is reachable for the longer hitters, only 50 yards over the brow, sharply downhill to a smallish green with the beach not far behind.

They don’t come much shorter than the 11th but it’s a wonderful par 3, with the sea on the left of a narrow green.

The 12th and 13th are what you might call big holes, the first of which is a dog-leg left, with the sea on the left, waiting for an unfortunate pull or hook, while a small bunker on the right of the fairway has an almost magnetic effect on any shot up the right. If you get away unscathed, don’t even think of relaxing until you have got onto the green at the 13th. James Braid, five times Open Champion, described this hole “as the finest in all the country”. The green is long and narrow, with a massive run off along its lefthand side making it an unbelievably intimidating shot.

Finally, the last hole has a ridge running down the centre of the fairway, after the first bunker and a well placed tee shot is all important, as is a well struck second, to a big green, otherwise the gully that runs from the front of the green to the bunkers short of the green is likely to gather up the ball.

In 2012 both clubs hosted the Senior Ladies Home Internationals, supplying caddies, ball spotters and entertainment. This was a very successful event. In 2018 the Scottish Women's Amateur Champoinship was heldon the course in near perfect conditions.