Leynir - Akranes

Top 25 Golf Courses of Iceland 2022 Welcome to the first of our chart updates in 2022. We begin a new round of re-rankings with Iceland, where we’ve added ten new courses to create a Top 25. It’s a golf-mad nation that has more than sixty courses spread out around the island with the number of registered golfers comprising around 6% of the population, the highest in all of Europe. The golf season isn’t that long – five months from May to September normally – but during the summer months it’s possible to play 24 hours a day as the sun never sets in this part of northern Europe at that time of year. We’ve drastically overhauled our procedures across the whole Nordic region so fully expect to see plenty of chart movement in the weeks to come for Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden. The data capture net has been cast wider and deeper this time around and the new groups of panellists in each of these countries have alerted us to quite a few courses that we’ll be exposing for the first time. We start with the volcanic island that lies just outside the Arctic Circle in the north Atlantic, where organised golf has been played since the early 1930s… Keilir Only three courses stay in the same position in our revised listings for Iceland and one of them is the Hvaleyrarvöllur course at Golfklúbburinn Keilir, just outside the capital city of Reykjavik, which remains the #1 golfing layout in the country. The first nine holes were constructed on farmland next to the sea and these opened for play in the mid-1960s. It took another thirty years before an 18-hole course became operational, once another nine holes had been laid out over adjacent lava fields. Regular contributor Peter Wood said this last year: “the back nine is routed over a small peninsula abutting Hafnarfjordur harbour while the front nine traverses a field of black lava. I particularly liked the opening nine with its ocean views and ‘linksy’ feel – you can see players and flags on other holes, but not the playing surfaces – much like a links course. The strategic nature of the course demands good course management. It is a thinking golfer’s course… however, one certainly does not want to hit it into the lava!” Brautarholt The layout at Brautarholt Golf Course entered our Icelandic listings in 2018, debuting at #9. It rose to #4 in our last chart revision and it continues this upward trajectory now, climbing another two spots to the runner-up position in our national standings. Starting out a decade ago as a 9-hole track, it’s had another three holes added to fashion a 12-hole course. Don’t expect this expansion trend to continue though, as architect Edwin Roald is well known for questioning the logic behind many smaller clubs craving the notion of operating an 18-hole course when they don’t have enough land to justify such a venture. "When you have limited resources, you are forced to use what nature has given you," Roald was quoted as saying a few years ago. "If only you could break away from the constraints of having someone else tell you how many holes you must build. It is the same as writing books or making movies. Imagine if all books had to be exactly 200 pages, or a film had to last 95 minutes. Would they be as good?" We agree with him 100% – maybe one day we’ll even get round to creating a ranking list of courses around the world that contain fewer than eighteen holes… Three courses make impressive 3-place upward moves within the new Top 10. Oddur The first of these is the Urrida course at Golfklúbburinn Oddur(now at #3) where England narrowly defeated Spain 4-3 in the final matches of the European Ladies’ Team Championship when it was staged here in 2016. Opened as a 9-hole track in 1990, the course had eighteen holes in use by 1997, with holes routed around lava fields from the dormant volcano Búrfell. The club hosts another EGA tournament in July and this time it’s the European Girls’ team Championship that will take centre stage. Reykjavik Until now, the Grafarholt course at Golfklúbbur Reykjavíkur has been regarded as the better of the club’s two 18-hole layouts. Well, that’s no longer the case as the Grafarholt drops three places to #5, with the Korpa overtaking it as it slips one ahead, into the #4 slot. The older Grafholt course dates back to the early 1960s, with the young upstart Korpa unveiled thirty years later in the mid-1990s. Designed by Hannes Thorsteinsson, the twenty-seven Korpa holes are laid out of undulating terrain, with the Sjorinn and Ain nines considered the main 18-hole layout. Kidjaberg The course at Golfklúbburinn Kidjabergwas the highest newcomer in the 2020 edition of the Iceland Top 15 chart and it now moves up from #10 to #7. Established as a 9-holer layout in 1993 then subsequently expanded to eighteen holes 12 years later, Kidjaberg occupies a dramatic landscape next to the meandering White River as it flows towards the Atlantic. Described by a recent reviewer as being “routed through some impressive terrain with extensive river frontage,” the course is “not overly long but challenging [with] green complexes and bunkering [that] are relatively simple but nicely maintained.” There are ten new entries in our extended Icelandic standings and two of them appear ahead of the rest of the pack in the top half of the table. Mosfellsbaer Golfklúbbur Mosfellsbaer was formed in 2014, following the merger of Bakkakot and Kjolur golf clubs. The Hlidavollur course in Mosfellsbaer (new at #8) was then extended to eighteen holes by Edwin Roald, who set fairways out next to the black sand beach of Faxafloi Bay. Conveniently located less than a half-hour drive from Reykjavik, the course plays down and alongside the ocean, with majestic Mount Esja as a spectacular backdrop. GKG Golfklúbbur Kópavogs og Garðabæjar in Reykjavik is one of Iceland's largest golf clubs, comprising an 18-hole layout called Leirsdalvöllur (new at #9) plus a 9-hole par three layout named Mýrin. The club recently invested in a state-of-the-art indoor facility – consisting of a putting green, chipping area and sixteen Track Man golf simulators – on the ground floor of the clubhouse which allows members to fine tune their game throughout the cold, dark winter months. When spring arrives, players are then raring to tackle the 6,000-metre par 71 Leirsdalvöllur layout and put into practice what they’ve been doing artificially in the preceding months. To view the complete detailed list of our latest Top 25 Golf Courses of Iceland click the link. View list here.

Top 100 Golf Courses updates its Nordic rankings 2020 This news release covers the five Northern European nations of Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden. We’re increasing the number of courses featured in this region by extending three of the national listings so we now publish ranking details for almost two hundred of the approximately 970 golfing layouts that are spread out across this vast northern section of the continent. The latest KPMG Golf Participation Report for Europe 2019 indicates participation rates are collectively slightly down in these five countries for the period 2017-18, though Iceland and Norway both buck the general trend; the former recording a 0.82% increase to 17,164 registered golfers and the latter posting a 2.28% rise to 103,000 affiliated members. More encouragingly, a similar document co-produced by the R&A and the European Golf Association entitled the European Golf Participation Report 2019 highlights that Iceland’s registered golfers as a percentage of the population (5%) is the highest in Europe, edging Sweden (4.8%) into second place. The Swedes also have the most junior golfers (46,844) and 3rd most adult female players (121,552) so it’s not all doom and gloom in this part of the golfing world. Denmark The leading seven courses in our Denmark Top 40 remain in the same position, which means that the Old course at The Scandinavian is still our #1 layout. Designed by Robert Trent Jones Junior and opened for play a decade ago, it’s been the national No.1 since taking over the top spot in 2014. Comprising 50% of a fabulous 36-hole golf complex on the outskirts of Copenhagen, the Old course is also one of five Danish tracks to currently feature in our Continental European Top 100. The Scandinavian - Old course Twenty-five kilometres further north of the capital lies Simon’s Golf Club, and here the A and B nines now climb two places to #8. Laid out by Martin Hawtree in the early 1990s, the original 18-hole layout has since had a newer loop (the “C” nine) added to form a very impressive 27-hole golf facility. Many will take for granted that the Made in Denmark tournament is now an annual fixture on the professional calendar, but not so long ago Simon’s held the inaugural Danish European Tour event, the Nordic Open, where Ian Poulter won the one and only edition in 2003. Simon's There’s only one new Danish entry, Sønderjyllands Golfklub in Southern Jutland, situated less than fifteen kilometres from the border with Germany. The fairways are set out in an area formerly known as the Gravel Balls, which forms the western continuation of a large glacial meltwater cone, with gravel deposits to a depth of up to forty meters in places. The club celebrated fifty years of operation in 2018, having started out with a 9-hole layout before another nine holes were added in stages up until 1986. Sønderjylland Rank/ To view the complete detailed list of the Top 40 Golf Courses of Denmark click the link. Finland There are only five non-movers in our newly extended rankings for Finland and one of the layouts retaining its former position is the national #1, the South East course at Kytäjä Golf. We’ve been listing Finnish courses biennially since 2008 and this one has topped the table every time so it’s probably no surprise that it holds onto its No. 1 status. Designed by Tom McBroom, it forms half the golfing complement at a stylish 36-hole complex that opened its doors to visitors early in the new millennium. Kytäjä - South East course A couple of courses make admirable six-place gains in our new Top 40: the first is the 18-hole layout at Aura Golf (at #13) which was initially set out on the island of Ruissalo, outside Turku, back in 1958 and the second is the more modern course at Virpiniemi Golf (at #16), where Jan Sederholm fashioned two distinct returning nines in 2006, close to the shores of the Gulf of Bothnia on the Baltic Sea. Aura The highest of our ten new entries is the Castle course at Ålands Golfklubb (new at #12) in the Åland Islands, which we used to list separately, but we’ve now integrated the archipelago into our mainstream Finnish standings. The 18-hole Castle layout has just undergone an extensive upgrade by Philip Spogárd, who installed a new irrigation system, renovated greens to USGA standard, and reworked all the sand hazards with Durabunker edging. Ålands - Castle course To view the complete detailed list of the Top 40 Golf Courses of Finland click the link. Iceland Only one course remains in the same place for this revision and it’s Iceland’s #1 layout, the 18-hole Hvaleyrarvöllur course at Keilir Golf Club, located half an hour’s drive from Reykjavik airport. The club started out with a modest 9-hole set-up in 1967 then holes were gradually added over the following thirty years until the current 27-hole facility became a reality in 1996. Mackenzie & Ebert have been involved in recent renovation work here, ensuring the links maintains a firm grip on its top billing status in Iceland. Keilir The only new entry in the 2018 version of the Iceland chart was Edwin Roald’s 12-hole layout at Brautarholt Golf Club, which debuted at No.9. After adding three new holes, the course now leaps five places up the 2020 listings to No.4, with a reviewer describing it last year as “a very pleasant surprise... the views from the course are spectacular the whole way round while the cliff side holes are the show stopper… for a great day of fun golf where thinking your way around is rewarded I can highly recommend Brautarholt.” Brautarholt The first of five newcomers arrives at #10 and it’s the White River Golf Course at Golfklúbburinn Kiðjaberg, situated seventy kilometres east of the capital. Work started on the layout in 1989 before a 9-hole track was brought into play five years later. Another decade then passed before it was finally extended to an 18-hole layout and there’s also now a 5-hole par three course available for junior and learner golfers at a tidy little golf club. Kiðjaberg To view the complete detailed list of the Top 15 Golf Courses of Iceland click the link. Norway Lofoten Links is still the #1 course in Norway and it also now occupies a position in the upper half of our Top 100 for Continental Europe. It’s quite a turnaround in fortunes for a rather out of the way development that started out in the early 1990s with just a few holes etched into a fantastic natural landscape on the island of Gimsøya in the northern reaches of the country, where golf can be played 24 hours a day in the summertime. Lofoten Links A recent post summed up the course rather well: “the links at Lofoten has a magical setting with a combination of imposing mountain and ocean backgrounds. The routing of the links incorporates no less than seven gorgeous ocean-side holes. The combination of granite boulders defining tight landing areas plus carries over rolling sea and sandy coves on these holes is intoxicating.” The biggest upward move in the Norwegian Top 30 is made by the course at Elverum Golfklubb, rising five spots to No. 22. Construction of the layout began in 1987 and the first nine holes were commissioned twelve months later. An extension to eighteen holes was then undertaken in 1990 and the completed project was ready for play by the end of the following year. In 1993, the old club folded but the new club management has gone from strength to strength ever since. Utsikten-Kvinesdal The only new entry appears at #28 and it’s the woodland course at Utsikten Golfpark, overlooking the town of Kvinesdal and the magnificent Fedafjord which runs south from the mouth of the river Kvina to the Listafjorden. It’s a fabulous environment for golf; the wild forest and edge of the moors on one side, with the fjord leading to the ocean on the other. To view the complete detailed list of the Top 30 Golf Courses of Norway click the link. Sweden The Stadium course at Bro Hof Slott Golf Club is our No. 1 course in Sweden for the 6th straight edition of our newly extended Swedish standings, having risen from No. 3 to the chart summit in 2010. Designed by Robert Trent Jones Junior, the course will host the Scandinavian Mixed tournament in June this year, with male and female professionals from the European Tour and Ladies European Tour going head-to-head for one prize fund and one trophy. Bro Hof Slott - Stadium course Advancing seven places to #9, the Östra course at Kristianstads Golfklubb enters the Top 10 ranking tier in Sweden for the first time, after twelve years of fluctuating between #13 and #20. Founded in 1924, Kriastianstad is one of the oldest clubs in the country, starting out with a modest a 9-hole course then evolving into a 36-hole golf facility in the modern era. Kristianstad - Östra course In 1986, it hosted the Kristianstad Open, a Ladies European Tour event featuring stars like Liselotte Neumann, Helen Alfredsson and Laura Davies. In September this year, 126 of the world’s finest professional women golfers will compete in another LET event, the Creekhouse Ladies Open, with a €400,000 prize fund on offer for those taking part. The highest of our new entries makes an appearance at #32 and it’s the Södra course at Skövde Golfklubb, which is the main golfing component of a 27-hole set-up at the club. Architect Christian Lundin of reGOLF has recently completed a rebuild of the original Peter Nordwall design, using contractor Nelson & Vecchio to grass the layout with fescue and encourage the ground game wherever possible, improving the overall playing experience for every standard of golfer. Skövde - Södra course To view the complete detailed list of the Top 70 Golf Courses of Sweden click the link. Jim McCann Editor Top 100 Golf Courses

Top 100 Golf Courses updates its Nordic rankings 2018 In a repeat of what we did when we re-ranked the Nordic countries two years ago, we’re issuing a joint news release for the five Northern European countries that we cover in this region – namely Iceland, Finland, Norway, Denmark and Sweden. More observant browsers might also notice we’ve increased the Swedish chart to a Top 60 so we now feature a total of 170 Nordic courses, eighteen of which also appear in our Continental Europe Top 100. Golf in these five nations dates as far back to 1888, when Edward Milner set out a 6-hole course for the Sager family within the Ryfors private estate, which lies 27 km northwest of Jönköping in Sweden. A few years later, Milner’s son extended the course to a 9-hole layout and it remained in operation until 1920. Ryfors Golf Club was formed in 1988 to mark the hundredth anniversary of the course’s formation and a new 18-hole course was laid out on the same estate. These days, more than nine hundred clubs look after the golfing needs of almost 900,000 registered players in the Nordic countries, where the game appears to be just as popular as it ever was. According to KPMG in its Golf Participation Report for Europe 2017, it reckoned there had been an increase in affiliated golf membership of just under 1% across the combined five countries for the period 2015-16. The report showed that Sweden was Europe’s leading light for junior golfers as it has 46,000 young people signed up, and the Swedes also register the 3rd highest number of female golfers, a total of 118,000 women. Nordic nations also led the way within the Top 10 European markets in terms of participation rate relative to the number of registered golfers in 2016. Iceland and Sweden occupied 1st and 2nd place, Denmark and Finland were ranked 5th and 6th, with Norway in 8th place. Iceland The 18-hole Hvaleyrarvöllur course at Golfklúbburinn Keilir is still the number 1 track in Iceland. It’s a totally unique design, with the front nine routed across an ancient lava field and the back nine set out on a small promontory at the entrance of Hafnarfjordur harbour, with spectacular views across to Snaefellsjokull glacier and the Alftanes peninsula. Back in June last year, a reviewer expressed concern about the fairways of the club’s 9-hole Sveinskotsvllur layout sitting dangerously close to the back nine on the main course but, in fairness, any misgivings he had were alleviated somewhat by the “joy in playing the front nine Lava course” which was “definitely an experience and an adventure you must play.” A couple of courses make upward moves in the new national Top 10, both of them rising two places. Golfklúbbur Vestmannaeyja (our new number 2) is the third oldest golf club in Iceland (founded with a 9-hole layout in 1938) and its present-day course is host to the annual Volcano Open. Golfklúbburinn Leynir (at number 4) is the other climber and the club, which celebrated its fiftieth year in business during 2015, is where Iceland’s first European Tour professional, Birgir Leifur Hafporsson, plays when he’s at home. We have one new entry and it’s the 12-hole layout at Golfklúbbur Brautarholt at number 9. Designed by Edwin Roald, the course was only extended to its current configuration last year, with the addition of three new holes. Roald, one of the more progressive thinkers in the world of golf course architecture, questions why we always seem to impose either a 9-hole or 18-hole design on a property when perhaps the best solution is setting out a course with its own unique number of holes, based entirely on local conditions – hence the 12 holes at Brautarholt. Rank/ To view further details of the Iceland Top 10 click the link. Finland This is the fifth time we’ve reappraised the listings for Finland which were first published in 2008. Retaining the position it has held in all previous editions, the South East course at Kytäjä Golf remains as the national number 1. Designed by Canadian architect Thomas McBroom, the course forms only 50% of the golfing component at a wonderful 36-hole facility located an hour’s drive north of Helsinki. With the front nine playing through forested terrain and the back nine laid out alongside Lake Kytäjä, it’s very much a game of two halves at this enchanting new millennium track. Sixty kilometres further north, the course at Linna Golf is still in the number 2 position. A Tim Lobb design from when he worked at European Golf Design in 2004, this course has hosted a number of important international amateur and professional events, the most recent of which was the European Tour Properties Senior Classic last June. The course advanced fifteen spots to number 74 in our Continental Europe Top 100 last month, with Kytäjä (South East) falling eight places to number 61 in the same standings so some might surmise the gap at the top of the Finnish table has just got a little tighter. There are three new entries in our Finland Top 30 with the highest debutant, the Rock course at the 36-hole Nokia River Golf facility, making a big splash at number 13. Laid out on the edge of Lake Kulovesi, near Tampere, this 18-hole layout only opened in September 2016 as a redesign of an older course by Lassi Pekka Tilander. The architect added eleven new holes to seven existing holes from the former 27-hole complex to fashion a new 18-hole course and these fairways now sit alongside eighteen of the old holes in the newly named River course. To view further details of the Finland Top 30 click the link. Norway The big news for Norway is that it has a new number 1 course, the much celebrated Lofoten Links (rising nineteen places from number 20), which also entered our European Top 100 at number 51 last month. Something of a labour of love for architect Jeremy Turner, who transformed a basic 6-hole track on the remote island of Gimsøya in the far north of the country into one of the best 18-hole links layouts on the continent, the course occupies a fabulous coastal setting, with one reviewer saying “the views are just gorgeous to the extent that the golf is almost incidental”. It’s a bit of trek to play here (and that’s really an understatement) but we think it’s one worth making for the intrepid golfer who fancies a mid-summer midnight match on the links inside the Arctic Circle. Another couple of courses move up the table within the Top 10. The first of these is Kongsvinger (up four to number 4), a Peter Nordwall-designed tree-lined track located an hour and a half’s drive northeast of Oslo, and the second one is Nøtterøy, situated a 90-minute drive in the opposite direction from the capital in the heart of Vestfold, where the aforementioned Jeremy Turner carved out the eighteen fairways from a largely forested landscape in 2003. Further down the chart, two more courses enjoy a positive impact on their new Norwegian standings: Kragerø (up seven to 20), a coastal resort course where a relaxing game of cart golf is often the norm for visiting players and Tyrifjord (up five to 21), which enjoys an idyllic location on the small island of Storøya in Tyrifjorden Lake, with a terrific mix of woodland and seaside holes laid out on an undulating property. There are two newcomers to the new Norwegian rankings, both of them appearing in the final two positions at number 29 and 30. The course at Valdres (#29) is a lovely 9-hole layout from the prolific Jeremy Turner, set out on the southern edge of the Aurdalsfjorden, where six of the holes actually touch the water’s edge. The course at Haga Golfklubb (#30) has been renovated recently by Johan Benestam (with the architect upgrading drainage and bunkering) and the Gul and Rød nines at this 27-hole facility make the cut in our revised national Top 30. To view further details of the Norway Top 30 click the link. Denmark The Old course at The Scandinavian holds onto its number 1 status in our Top 40 for Denmark – just! The Robert Trent Jones Jnr design took over the top spot from Lübker in 2014 and has managed to stay ahead of the pack since then, despite intense pressure from other contenders. A couple of the Top 100 Team visited The Scandinavian recently and were impressed by what they found: “built on an epic scale, with an absolutely fabulous, cathedral-like modern clubhouse at the epicentre of a beautiful 500-acre property, the Scandinavian is home to a pair of ravishing Robert Trent Jones Jnr 18-hole courses that epitomise new money, high-end golf at its very best”. It’s certainly the best 36-hole venue in Danish golf but for how long will the Old course remain the #1 layout? We ask that question because it was almost ousted from its lofty position during the current re-ranking process by a new kid on the golfing block, Great Northern, which only opened last summer, and it makes its chart debut in the runner-up position. This 27-hole facility is a big budget, no-expense-spared development from Nicklaus Design that careered into our Continental Europe Top 100 at number 27 last month, the second highest new entry in ten years of publishing that particular chart. A few of the Top 100 Team played the course last year, attracting comments like “absolutely top drawer” and “perfectly polished”. Expect to see prestigious tournaments played here in the near future as this is a club with big ambitions, both on and off the course. The leading six courses in our Danish Top 40 make it into the European hundred, so there’s no doubt about the top quality of golf to be found in the Jutland peninsula. Further down the listings, three courses make noteworthy progress: Hvide Klit, the most northerly course in the country (up three to number 17), Aalborg, the second oldest club in Denmark (up five to number 21), and Royal Oak, which was laid out on the west bank of Lake Jels by Jens Malling and Per Gundtoft in the early 1990s (up five to number 29). To view further details of the Denmark Top 40 click the link. Sweden The top six positions remain unaltered from our 2016 ranking revision for Sweden, so that means the Stadium course at Bro Hof Slott is still our number 1 course for this country, a position it has held since 2010. Host venue for five of the last eight editions of the European Tour’s Nordea Masters event, the Stadium layout is a Robert Trent Jones Jnr design which has definite appeal for golfers who prefer their golf experience to be as near perfect as possible, as recently articulated by a reviewer who described the Stadium thus: “always top notch… impeccably maintained… as good as it can get” and he went on to say: “the clubhouse is by far the nicest in Sweden and the spa and locker rooms are what you would expect”. Entering the Top 10 for the first time as it leaps four places to number 12 (also retaining its membership of the European Top 100 at #100), the course at Vallda Golf & Country Club near Kungsbacka lies 30 kilometres south of Gothenburg, where Martin Hawtree laid out the fairways in the style of a fast-running heathland track. In the words of the architect, the course has been set out using design components such as “characteristic bunkers and intriguing rolling greens (and) water features to challenge the players on several holes with multiple options for reaching the green.” It’s a great place to practice your ground game around greens that are boldly bunkered and cleverly contoured. Further down the standings, two courses make exceptional eight-place jumps into the top half of the table: the first of these is at Torekovs Golfklubb (at number 24), where a couple of holes on the 18-hole layout at the end of the Bjäre peninsula touch the coastline, and the second is LinksGolf Öland (at number 28), formerly known as Grönhögen. It's located on Öland, the second largest Swedish island, and the layout had a makeover from former European Tour professional Pierre Fulke in 2004. The first of our twelve new entries (we’ve expanded the chart to a Top 60 so two courses – Vaxjo and Hooks (Park) – drop out) arrives at number 34 and it’s the Vesterby course at the 54-hole Landerys Golfklubb facility on the southern outskirts of Linköping, where more than 3,500 members play their golf. Located a few kilometres from the golf club’s other two layouts, the Vesterby course was acquired in 2008 and subsequently renovated by architect Johan Benestam, offering golfers a risk and reward strategy from tee to green on almost every hole. To view further details of the Sweden Top 60 click the link. If you think we’ve maybe made a mistake with one (or more) or our Nordic rankings then please feel free to let us know about it. There could be a course that we’ve left out that should be included or maybe there’s one registered that should be immediately de-listed. Perhaps we should be bringing a particular layout back down to earth with a bump or, on the other hand, elevating one that’s been sitting too far down for too long. No matter your opinion, we’d be glad to hear from you so please click the “Respond to this article” link at the top or bottom of this page to submit your feedback. Jim McCann Editor Top 100 Golf Courses