Tournament Players Club

Tournament Players Club of Myrtle Beach

The Tournament Players Club of Myrtle Beach is an 18 hole course located on highway 707 in Murrells Inlet.  The TPC of Myrtle Beach gives all of its golfers the chance to see and feel what it is like to be inside the ropes of a tour caliber course. With mature trees lining all the fairways, bunkers guarding the elevated greens and natural hazard gobbling up wary shots this is one of the favorites in Myrtle Beach.

TPC of Myrtle Beach, sometimes the intrinsic value of a golf course is about more than strategic refinement and philosophical representations of playability and shot values. In other words, dare we say it, a golf course embodies more than just a test of golf.   In some instances, a course appeases reticent instinctual requirements. It appeals to the senses, to our mandatory bonds with nature.  So it is at the Tournament Players Club of Myrtle Beach, which weaves a marvelous challenge through a visually pleasing labyrinth of natural wonder.

A craftsman with a penchant for building gorgeous golf holes, Tom Fazio predictably fashioned a national wetlands conservation area in the inland town of Murrells Inlet, SC, into a golf course that caresses our visceral pangs. But the TPC of Myrtle Beach is as challenging and strategically sound as any golf course you come across, thanks to the additional input from design associate Lanny Wadkins. The Tournament Players Club of Myrle Beach has been the host to the Senior Tour Championship. This club affords you the privileges of testing your game on the same course where some of golf's greatest figures have played.& But it offers so much more. Certified in the Audubon Cooperative Sanctuary Program, the TPC of Myrtle Beach is simply a visual delight, one of the most scenic on the Grand Strand.

Give Fazio credit for taking a picturesque parcel of land and squelching his tendency to overwork a property with his bulldozers. He and Wadkins directed the movement of a mere 300,000 cubic yards of earth, yet the property features 35 feet of elevation change in the Carolina Low Country. Traditional southern water features and wetlands permeate the property; wetlands come into play on 11 holes. Towering pine trees frame many holes. It all makes for a serene setting.   But, in the end, golf is the primary purpose of the TPC experience. For a modern par-72 layout the TPC of Myrtle Beach is not long, just 6,950 yards from the championship tees. But it can be menacing.

The wetlands create formidable carries on several holes, though alternate routes are provided for higher handicap players. More than 70 bunkers, most of them around the medium-large, undulating greens, protect targets. Many fairways have pronounced slopes. To enhance the visual strength of the property, and the playability of the course, most tee boxes are elevated, enabling players to clearly see landing areas. Other free-form bunkers, flashed up and back-tilted, add further definition to Fazio's broad fairways. The par-3s are consistent with the course theme, artful and attractive, but none is longer than 205 yards. The 17th, featuring a peninsula green, is arguably the boldest and most beautiful. A bunker left connects the water on three sides. A ridge runs along the front third of the green. No. 5 is reminiscent of the 12th at Augusta, which might be no small coincidence given Fazio's recent responsibilities as chief consultant for Augusta National Golf Club in the ongoing renovation of the famed Masters course.

Because of the use of marsh and creeks, the par-5s aren't easily reachable, though the longest is 549 yards. The par-4 ninth is the toughest hole, buttressing a collection of strong four pars. It stretches to 472 yards with a landing area pinched by water and pines.  As with most TPC courses, spectator viewing areas are incorporated into the layout, but here Fazio and Wadkins again eschewed any contrivances, relying on natural ridges and subtle slopes on the periphery that blend with the landscape without obstructing its beguiling attributes – no small feat, but one, among many, Fazio and Wadkins pulled off.  The Tournament Players Club was recently awarded Five Stars by Golf Digest, the only course in Myrtle Beach to receive this honor.  The greens are L-93 bent grass.

Designer – Tom Fazio.

Rating: 74.0 Slope: 145