Happy New Year! Welcome to our December BiteSize update, which is headlined by our latest 2016 USA Top 100. There’s a new number one and eight new entries within this stellar ranking list from the country that owns almost half of the world’s 34,000 golf facilities. Naturally this is one of the toughest lists to assemble and it’s bound to split opinion, so don’t sit on your hands, let us know what you think – don’t be shy.

This month we’ve also released our first ever Second Hundred Golf Courses of the World. We preview the challengers for the 2018 World Top 100 and take a look at the layouts that missed out in 2016.

Also in this edition we unveil our latest Continental European Top 100. This particular list is the hardest of all to create as we’ve yet to connect with anyone who has played them all. If you’ve played 50% or more of the courses on our European list, please get in touch, you’re doing way better than most of us.

Our Editor has been in the air and on the road visiting the Balearic Islands and Morocco. His accounts of these adventures are also included in this edition. His Moroccan trip culminated in a complete revision of the national rankings and his Majorcan encounter resulted in significant changes to the Balearic standings.

Finally, we’ve released our 2016 Iberian rankings for both Spain and Portugal. These two winter golfing destinations are incredibly popular with European travellers and both lists are therefore essential guides for any future trips to Iberia.

Each of the previous five editions of this ranking list featured Pine Valley at the top of the chart. Those that have been following our recent re-ranking releases will already know that Cypress Point has displaced Pine Valley from the top of the World rankings. Therefore it will be no surprise to hear that Cypress heads our new US list.

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We’ve focused this Second Hundred Golf Courses of the World feature on forty highlighted challengers, but it’s feasible that any of the hundred courses listed at the end of this article could make the next World Top 100. It’s also viable that numerous other courses could also make the grade. If you think we’ve missed a layout from our current World Top 100 or from our Second Hundred let us know.

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It seems inconceivable that only two courses from Continental Europe have recently been listed in our 2016 World Top 100. The main reason for this is that it’s a real labour of love for any golfer to travel to so many different countries with their sticks in tow. It could take a lifetime to visit each country in Continental Europe let alone play every one of the contender courses in more than forty different countries.

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At the moment, we feature a dozen courses from the Balearic Islands, which represents only 10% of the Spanish layouts in our regional and national charts. It may be only a small fraction of the overall number of Iberian tracks that we promote but it’s an important cluster, attracting an ever-growing number of golfers who visit the islands every year.

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We knew there was a lot going on in Morocco. After our last reported visit to the country three and a half years ago, our Moroccan news article at the time mentioned we were aware of several compelling new developments, particularly around Marrakech. It seemed like a good idea to find out for ourselves exactly the state of play on the ground and so we revisited the Red City earlier this month.

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According to the latest statistics from the Portuguese Golf Federation, there are around one hundred 18-hole courses in play within the 82 golf facilities that operate around the country. We’ve been ranking courses in this part of the Iberian Peninsula since 2008 so this is the 5th biennial edition of our Portuguese Top 40 chart.

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First and foremost, the Stadium layout at PGA Catalunya remains in the top spot. The course ousted Real Valderrama from the number 1 slot four years ago and it’ll retain pole position for at least another two years. Owner Denis O’Brien might not be best pleased that his resort didn’t succeed in its recent bid to host the 2022 Ryder Cup but life goes on regardless and it was possibly the correct decision to award the matches to a European country that had yet to hold the event.

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Top 100 Golf Courses of Scotland 2016-2017 has been published in Kindle format, which can be enjoyed on any device with Kindle’s free App. This latest title in the Top 100 series is jam-packed full of previously unreleased material and it includes an insight from our Editor and Scottish Correspondent, Jim McCann, who has played every layout in the Scottish hundred. If you like what we do, then please help to support Top 100 and purchase a copy of our latest title… it’s only $9.99 so it won’t break the bank.

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