A.W. Tillinghast designed the loudest tournament courses in golf. Bethpage Black, Winged Foot, Baltusrol. Where Donald Ross gave you turtle-back greens, Tillinghast gave you a fist to the chest, penal bunkers, long carries, par-fours that act like par-fives.

scratched.io's catalog credits Tillinghast on five mapped layouts.

The bucket-list Tillinghasts

• Bethpage Black, Farmingdale, NY. 1936. Course rating 77.5 / slope 152. The state-park monster. Two U.S. Opens, one PGA, one Ryder Cup in the books.
• Baltusrol Golf Course, Springfield, NJ. 1922. 77.5 / 146. Lower Course has hosted seven U.S. Opens.
• Winged Foot Golf Club, Mamaroneck, NY. 1923. 76.3 / 146. West Course hosted Hale Irwin’s ’74 “Massacre” and Bryson DeChambeau’s 2020 U.S. Open win.
• San Francisco Golf Club, California. 1915. 72.5 / 137. Ultra-private. The Lake Course at Olympic has the Open pedigree, but golf-architecture nerds rank SFGC higher.
• Bethpage Yellow Course, same Long Island state park as the Black. 1958 build credited to Alfred H. Tull, but the routing follows Tillinghast’s 1933 master plan for the property.

The pattern

Tillinghast’s par-fours often play 460 yards into the breeze with a forced carry over Sahara-style bunker complexes. The greens slope away from the fairway in ways that make a perfectly struck approach roll into trouble. He liked the rough as much as he liked the tee box. When the USGA wants a U.S. Open to be miserable, they go to a Tillinghast.

Browse every Tillinghast course in the catalog →