Long Island National

Long Island features a collection of golf courses that is the envy of most nations, so why not add a Long Island National Golf Club to the mix? Robert Trent Jones II completed the Riverhead design just prior to the new millennium.

Although these days it is Friar’s Head, just down the road, that draws most of the praise for its wide expanses of sand, Long Island National certainly got the regional trend started. Players will come across a number of enormous sand hazards that spread themselves between multiple holes; early on, they’ll contend with a trap that runs nearly 200 yards along the left of both Nos. 2 and 3.

At the end of both nines, they’ll try to avoid a more natural-seeming waste area that infringes on both the par three No. 9 and the par five No. 18. The former, a relatively short hole (165 yards), will threaten players who go either left or long with a sandy demise. The latter, a relatively long hole (615 yards) brings this same sand hazard into play along the green, after players have already battled against a separate sandy monolith off the tee along the right.