13 courses we wish would host a Presidents Cup

Presidents Cup organizers did well to secure another gem in Australia, as the 11th-ranked Kingston Heath will host the 2028 Presidents Cup. Kingston Heath is often considered an Alister MacKenzie design, but in fact Australian golf professional Des Soutar designed the course in 1925. MacKenzie made a brief visit the following year and suggested the bunkering, which was constructed by greenkeeper Mick Morcom before he built Royal Melbourne's two courses. The bunkers are long, sinewy, shaggy, gnarly, windswept, and of course, strategically placed. Some say MacKenzie's tee-to-green stretch of bunkers on the par-3 15th set the standard for all Sandbelt layouts. Under the recent guidance of Mike Cocking of Ogilvy, Cocking & Mead (OCM), the tournament tees and several bunkers and green complexes have been reworked, and a new short course and 19th hole were added.

It is a common misbelief that Toyko Golf Club was designed by C.H. Alison, the talented Englishman who visited Japan in the early 1930s and transformed the country’s golf architecture with such courses as Hirono and Kawana Hotel. Alison did design a course for Tokyo in 1932, but its land was requisitioned by the Imperial Army in the lead-up to WWII. The club moved to a new layout designed by Japanese architect Komei Ohtani in 1939, while Alison’s course became potato fields. That didn’t keep golf architect Gil Hanse, who has done extensive remodeling of Tokyo G.C. over the past 15 years, to fashion features that reflect Alison’s, not Ohtani’s, philosophy of design. Seeing how well-attended the Zozo Championship in Japan was, we'd love to see Japanese golf fans treated to a Presidents Cup.

South Africa is due for another Presidents Cup with the 2003 matches at Fancourt being the time the country has hosted the Cup. Intended to merge with its Bushveld environs, what with Kruger National Park and the Crocodile River on the north and west, the Gary Player-designed Leopard Creek is really more akin to a polished, immaculate American layout, with a manmade stream diagonally slashing in front of the 14th green, the fifth, 15th, 16th and 18th greens guarded by stone-bulkheaded ponds and the par-5 18th green on an island. But no course in America has views of elephants, hippos and crocodiles in the wild.

Just like bringing a U.S. Open to Bandon Dunes might be a pipe dream, Cabot Cliffs hosting a Presidents Cup is probably not realistic—but we can hope. Another sensational Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw design, Canada's No. 1-ranked course overflows with variety with its southernmost holes in Lahinch-like sand dunes, its northernmost atop Pebble Beach-type ocean cliffs and bits of pine-lined Scottish Highlands in between. The course has six par 5s, including three in the space of four holes, and six par 3s, plus an additional one-shot bye-hole aside the fourth. Sporting the same fescue turf mix as nearby sister course Cabot Links (ranked 25th), some tee shots seem to roll forever, but so do errant shots that miss greens. The cliff-edged par-3 16th has become one of the game's most photographed holes.

Sheshan International, at the base of Sheshan Mountain, is considered by some to be the Augusta National of China because of its opulent conditioning. The stylistic design, by Canadian Neil Haworth and his late partner Robin Nelson, incorporates a small forest, a canal, several manmade ponds and a small, deep stone quarry, over which both the drivable par-4 16th and long par-3 17th play. Sheshan hosted 14 of the 15 annual World Golf Championship's HSBC Champions events between 2005 and 2019, so a number of players would be familiar with making the trip.

A Presidents Cup in Cabo? No player would say no to that. Mexico's first true links, fashioned by Davis Love III and his design team (which included his brother Mark Love and designer Paul Cowley) from a fantastic set of white sand dunes along the Pacific Ocean, huge portions of which are without vegetation and seem like enormous snow drifts. Holes hug the flowing terrain with little artificiality. Two holes on the back nine once played past around a long lagoon, but have been replaced by new 12th and 13th holes on the beach. Now all of the second nine is adjacent to the ocean, amidst the tallest dunes. No other links in the world sports cactus.

Not a links, more like a stratospheric Pebble Beach, high atop a windswept plateau some 500 feet above the sea. The 2004 design truly demonstrates the lay-of-the-land philosophy of American architect Tom Doak, who ran holes out and back along a series of ridges perpendicular with the coastline, most framed by deep canyons. The fairways are wide, but Doak rewards bold tee shots that flirt with ravines and sets strategies using some of the deepest bunkers he has ever built. Cape Kidnappers was also the International winner of a 2012 Environmental Leaders in Golf Award, co-sponsored by Golf Digest. Can you picture all the corporate hospitality tents being constructed on this dramatic site in New Zealand? Probably not, but we can dream.

The Teeth of the Dog turned the Dominican Republic into a golf destination in 1971. Pete Dye rebuilt and updated the course several times, sometimes after hurricane damage and sometimes to fine tune the design. The routing is stunning, a clockwise front nine, counterclockwise back nine, with seven holes hunkered down on the ocean, no more than 20 feet above the surf. The sea is on the left on holes five through eight, on the right on holes 15 through 17. Every hole is unique and scenic. Former PGA Tour player Jerry Pate is overseeing comprehensive course upgrades beginning in 2024, which could set the 54th-ranked course on World's 100 Greatest Courses up to host the pros in the future.

South America’s best golf course came thanks to a special call from Argentina’s prestigious Jockey Club, which decided to add golf to its sporting activities on land adjacent to its race track. The club called the USGA for advice on creating unique golf, and the association recommended Alister MacKenzie, having just completed work at Augusta National Golf Club. MacKenzie stayed in Argentina for a few months to oversee the work on the Jockey Club’s two courses, the Red and the Blue. The final three holes are fantastic: The 16th is similar to Augusta’s eighth hole, though a par 4, but with no greenside bunkers and hillocks and bumps to navigate or utilize on your approach. The par-3 17th hole is a memorable slight dogleg left one-shotter that mandates you clear a tree protecting the green. The great doctor paid homage to the Old Course at St. Andrews with his green at the home hole, with a valley of sin gobbling golf balls off the front of the green.

Metropolitan was designed by club members J.B. Mackenzie and C.W. Chapman in 1908 and was revised in 1926 by famed architect Alister MacKenzie, as part of his two-month visit to Australia. But the present design is the work of American architect Dick Wilson, who added eight new holes in the late 1950s. Wilson also revised the remaining holes to reflect his philosophy that golf is meant to be played through the air. Bunkers front nearly every green and pinch nearly every fairway. Metropolitan hosted the PGA Tour's World Cup of Golf in 2018, so it's no stranger to hosting the world's best players.

This is undoubtedly the finest design of globetrotting C.H. Alison, longtime partner of H.S. Colt. He laid out Hirono in the early 1930s in a hilly pine forest slashed by gulleys, clearing wide corridors and positioning greens on the crests of ridges. What makes Hirono special was Alison's spectacular bunkering, which ranged from diagonal cross bunkers, fearsome carry bunkers and strings of ragged-edged ones. Soon after completion, writers were calling Hirono the Pine Valley of Japan. The restorative work by Tom Mackenzie and Martin Ebert has sharpened the teeth of Alison’s bunkering and restored the lost tees of the par-3 13th, making the hole play once again at an angle to the fronting lake rather than directly across it.

Built by American designer Tom Doak from what had been a pine-covered Sahara along the northeastern coast of New Zealand's North Island, Tara Iti iis far more links-like than the country's other coastal courses, most of which are on rock. Doak and design associate Brian Slawnik spent more than two years gently resculpting the sandy soil into hummocks, punchbowls and sand dunes that look like they were formed by wind and vegetated by nature. There's lots of sand but no bunkers. Golfers may ground the club anywhere. With holes inspired by Cypress Point, Royal Dornoch and Royal St. George's, and views everywhere of the Hauraki Gulf, this might be New Zealand's answer to Pebble Beach's Carmel Bay. The greatest meeting of land and sea is clearly up for debate. How incredible would it be if this glorious layout could be on full display for the golf world to see?

George Fazio once lost a U.S. Open in a playoff to Ben Hogan and his architecture reflected the sort of discipline needed to win that championship: tight well-guarded fairways, big, well-bunkered, fast-paced greens and polished conditions. National G.C. of Canada reflects that and more, with gambling water hazards and double doglegs. In 2005, Tom Fazio, who helped his uncle with the original 1974 design, rebunkered some holes and created a new par-4 16th. This would be a proper championship test that would be a great showcase of Canadian golf.