National Golf Club of Canada - Ontario - Canada

The National Golf Club of Canada is an exclusive men-only club and naturally, in this day and age, eyebrows are raised. But usually, the course is in the spotlight for the right reasons and that’s because it’s one of the world’s most demanding courses. It’s just a pity that more people can’t enjoy the experience.

In 1976, George Fazio was hired to design National Canada and his aspiring young nephew Tom assisted him. The brief was to create one of the toughest courses in the world and they have certainly achieved the objective. Tom Fazio returned recently to ensure that this course remained true to his uncle’s original brief.

With narrow, undulating and tree-lined fairways, it’s easy to see on the surface why The National Golf Club of Canada is so tough, but the more formidable challenge arrives at the greens. Far too many superlatives have been used to describe them. These putting surfaces are among the best in North America and they are prone to the Jekyll and Hyde syndrome. Sometimes they’re subtle tricky to read and sometimes they are wickedly borrowed and viciously quick.

Get your best putting boots ready and if you do get the call up to play at The National Golf Club of Canada, see if you can threaten Lee Trevino’s 67, which he posted on his way to winning the 1979 Canadian PGA Championship. We are sure that these scary greens will protect Lee’s course record for some time to come.

"For three decades, The National was rated the #1 course in Canada by a magazine poll,” commented Tom Doak in The Confidential Guide to Golf Courses, “a result clearly at odds with our own ratings… It’s tough and it’s in great condition, but the same is true of hundreds of other courses. The land is too handsome and diverse for there not to be more memorable holes here… In the end, it just amazes me that a couple of promotional events at the club’s beginning could keep it in the limelight for so long.”