Atlanta Athletic Club: Riverside

Robert Trent Jones built 27 holes for the Atlanta Athletic Club when it moved from East Lake in Atlanta to the northern suburb of Duluth (now called Johns Creek) in the late 1960s. When Joe Finger added a fourth nine on a high section of the property in the early 70s, the holes were broken into two 18-hole courses, the Highlands Course, host of the 1976 U.S. Open and 2001 and 2011 PGA Championships, and the Riverside Course.

Riverside was always viewed as the more friendly, non-championship course, though it hosted it's share of prestigious tournaments as well. Rees Jones performed major work on both courses through the years and the style of each came to resemble more his architeture than his father's, or Finger's.

In 2022, Tripp Davis remodeled Riverside, rebuilding and reshaping each hole, each green site and the bunkers to tie them better into the landforms, creating new looks and several new holes in the process. Davis divided the par-5 third into a short par 3 and a dogleg left par 4 with the new green pushed back against the Chattahoochee River, then combined the old fourth and fifth into a riverside par 5 that bends gradually right. The twelfth green was pushed back 80 yards to turn it into a par 5, the par-3 17th green was rebuilt with modifeid punchbowl shaping and water hazards near the greens at 14 and 18 were removed. Riverside finished second for the 2023 Best Transformation award, and there are some (including us) who would divide a 10-round split between Highlands and Riverside 5-5, or even 6-4 in favor or the latter.