Course ranking on rise

Horsham Golf Club is continuing its march back into the forefront of Australian golfers’ minds, after winning top 100 Golf Australia recognition last week.

Golf Australia magazine’s biennial top-100 public-access Australian courses has become an industry standard for the national golf-course ranking system that considers all Australian courses that have offered tee times for non-member golfers at least five days a week.

Horsham Golf Club was ranked the 74th best course in the nation out of 1500 public-access courses across Australia.

The club has climbed 17 spots since the magazine’s previous ranking two years ago.

Golf Australia rankings judge Craig Smart said Horsham’s course had ‘improved noticeably during the past few years and it must now be considered as offering one of the best value-for-money rounds in the country’.

Horsham Golf Club president Gerard Bardell said it was ‘wonderful’ to see the course back within Golf Australia’s top-75 ranked courses.

“There are opportunities for the club to push the course into the top 50 across the next few years,” he said.

“We have had a strong focus on the quality of our course during the past five years, but it has always had a quality layout.

“The club has a strategic plan to keep growing, and we are following that through. It was nice to see that plan recognised by these reviewers.”

Mr Bardell said there was still ‘plenty of work to do’ for the club to have its course become a mainstay of the ranking’s top 50, and the club had spoken with course architects about ‘simple’ and ‘inexpensive’ changes that could help with the club’s rankings rise.

“It will always be a team effort at the club, and our members, sponsors and staff, have all pitched in to grab these amazing results,” he said.

Golf Australia rated Cape Wickham Links at King Island, Tasmania, the number-one course nationally.