The Ocean Course at Kiawah Island

The Ocean Course at Kiawah Island is the Pete Dye layout built for a single event, the 1991 Ryder Cup, and carved from barrier-island marshland in eighteen months along South Carolina's Atlantic coast. That week became the War by the Shore, decided by Bernhard Langer's missed six-foot putt on the 18th green. The course has been testing nerve ever since.

At 7,937 yards with a course rating of 79.6 and a slope of 155, this is among the longest and most difficult resort courses in the United States. The defining variable is wind. The course sits on an exposed coastline where the Atlantic pushes air across the fairways with little to interrupt it, and Dye elevated most holes above the surrounding dunes and marsh, a deliberate decision that amplified wind exposure and created ocean sightlines from every hole. Ten holes run directly along the shoreline. All eighteen offer Atlantic views, a distinction no other course in the Northern Hemisphere can match. The front nine plays in one direction along the coast and the back returns the other way, so the wind that helped you for nine becomes the adversary for the next nine. Bunkers are deep and irregular. Waste areas of crushed shell and sand border many fairways. Greens are large by Dye's standards but contoured with subtle breaks and false fronts.

Osprey Point and Turtle Point are excellent resort courses. The Ocean Course is a championship venue that happens to accept resort guests.