
INTRODUCTION TO THE COURSE WITH LINKS TO THE COURSE GUIDE AND PRO SHOP
The Early Years
The first recorded mention of playing golf in Nairn dates from 1797. A hundred or so years later, and twelve years after the forming of The ‘Nairn Golf Club’, a second course in the popular holiday town of Nairn, the ‘Nairn Dunbar’ was formed in 1899, with 9 holes on pretty much the same area of land as the current course exists on today. With an additional nine holes being created and various changes to the routings taking place over the last 125 years, the course we see today was finally settled on. Whilst the other course in the western area of the town ‘The Nairn Golf Club’, was in its early days played almost exclusively by the ‘Gentleman of the period’, the ‘Dunbar’ to the east of the town was very much for the working classes of Nairn, and thus offered the opportunity for them to play the game at an affordable cost.
The early years for Nairn Dunbar were at best challenging, but with fortitude and determination, the club weathered those early years and quickly started to prosper and grow in popularity, increasing its membership in the following years and soon establishing itself as a fine, and well used course. Whilst the look and layout of the course adapted to the environmental changes around it, due to new housing and commercial developments. The course flourished from the enthusiastic efforts of the committees, members and greenkeeping staff who constantly adapted the layout in regards to the routing of the holes, while also bringing many changes in the very nature of the environment the course is sited on, some natural and fitting, but with the addition of many trees the original links land was less easily seen. Indeed the course spent a good number of its years, looking and playing very different to the original look and feel of the course back in those very early years, when indeed, nothing separated the links from the sea, but sand and dunes.
The course today, has over a number of years returned much closer to those original true links. There are however, still a large number of tree’s on the current layout, which would for some, raise the question of how true a Scottish traditional links Nairn Dunbar is to a purist lover of traditional classic Scottish links. But there is little doubt, that the golf course now exhibits many links aspects, in its new links grasses, its firm fairways and fast true running greens when the right conditions allow. While there is still work to be done, to return the course ever closer to its original links character. There is no doubt that the links golf now being enjoyed at Nairn Dunbar will usually provide a proper test to the golfers who play here, and especially so if the wind should blow.
Professionals View
A Greenkeepers Perspective
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Email: office@nairndunbar.com
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Address
Nairn Dunbar Golf Club
Lochloy Road, Nairn, IV12 5AE
Tel: 01667 452741
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