gutter credit tkIt’s not that Pebble Beach
doesn’t face competition from
other great public courses.
The top 15 on our latest public
ranking also are members of
America’s 100 Greatest, and
another 20 of our top public
courses are ranked on Ameri-
ca’s Second 100 Greatest. But
it’s hard to beat Pebble Beach’s
combination of locale (nine
holes strung along California’s
Carmel Bay), memorable holes
(the par-3 seventh, the ocean-
cove eighth, the parabolic par-5
18th along the sea) and champi-
onship history.
Our 100 Greatest Public
ranking is from almost 70,000
ballots filed by Golf Digest’s
panel of more than 1,700 low-
handicap male and female golf-
ers. They played and evaluatedPhotographs by Dom Furore
HAS A 100-YEAR-OLD CHAMPION
EVER LOOKED SO GOOD?Pebble Beach
Golf Links celebrates a century of existence this year by hosting
the U.S. Open June 13-16 and by retaining its spot atop Golf
Digest’s biennial ranking of America’s 100 Greatest Public Golf
Courses. Pebble Beach has been No. 1 among America’s public
courses in every Golf Digest ranking since our public-course
list debuted in 2003. It also has been the primary public-access
exemplar on our biennial rankings of America’s 100 Greatest
Golf Courses, a member every time since 1966, one of just 22
courses to hold that distinction. It has never been out of the
top 10 on our 100 Greatest, never ranked lower than seventh,
and for one glorious period, from 2001-’02, it knocked off Pine
Valley to become the No. 1 course among all those in America.