Then consider the Southern Pines course at the Elk's Club, where the Azalea/Bluebird nines provide pleasure and challenge to all golfers, regardless of skill level. The golfer is given plenty of latitude off the tee. Neither length nor water are factors and to lose a ball is to shame one's family. The longest green to tee walk is from the 6th green to the 7th tee, which is 40 yards.

Next to no dirt was moved from tee to green at the dogleg left 410 yard 12th.

Yet, this Donald Ross routing still packs a punch. As the player approaches the greens, the challenge is stepped up several notches. When Ross placed a green on top of a hillock as at the 2nd, 4th, 7th, 10th, 14th, 16th and 18th, the greenside bunkers that were cut into the sloping terrain are deep and  recovery shots are difficult.

Southern Pines was laid out at the height of Ross's powers. It opened in 1923, the same year as the courses at Oak Hill Country Club in Rochester and Whitinsville, which is considered by many as the country's finest nine hole course. Yet, despite Ross's busy schedule, Southern Pines received plenty of attention from the master himself, given that he lived nearby.

The strength and appeal of the course lies in the succession of one fine hole after another, which is the direct result of Ross's elegant routing over the rolling terrain. Every hole has at least twenty feet of elevation change and yet the golfer would never complain of hilliness. As at Beverly Country Club, a famously well routed Ross course, the golfer keeps expecting to find an ordinary or indifferent hole but instead only encounters one enticing shot after another, the kind that makes you play golf until dark.

A modern architect may not even develop with such a fine routing, simply because he would have been handcuffed to returning the nines to the clubhouse. No such restrictions existed in the 1920s and the architects were more free to find the routing that would yield the finest holes. Photographs in the professional shop from the 1940s show that little has changed with the tee to green character of the course.

The 6th hole continues the lovely stroll through the broad corridor of pine trees.

Holes to Note:

1^st hole, 360 yards: An appealing opener, with everything laid out below for the golfer to see, as the hole tumbles downhill. The green rises in the back right third and the effect is to create tough but interesting hole locations.  As good as this hole is today, apparently it once featured one of Ross's most interesting greens: any ball hit on the right third was almost assured of being gathered into a right hand green side bunker, either that or rolling well back into the fairway. Why the original Ross green complexes were modified remains a mystery to the author but John LaFoy was called in twice, in 1988 and again almost a decade later. Lafoy deserves credit for such vexing green complexes as the 2nd and 8th of today but conversely, he is responsible for the clumsy use of mounds that are poorly integrated into their surrounds,  like at the 6th, 13th, and 15th.

2nd hole through 6th hole; The classic Ross give and take is much in evidence throughout the round with this stretch of five holes being the case in point. The 2nd is a reachable par five to a severe green and while many strong golfers may get near the green in two, getting down in two is another matter. This par 4 1/2 hole is followed by a tough 195 one shotter which in turn is followed by tough uphill two shotter to a green that angles away from the golfer. Ross follows this toughie with a three shotter that can be reached in two if the golfer can turn his drive from right to left and have it bound down the hill that falls at the 240 yard mark from the tee. This potential birdie hole is followed by the longest two shotter on the course. And so it goes for the rest of the round, with the golfer always being challenged but never to the point of becoming discouraged.

Though the 485 yard 2nd hole is easily reachable in two, the golfer will have
to do so by hitting from a downslope to an uphill green.

Three holes later, the golfer confronts another par five, though it plays completely different
to the first one as the green is set below the golfer and is an extension of fairway.

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