Design Notebook: The State of the Open Championship Rota

Hello, Fried Egg Golf Club members, and welcome back to Design Notebook, your monthly rundown of what’s happening in the golf course industry.

In this Open-week edition of DN, I take stock of the current Open Championship rota: which courses are in, which appear to be out, and where the R&A might take golf’s oldest major in the future.

Rota Revisions

In an interview he gave to John Huggan before stepping down as R&A CEO last year, Martin Slumbers pointed to the transformation of the Open Championship as one of the most important achievements of his tenure. “It needed a cleaner brand,” he said. “It needed to be much bigger. It needed to be more commercially successful, because it fuels everything else that we do. The size of the crowds creates the atmosphere. I remember going to my first Open at [Royal] Troon in 2016. There were 170,000 people there. It’s a big course and it felt empty. [At the 2024 Open] we had 250,000, and it certainly did not feel empty.”

Any discussion of the evolution of the Open’s roster of host venues—the rota, as it’s called—needs to start here: the R&A wants to make the tournament as big and profitable as possible. During this week’s Open at Royal Portrush Golf Club in Northern Ireland, approximately 278,000 fans will walk through the gates—more than attended this year’s PGA Championship or U.S. Open. Once the most humble major, the Open is now a juggernaut, and its venues must accommodate crowds of massive proportions.

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A handful of traditional Open sites have proven themselves up to the task. St. Andrews Links, with its seven-course footprint and proximity to plenty of hotels, remains the linchpin of the rota and the only twice-a-decade host. Royal Liverpool, Royal Troon, Royal Portrush, and Royal Birkdale also seem on solid footing with the Open’s decision-makers, not least because all four clubs have recently invested in infrastructural upgrades and retained the services of Mackenzie & Ebert, the R&A’s favored course architecture firm. 

Royal St. George’s should probably be considered part of this core group as well, but it hasn’t yet been booked for an Open in the post-pandemic era. Perhaps the R&A is concerned that the seaside towns of Kent offer too little lodging. But given that Royal St. George’s has a spacious property and is just two hours from London, I would expect it to get another Open soon.

As of now, the R&A has selected only two future Open sites: Royal Birkdale for 2026 and St. Andrews for 2027.

Which other courses might claim spots in the 21st-century rota? Let’s run through a few possibilities:

Likely In: Portmarnock Golf Club (Portmarnock, County Dublin, Ireland)

It’s no secret that Portmarnock, a sturdy links 30 minutes outside of Dublin’s city center, has a good chance of becoming the first club outside of the United Kingdom to host an Open Championship. Last October, the Irish government declared “provisional support” for the idea, and new R&A chief Mark Darbon visited the course in May. The membership also voted to approve the de rigueur Mackenzie & Ebert renovation.

If the changes to the course and the venue’s infrastructure are completed on schedule, we may see the Open at Portmarnock as soon as 2030.

Likely In: Muirfield (Gullane, East Lothian, Scotland)

After the Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers voted to remain men-only in 2016, the club’s home course, Muirfield, was dropped from the Open rota. Its bluff called, the Honourable Company reversed its own decision the next year and admitted a group of female members in 2019. But the R&A has remained aloof. The East Lothian links has not hosted the men’s championship since 2013, when Phil Mickelson joined a list of Muirfield Open champions that includes Harry Vardon, James Braid, Walter Hagen, Gary Player, Jack Nicklaus, Lee Trevino, Tom Watson, Nick Faldo, and Ernie Els. (Whoa.)

So what’s the issue? At last year’s Open, Martin Slumbers suggested that the R&A is not inclined to take the championship to Muirfield as long as the DP World Tour insists on staging the Scottish Open the week before at the Renaissance Club, Muirfield’s next-door neighbor. “We’re going back to Muirfield,” Slumbers said. “It’s a brilliant golf course. I’ll have a little conversation with [DP World Tour CEO] Mr. [Guy] Kinnings about maybe moving the Scottish Open from the Renaissance.”

The Scottish Open’s contract with the Renaissance Club, which started in 2019, ends in 2026. So perhaps, if Kinnings chooses not to continue jamming the R&A, we’ll see the Open at Muirfield in 2028 or 2029.

Meanwhile, as we reported in May’s Design Notebook, the Honourable Company has hired Mackenzie & Ebert to prepare a master plan for course renovations.

In Limbo: Trump Turnberry (Girvan, South Ayrshire, Scotland)

Hoo boy, here’s an interesting one.

Ever since U.S. President Donald Trump purchased the four-time Open venue in 2014, and especially after he rode down that golden escalator in 2015 (has it really been 10 years?), the R&A has shied away from Turnberry. Slumbers insisted last year that the championship would not return to the South Ayrshire resort until the R&A could feel “comfortable that the whole dialogue will be about golf,” and Darbon said this past April that Turnberry poses some logistical challenges related to “road, rail, and accommodation infrastructure.” Darbon added, “We’re doing some feasibility work around what it would look like to return to that venue and the investment that it would require.”

In other words, Trump Turnberry doesn’t jibe with the Big, Beautiful ethos of the modern Open.

But that hasn’t stopped the most powerful man in the world from ratcheting up the pressure on the R&A. Earlier this year, several British media outlets reported that President Trump had repeatedly brought up the possibility of an Open at Turnberry with UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer. Then, in late April, The Guardian revealed that senior UK government officials asked the R&A “what the hurdles would be to hosting the 2028 Open at Turnberry.”

It’s worth noting that PM Starmer, in spite of his affiliation with the liberal Labour Party, has adopted a conciliatory stance toward President Trump, perhaps hoping to protect the UK from the punishing tariffs that the White House has threatened. “The [UK] government is doing everything it can to get close to Trump,” an anonymous source told The Guardian. “One concrete thing is that the Department for Culture, Media and Sport have been involved in pushing for the Open to return to Trump-owned Turnberry.”

My own sense: Starmer and the UK government feel they must appear to be holding Darbon’s feet to the fire, but they know full well that the R&A has no desire to go back to Turnberry before Trump’s second presidential term ends in January 2028.

Anyway, Starmer is scheduled to visit Trump in Scotland this month. Wonder what they’ll talk about.

In Limbo: Carnoustie Golf Links (Carnoustie, Angus, Scotland)

Carnoustie, which last hosted the Open in 2018, would seem to be an obvious pick for a 2028 or 2029 slot, but it’s apparently not in the running. The sticking point, we understand, is lodging. According to the local rumor mill, the R&A has made clear that major improvements to the aging Carnoustie Golf Hotel will be needed in order for the Open to return to the Angus links.

Recently, the 59-hole facility changed owners, handed over by the Angus county council to a consortium of investors calling itself Carnoustie Golf Heritage and Hospitality Group Limited. Tim Gavrich of GolfPass argued that this shift from public to private control might affect Carnoustie’s rota status, pointing out that the venue welcomed 172,000 fans in 2018—a low number by the championship’s current standards. “Between this smaller capacity and the uncertainty surrounding Carnoustie’s ownership’s relationship with the R&A,” Gavrich wrote, “there is considerable doubt about its future as part of the rota.”

A reasonable conclusion. But I could be equally persuaded that Carnoustie’s new owners will be motivated to bring the Open back and capable of paying for whatever infrastructural updates might be requested. We’ll see.

Likely Out: Royal Lytham & St. Annes Golf Club (Lytham St. Annes, Lancashire, England)

The 2012 Open, won in moving fashion by a 42-year-old Ernie Els, may be the last ever held at Royal Lytham & St. Annes. Bound on all sides by dense suburban development, this charming, subtle links is simply too small for the Open’s current ambitions. 

Still, the R&A hasn’t publicly ruled out a return to Lytham & St. Annes. A spokesperson told the Blackpool Gazette that the course “remains very much part of our thinking for the Open” and that the R&A “look[s] forward to returning to the Fylde coast again in the future.” It’s just hard to imagine how RLSA’s property could possibly fit the build-outs and crowds that have come to define the modern Open.

Possible: Somewhere Completely Unexpected

Could the Open go to an inland course? Could it be held outside of Great Britain and Ireland? Maybe! Industry scuttlebutt has it that the R&A’s leadership sees the Open as a global brand and is laser-focused on making the tournament as profitable as possible.

This worries me. The Open is great because it’s unique. It has a rich tradition and a specific identity, both inextricably tied to the links of Great Britain and Ireland. So as the R&A’s executives figure out how to extract more value from the event, I hope they don’t lose sight of what makes it valuable: the golf.

Chocolate Drops

→ As we noted in last month’s Design Notebook, the group that owns the “Pines trio” of the North Carolina Sandhills—Mid Pines Inn & Golf Club, Pine Needles Lodge & Golf Club, and Southern Pines Golf Club—has partnered with Marine & Lawn Hotels & Resorts to upgrade the hotels and restaurants at Mid Pines and Pine Needles. This past week, the same group, constituted as a new company named Rolling Pines LLC, announced that it had purchased the Country Club of Whispering Pines and Foxfire Country Club, a pair of 36-hole facilities in the Sandhills area. “We see great opportunities in both properties,” said Kelly Miller, managing partner of Rolling Pines. “Our goal is to make significant improvements on all four courses and get them on an upward trajectory.”

The press release emphasizes that the Rolling Pines venture will be separate from the ongoing management of the Pines triumverate. However, guests at Mid Pines and Pine Needles will have access to Whispering Pines and Foxfire “in the near term,” and the owners are considering “various synergies between the five operations.”

→ Clayton, DeVries & Pont—the super-firm consisting of Australian Mike Clayton, American Mike DeVries, and European Frank Pont—is staying busy. As Golf Business News reported last Thursday, CDP has been hired to create a long-term master plan for Berkhamsted Golf Club, a heathland course north of London with a design heritage that includes Willie Park Jr., Harry Colt, and James Braid. Also, as I learned on X for the first time on Friday, the firm is working with Australian architect Harley Kruse at Woodlands Golf Club, an underrated gem in the Melbourne Sandbelt that I visited last December.

→ Probably tipped off by this piece in a local newspaper, Bethpage Black Metal relayed the news that the town of Mansfield, Ohio, had sold 19 acres of a public park to Westbrook Country Club for the development of The Diamond, a facility featuring a nine-hole short course designed by Tyler Rae and a “state-of-the-art” practice area. It is not known whether The Diamond will be private or public.

→ Speaking of short courses with slightly silly names, The Dozen at Arcadia Bluffs in northwestern Michigan is open.

In case you missed it…

• A Fried Egg Golf exclusive: the Capstone Club, an early Gil Hanse design in Alabama that closed its doors in 2014, will soon be revived as Coal Club.
• Scott Hoffman will design an 18-hole course for Kettle Forge, a new destination golf club near Erin Hills in Wisconsin.
• Beau Welling’s upcoming renovation of King and Prince Golf Club on St. Simons Island is an example of the rising influence of private equity in golf course development.
• Chechessee Creek Club in the South Carolina Lowcountry has hired David Zinkand to create a 12-hole short course.
• Want to learn more about this week’s Open Championship venue? Check out our video on Royal Portrush as well as the Designing Golf deep dive on the course’s history and architecture that I recorded with my colleague Matt Rouches.

A Course We Photographed Recently

Portsalon Golf Club (Portsalon, County Donegal, Ireland)—designed by Charles Thompson in 1891, redesigned by Pat Ruddy in 2000, renovated by Paul McGinley in 2010

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Underlined and Starred

“It is truly magnificent and Mr. H.S. Colt, who designed it in its present form, has thereby built himself a monument more enduring than brass. The course does not disdain the spectacular, such as the one-shot hole called Calamity Corner, with its terrifying, sandy cliff and its gadarene descent into unknown depths to the right of the green; for the most part the course does not depend on any such dramatic quality, but rather on the combined soundness and subtlety of the architecture…. The greens are full of interesting undulations and altogether I find it hard to imagine a more admirable test of golf.” -Bernard Darwin on Royal Portrush in 1951