Our final round in Houston turned out to be my favorite round of the trip! Originally, our week of golf looked quite a bit different. The original plan was to travel outside Texas but we scrapped that for some more budget-friendly courses here in Texas.
As soon as I knew that we were now looking to stay in Texas to golf I got excited about playing the Tournament Course at the Golf Club of Houston! One of my golf goals this year was to play a course the PGA Tour plays, so I made sure to snag us a tee time on the Tournament Course. For $55 per person, I might add!
The Tournament Course is where the PGA Tour held the Houston Open (formerly the Shell Houston Open) for many years the week before the Masters. However, when the PGA Tour revamped their schedule they moved the Houston Open from April to October. And, this is the last year the event will be at the Golf Club of Houston. Next year the event is scheduled to move to Memorial Park Golf Course.
While I’m sad to see the tournament moved to October the timing worked out perfectly for us to play here. As you’ll see in my pictures the course was in full preparation mode for the upcoming tournament! Many grandstands were up, conditions were pristine and generally speaking, the course looked like the place I’ve seen on TV for many years! Well, almost everything looked the same – the ryegrass overseed is missing this time of year.
After playing here it is easy to see why the Tournament Course was popular with the PGA players before Augusta. The course has tons of width off the tee, forces you to hit solid iron shots to score and has some Augusta vibes when it comes to the presentation – with beautiful bunkering and some pine trees. Visually, it was a course that had me forgetting I was in Texas!
As you might expect, the tournament tees were closed for the upcoming tournament. However, the blues (72.5/140/6571) still allowed us to get a taste of the shots that the pros face around here. I’ve always thought it would be neat to play the 5th, 7th, 16th and 18th, most of which are water holes! Considering all the water in play I was surprised at how fair the course played.
The 5th is the #1 handicap and has the toughest drive on the course. Water is all down the left side on this 391 yard par-4 so naturally, I ended up way right in a low area! The 7th is a short par-3 with more water to the left and some interesting bunkers, in a shell-looking formation that surround the green.
The 16th, another par-3, is made tons cooler with all the grandstands. I remember watching Patrick Reed race his caddie to the green after a hole in one a few years back. That green has an elevated back tier and somehow my long birdie putt ended up dropping, for my own personal triumph!
The 18th is a strong closing par-4 where there has been plenty of PGA drama over the years. It plays 487 yards from the tips with water again all down the left side.
In case you couldn’t tell I had a blast at the Tournament Course and would highly recommend it. In fact, I’d rank my round here among my favorite golf experiences (Bethpage Black, Old White TPC and TPC Scottsdale’s Tournament Course for example).
However, there isn’t a ton of significance architecturally speaking to the course. I’m okay with that, but I know some won’t be. Rees Jones and David Toms designed the Tournament Course – for those curious – and like many of the tour courses that I’ve played the design doesn’t really capture your attention. I found the greens to have minor breaks and the course seemed routed for players, fans and media to move around efficiently. There aren’t any homes in play and thankfully not a bunch of Rees Jones mounding off the fairways.
I always love playing a tour course and the Tournament Course at the Golf Club of Houston was no exception. I’ll look forward to watching the pros play here one final time!
Course Pictures (click any picture to scroll through the gallery):