Grand National, Alabama
- Gunnar Kobin
- 5 days ago
- 4 min read
Robert Trent Jones Sr. supposedly said that Grand National was the single greatest natural site for golf he had ever seen.
Now I don't know if he actually said that or if it's one of those quotes that gets attached to a famous person after the fact to sell green fees. But having played both courses here I'll say this. If he did say it, I understand why.
Grand National sits on 2,000 acres around Lake Saugahatchee near Opelika in eastern Alabama. Auburn University is right down the road. The property has two championship 18-hole courses, the Lake and the Links, plus a short course. It's hosted PGA Tour events, LPGA events, Korn Ferry Tour, NCAA championships. The resume is ridiculous for a public facility in a town most Europeans have never heard of. Golf World readers voted it the number one public golf facility in America at one point. Again, Opelika, Alabama. Population maybe 30,000. You could drive through it without noticing.
We played both courses. Lake in the morning, Links in the afternoon. Same day, 36 holes. By now we'd gotten used to the rhythm of double-course days on the RTJ Trail and honestly it's my favourite way to do it. You get the comparison fresh in your mind and you can feel the difference between two courses rather than just reading about it later.
The Lake goes first because that's the order we played them in.
Twelve of the 18 holes hug the shore of Lake Saugahatchee. That's a lot of water. The PGA Tour's Barbasol Championship was played here from 2015 through 2017 so this is a course that serious tournament golfers have competed on, and you can feel the tournament pedigree in the routing. It's tight. Strategic. Bunkers are placed exactly where you want to hit it, which is infuriating but also means you have to think on every shot. The greens are multi-tiered and big, classic RTJ, and they rolled true.
The par 3s on the Lake are strong. The 15th is an island green. I know, I know. Every golf course review mentions the island green like it's the most original thing in the world. But this one is good. It's not a gimmick. The hole plays over water to a green that's surrounded by it and there's a genuine sense of risk standing on that tee. I hit the green. My partner didn't. His ball made a sound I can still hear.
My issue with the Lake course is that the last few holes feel a bit squeezed in. Holes 15 through 18 get tighter and it starts to feel like the routing ran out of room near the clubhouse. It doesn't ruin anything but after 14 holes of beautiful lakeside golf where everything breathes and flows, the finish is slightly cramped. Minor thing. The Lake is still an excellent course and if we hadn't played the Links afterwards I'd probably have rated it higher in my memory.
But we did play the Links. And the Links is better.
Here's the funny thing. It's not a links course at all. Not even slightly. There's no wind-blasted coastline, no running game, no firm turf. It's carved through pine forest with marsh and water everywhere and forced carries on half the approach shots. I have no idea why they called it the Links. Maybe in 1992 the word links just sounded good on a brochure. Doesn't matter. Whatever you call it, the routing is superb.
The holes don't run parallel to each other which gives you this feeling of being deep in the woods, isolated, each hole its own world. The elevation changes are more pronounced than on the Lake course. You're going up and down through the trees with the occasional glimpse of the lake through the gaps. The doglegs are tighter and more frequent. Some of them are nearly 90 degrees which sounds annoying but actually forces you to shape shots off the tee rather than just hitting it straight and long. The 6th is a par 5 that needs three accurate shots with the third carrying over marsh to the green. It's the kind of hole where par feels like birdie.
And then the 18th. Both the tee shot and the approach have to carry water. The lake is on your left the entire way. The green is on a pedestal above the water. It's one of the strongest finishing holes on the entire Trail. After 17 holes through the forest you come out to this wide open lakeside stage for the finale. It's the finish that the Lake course doesn't quite deliver, which is ironic given the names.
What made Grand National one of the best stops on the trip was something less tangible than hole design though. It was peaceful. Nobody bothered us. No speakers, no drama, no waiting on every tee. The courses were in outstanding shape. The weather cooperated. We just played golf for an entire day in a beautiful setting and nothing went wrong. After some of the earlier experiences on the Trail where loudspeakers and logistical annoyances got in the way, Grand National was the kind of day that reminds you why you travel for golf in the first place.
There's an Auburn Marriott resort on the property which is convenient for a multi-day stay. Capitol Hill is about an hour and a half south so you could easily pair these two stops on a trip. Grand National for a day, drive to Prattville, play the Judge the next morning. That's a strong two-day stretch.
If you're only playing one course at Grand National, play the Links. The Lake is very good and has the stronger tournament pedigree and the island green that everyone photographs. But the Links has better hole variety, more elevation, tighter doglegs that force creativity, and that 18th hole finish. Together they make one of the best 36-hole days available on public golf anywhere in the South.
The food in the clubhouse is the same RTJ menu. You already know.
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