Killarney Golf Club

This lovely Johannesburg course is laid out on a narrow strip of prime parkland immediately to the north of Killarney Shopping Center and hard alongside the M1 motorway which links Johannesburg and Pretoria. Through the course runs a massive storm-water drain; a feature put to optimal strategic use on all of 10 holes. The original layout was an early Grimsdell design, but in the 1960s nine holes were expropriated for the mall and motorway and a new nine, designed by Robert Trent Jones Jr, opened in 1970. He laid down the first bent grass greens in South Africa, pioneering what has become mandatory on all our finest highveld courses.

Killarney was a regular tournament venue up to early 1980s and returned to the SA Tour roster with the 1998 Vodacom Player Championship. The course is unusual in having only two par fives (hence its par of 70), though both are beautiful and prime examples of the risk-reward principle. Down the left of the 5th runs the aforementioned concrete hazard, down the right, the boundary fence. In the front of the sloping green is a large pond-take the challenges on at your own peril. The 15th is not dissimilar. Though even more spectacular: on the left you have the hazard, right the fence, the green pinched between pond, bunkers and concrete drain. These holes typify Killarney’s repeating demand for accuracy. Other memorable challenges are the par-four 8th and 9th holes and the lovely short 14th, played from elevated tee over water to a receptive but well bunkered green.

Killarney is justly famed for the quality of its catering and its newly renovated and extended bar, which overlooks the grandstand-finishing hole, a water-guarded ‘character’ par four.