St Andrews - The Home of Golf

by The Consummate Pro

There is only one “Home of Golf”.

The town of St. Andrews, and the mystical Old Course, are known the world over. That’s not surprising whenever you consider that golf has likely been played there for the best part of 600 years!

The focus for many golfers is without doubt the storied ‘Old Course’. What with its unique start and finish in the town, the photos on the ‘Swilken Bridge”, its timeless double greens, perilous bunkers and shot making demands, you could call this the ‘holy grail’ in golf. Add the history, the tournaments and the aura, and it cannot be surpassed.

However, there is much more to St. Andrews than just the famous Old Course. There are six other terrific courses in and around the town itself – The New, Jubilee, Eden, Castle, Strathtyrum and Balgove. Each of these presents the golfer with a unique test and are designed to complement each other and provide a different challenge to the next.

There is a state-of-the-art Golf Academy adjacent the Old Course Hotel. It is fitted with TopTracer technology, video swing analysis and a SAM PuttLab system, as well as other unique tools to analyse every aspect of your game.

As you would expect, there are several fabulous food and beverage outlets dotted around the town, from the ‘Tom Morris Bar & Grill’ in the Links clubhouse to the ‘Rock & Spindle’ in the Castle clubhouse. There are also numerous superb retail outlets for all those gifts and souvenirs, located in the Links clubhouse, adjacent the 18th green and at the rear of the 18th green beside the clubhouse.

The Town of St. Andrews.

The town of St. Andrews is an obvious mecca for golfers, but it is also home to more than 10,000 university students for a good portion of the year too. That gives the town a year-round vibrancy and buzz. It is a great walking town. The cobbled back streets are perfect for exploring on foot, with history and stunning architecture at every turn. The town is awash with great restaurants, coffee shops and bars, as well as local artisan businesses of all kinds to keep everyone occupied.

The town also has a variety of lodging options for every budget as you would expect. The famous ‘Old Course Hotel’ and ‘Rusacks’ dominate the landscape along the 17th and 18th holes and are very much in the luxury category. However, there are also many superb guesthouses, B&B’s, and self-catering options throughout the town that add significantly to the bed numbers. Add to this the seasonal offering from the University of St. Andrews, the various campsites and touring sites in the region, and you literally have something for everyone.

Whilst out exploring, no visit to the town would be complete without a visit to the ruins of St. Andrews Cathedral. Why? Well, it will allow you to pay your respects at the final resting place of the original “Keeper of the Green”, Old Tom Morris.

Speaking of history, a visit to the R&A Museum at the rear of the clubhouse, provides golfers and non-golfers with an insight into the history and development of the game of golf. It holds some of the best exhibits from the game of golf of any museum in the world and is absolutely worth a visit.

Playing golf in St. Andrews.

Despite what many people may believe, it is both not as straightforward, yet not as difficult as you might think, to play the Old Course. You cannot simply turn up and play ‘on the day’ so a degree of planning and compromise is required. Let’s walk you through the options.

The Old Course is one of the most sought-after tee times on this planet, so a degree of planning is absolutely essential. There are several routes to acquiring a tee time on the Old Course, and here they are. The first is by buying a “Guaranteed Tee time” package from a ‘Authorised’ golf tour operator. This tee times will usually be packaged up with at least one other round in St. Andrews, an accommodation option, as well as your transportation. It will likely require you to stay in the town of St. Andrews for a minimum number of nights, and as a result, will unquestionably be at the premium end of the scale, but it does have that all important “guarantee” of you standing on that 1st tee box.

The second way to acquire a tee time is through the “Private Advanced Tee Time Ballot”. Each Fall (usually around late August) the Links Trust opens a Ballot for a two-week period for private individuals in small groups to request a tee time for the following year. There is no initial cost to placing a request, but be warned that since Covid, requests for all Ballot times have doubled. If you are successful however, we can then assist by putting the rest of your trip in situ.

The third way to acquire a tee time is through the “Daily Ballot” for which you will likely need to plan to be in St. Andrews for several days to maximise your opportunity of success. Except for Sunday, when the Old Course is closed, the Links Trust operates a daily ballot which you complete online. The draw is made 48 hours in advance of play, i.e. if you want to play on Wednesday, you need to enter by 2pm on the Monday, and results are posted on the Links Trust website at 4.30pm daily. This application is for twosomes through foursomes, and you can only enter once per day, so it is best to plan to be in or around the town for at least four or five days to maximise your chances of success. We can help you either with the application process itself, or with booking other rounds in the area while you wait for the Ballot results. If successful, we will then work with the other course(s) to rearrange your tee times.

[Note: It is extremely important to highlight that each of the ‘Private Advanced’, ‘Daily’ and ‘Singles’ ballots, are just that, ballots. These are randomized, computer generated draws from which you have “no guarantee” of being successful. We know from our engagements with the Links Trust, that at peak periods in the summer months, the ‘Daily Ballot’ can be oversubscribed by multiples of thousands. It is therefore not unusually for a client to enter the Ballot for five or six days in a row and still not be successful. Expectations of success need to be managed and clearly understood].

The fourth way of acquiring an Old Course tee time is through the “Singles Draw”. Until recently, images of golfers sitting out overnight at the Starters Hut, in the hope of being first in line for an opening in a fourball, were stuff of legend. However, the Links Trust have decided to simplify this process, by introducing an online singles draw. The day before you wish to play, you simply visit either the Old Course Pavilion adjacent the first tee, or the St. Andrews Links Clubhouse, between 9am and 5pm, and enter your details into the designated system. If you are lucky to be drawn from the system, you’re in!

The fifth and final way to play the Old Course as a visitor is to apply for the “Winter Golf Package”. For a period in June each year, the Links Trust open applications for guaranteed times on the Old Course and two other St. Andrews courses, on three consecutive days in the period November through March, for groups of 2 to a maximum of 16 people. In addition to being at the mercy of whatever winter weather comes your way, and the shorter daylight hours, golfers must employ a small artificial fairway mat during their round to protect the delicate turf. However, if the stars all align, this is a superb way to experience a guaranteed round on the Old Course at modest expense.

As with all your travel plans, we will be delighted to assist you, where appropriate, in the design of your wider golf trip if successful with any of these St. Andrews Old Course options. Most of these do not require any upfront cost, so you have nothing to lose by submitting your application online. Please don’t hesitate to contact us if you need any help or guidance in doing so.

We look forward to being able to welcome you to the home of golf.