Wednesday, September 21, 2022

#890 North West GC, Ireland

One of the founding members of the GUI in 1891, North West GC was designed by the pro from nearby Royal Portrush, Charles Thompson. It is located on the Inishowen Penisula in Lisfannon, Ireland. North West has been called by some the Old Course of Ireland. It is very flat and on a somewhat narrow parcel of true links land that is threatened by erosion from the North Atlantic. The turf here is firm and fast and produces the bounce that I've found on only a few great links courses. It took me a few holes of approach shots that ended up off the back of the greens to start playing short and enjoy the ground game on this very well conditioned course. The green complexes are mostly very challenging with bunkers that play much larger than the eye perceives from the fairway with many green edges that runoff into swales that makes for difficult recovery shots. Even though the course is fairly level it has many humps, bumps, and hollows in the fairways that provides interesting terrain to play from. NW produced the highest score I posted on this trip.

North West wins my award for the "Most friendly golf club in County Donegal" and the grounds crew does a wonderful job here in maintaining the fun, firm, and fast conditions. It exceeded my expectations and is very underrated in my opinion. Be sure and take a look at my photo's below which show you the contours and great design that squeezed in 18 holes on the limited acreage available for this course. BLUE

https://photos.app.goo.gl/kMmnCGtgrAsd7KC37 Copy link to view photos

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