Maidenhead

Founded on Saturday, 12th December 1896, Maidenhead Golf Club secured the lease on a substantial number of acres from W. H. Grenfell, the local mayor, on which the initial course was laid out, with professional Alex Simpson from Forfar looking after the upkeep of the new course.

In 1908, J. H. Taylor, who’d secured three of his five Open victories by that time, was brought in to advise on the layout, suggesting it should be considerably increased in length by seven hundred yards and have seventeen new bunkers added to tighten up the challenge.

Immediately after World War II, the club formed a 'Bunkers Sub-committee' to help with the club’s efforts to restore the course to the position it was in before the war – and their efforts amounted to hiring a bulldozer to remove 26 of the sand hazards.

Nowadays, the course extends to 6,338 yards from the back markers, playing to a par of 70, with only two par fives on the card at the 9tth and 17th. Feature holes include short par fours at the 5th and 12th, along with the only par three on the front nine at the 195-yard 6th.

In recent years, there’s been strong speculation that the club will move from its current 130-acre location to a former landfill site in Fifield, surrendering its long-term lease to the Royal Borough for a multi-million pound sum that will finance the relocation.