The Honors Course

The Honors Course is set in a secret valley to the north of Chattanooga and it’s another jewel in America’s golf course crown.

As its name suggests, it’s the place that Jack Lupton, the founder, chose to honour and promote all that is best in amateur golf. The only thing he forgot to do was to make it a little more accessible to mere mortals.

There is nothing at this idyll to detract from the golf, which naturally is the main task in hand. Don’t expect to find a country club, just enjoy a brief interlude with Mother Nature. Nobody understands the art of agronomy better than the team at the Honors Course so if you can sweeten up a member, expect an absolute treat.

Designed by Pete Dye and his youngest son P.B. Dye, the Honors Course quietly opened for play in 1983. Apart from Nature's fine-tuning, little has since changed.

Author Darius Oliver wrote in his book Planet Golf USA: “With a spacious landscape and plenty of appealing ground movement, the layout was built with minimal disruption to the natural terrain, save for an irrigation lake through the middle of the property and some rather extreme shaping around the greens.

Holes are generally cut through an attractive collection of oak, ash, dogwood, hickory, persimmon and willow trees with a superb variety of unkempt native grasses helping to provide contrast and define the playing areas.

The Honors Course has done a tremendous job establishing its championship credentials over a relatively short period. For those fortunate enough to play here the complete absence of non-golf distraction, as well as the rich textures and colors of the landscape, combine to make it a pretty special experience.”