The Valley course, whilst connected to the Royal Portrush Golf Club, is more closely associated with both the Ladies Club and Rathmore Golf Club, home to GMac, he of Pebble Beach US Open fame. It’s the slightly poor relation to the Dunluce; less of a championship test, but one that’s more accessible, scoreable, and dare I say it, probably more fun for the average golfer.

I visited the course for the first time this April knowing that two of its best holes were stolen to create the Dunluce’s Open routing. I was concerned that this might create a lesser course, but more on that shortly. When looking at the Valley course from up high, whilst playing the Dunluce’s infamous Calamity hole, the Valley doesn’t look like much. What you see below is War Hollow. A relatively flat piece of land that sits within a large valley, hence the course’s name, and where a battle once took place at the start of the 12th Century between the Chieftains of the Route (the home team) and the King of Norway (the away team). Within this valley, around half a dozen holes are located. These are decent holes, quite straight forward in their design and holes you can open your shoulders on, but they aren’t what the course should be characterised by. The 4th is the first hole within the valley and has a green that’s set in front of the large dune that Calamity sits upon, whilst the 5th and 10th have quite excellent green complexes, but it’s outside of this area where the best of the land sits.

The 1st and 2nd play through and around small dunes and provide a relatively soft but pretty opening, whilst the drop shot 3rd is a cute par three, one that you’ll have taken a glimpse of earlier if you’ve warmed up at Royal Portrush’s fine practice facilities. Coming out of the valley, you play the 6th where you're required to thread your ball between two small dunes and over a sunken fairway. The 7th, Cradle, is a cracker of a short par four with a hidden dell for a green site, where a taller dune on the left can obscure the line of sight to the green. The 8th hole then takes you back towards the valley, and is a little madcap in its design. It’s a par five where the line of entry would be best suited from the fairway of the previous hole, but those meanies at Portrush made that line of approach an internal out of bounds. Instead, you need to take the left-hand passage which means the approach to this par five is semi blind, reaching across a huge dip in the land to a tucked green.

Once past the next section of valley holes, the run into the clubhouse is electric. The 13th has a beautiful natural green site with bunkers hidden within swales, whilst the 14th, a short par four, naturally tempts you to correct your line of approach directly towards the green, rather than sensibly playing along the bend of the dogleg. 15 is one of the new holes, and an excellent par three framed by large marram grass covered dunes. This hole plays perpendicular to the angle of the majority of holes on the course.