I've Had This Golf Course On My Bucket List For Seven Years... And It Completely Blew Me Away

Early on in my journey working in the golf industry I became aware of Sentosa Golf Club and it has been on my bucket list ever since. I finally managed to tick it off recently during a vacation to Singapore and South East Asia, where I got to play the club's iconic Serapong Course.

The Serapong is regarded as Singapore's greatest course and renowned as one of Asia's best, too. We think it's one of the world's most incredible golf courses. It recently won Singapore’s, Asia’s, and the World’s Best Golf Course awards at the World Golf Awards, too.

It has hosted multiple Singapore Opens, with the both The Serapong and The Tanjong courses taking turns in hosting the HSBC Women's World Championship since 2013. It also played host to the 2023 LIV Golf Singapore event won by Talor Gooch.

The Serapong opened in 1982 and was the brainchild of Californian architect Ron Fream, who has designed dozens of courses across the world including Tanah Merah's Garden Course on the Singapore mainland.

For those unaware of Sentosa itself, it's an island to the south of the city that is essentially a place of recreation. It's small and home to the golf club as well as Universal Studios Singapore, a waterpark, a number of hotels, beaches and other activities like a 'luge' downhill karting experience and a hub for the cable cart. It's easily accessible via a road bridge, the cable cart or a monorail.

Transport on the island is also completely free and Sentosa Golf Club is one of the stops on the free bus, it couldn't be more convenient.

Once you arrive at the grand clubhouse, you're greeted by a caddymaster ready to take your clubs before you walk into a reception area where helpful staff are able to assist you with your booking and your locker key. It was a pleasant welcome versus your traditional empty entrance at European clubs where you're usually left to find your own way. 

The locker rooms are seriously impressive, with hundreds of lockers (I had three-time Singapore Open winner Adam Scott's locker), refreshments, memorabilia and excellent facilities including a steam room. First impressions are important and Sentosa's first impressions are 'wow'.

The reception area features signed clubs from every single professional winner at Sentosa through the years, from Adam Scott to Sergio Garcia, Inbee Park to Paula Creamer, Jin Young Ko, Ian Poulter and many others. They've each signed a club and ball from their victories. The reception and corridors are a museum in themselves and you can easily spend half an hour taking it all in and reading the impressive honors boards.

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The veranda area is vast and has views out onto The Tanjong course, which looks to be a treelined routing that is more favored by the members to the demanding and showpiece Serapong. It has hosted the majority of the HSBC Women's World Championships.

The outdoor area features robot waiters, TVs showing the golf (including the day's green speeds - never seen that before!) and an impressive menu - I'd recommend the chicken katsu rice. The feel of the place isn't stuffy at all and gives an interesting insight into the golf culture in Singapore, and probably Asia too. It's tough to describe the vibes other than relaxed and golf mad, and the number of women certainly seemed to be higher than we'd see in Europe, perhaps evidence that there is less of a divide in Asia. Myself and my partner noticed this in the golf stores too in both Singapore and Thailand - women seem much better catered for on this side of the world.

The Serapong is a short cart drive away with its own clubhouse and excellent halfway hut, and it gets underway with a strong dogleg-right par 4. The key defence of the course is its bunkering. I genuinely found more bunkers around the Serapong in a single round than I can remember, and the lush bermuda grass makes it a very stern test for those not used to it.

The 1st green is flanked by impressive, man-made waterfalls and the downhill par 3 2nd is where the iconic views of the Singapore Straits start to come into play. Hole three is another strong par 4, again with stunning views, where you're faced with a downhill dogleg-left before the course's two signature holes.

The 4th is a split-fairway dogleg-left par 5 that wraps around a huge lake before the straight par 4 5th takes you to the corner of the property and has jaw-dropping views of the city including the world famous Marina Bay Sands hotel.

I'm writing this all by memory some two weeks later - it's notable that I remember every single hole of the Serapong Course. There's really not a weak hole.

Six is a stunning par 4 that plays along the water to the right, with one of the tougher drives on the course where it almost forces you to play down the right towards the water due to bunkers down the left, which I obviously found.

It doglegs left before you head to the par 5 7th that plays all along the water too. Eight is a par 3, a stern test playing uphill before the 9th that heads back up to the clubhouse with a huge lake to the right, playing parallel to the 18th hole across the water.

The front nine is truly exhilarating and you'd be forgiven to think that the back nine won't be anywhere near as good. Spoiler alert - it is.

After the water-filled front nine with views to die for, it was actually 10-12 that were some of my favorite holes. They play within mature trees and feel really old school.

The 10th is a short, downhill par 4, 11 is a dogleg-right par 4 with a huge green and drop off to the front-right and 12 is a slightly downhill, long par 5. It's a real two-tee start course where either nine could be played first. I think the routing is best as it currently is as the 18th is a better closing hole than the 9th, giving the course a stronger finish.

Once you come out of the mature trees, the 13th is a dogleg-right around a lake, with views of the Straits coming into play again. The bunkering is impressive off the tee down the left before you play into the green where you can just about make out Shrek's Far Far Away castle poking through the trees, yes you read that right, from the nearby Universal Studios - it's very cool, especially if you are going there the next day like we were.

The 14th is one of the standout holes on the course, with the short par 3 playing right along the water again with a lake short and right. Opposite to the front nine, water is on your left side as the routing takes the west side of the property vs the east side for the front.

It's almost a triangle layout with the front nine going out to the right before coming in and the back nine staying left and coming back in parallel to the front.

The par 4 15th follows the spectacular par 3, again playing right along the water before the 16th turns back towards the clubhouse. It's an impressive dogleg-left and plays over a fast-running stream to the green that is flanked by gorgeous flowering. 

Bryson DeChambeau is said to have driven this green during the LIV Golf event according to one of the local caddies - that's mightily impressive as I went driver-8 iron.

The 17th is a short par 3 heading back out to the water, again with huge bunkers that I found, before the epic finishing hole. The long par 5 flanks the water left and is heavily bunkered before the vast green in front of the Serapong clubhouse.

It's a truly spectacular golf course and its easy to see why it's regarded so highly. The views and variety throughout ensure you have serious fun out there but the bunkering makes it extremely difficult to make a score. It's a ball striker's course in that regard but you need a sharp short game too with the huge, undulating greens. Golfers from the likes of Florida and southern Europe will be well accustomed to the bermuda grass, which is an added test if you play your golf in the UK or colder climates.

The golf club is grand, historic (dating back to 1974 when Singapore's late Prime Minister Mr Lee Kuan Yew opened it) and very well renowned, especially in Asia, making it a bucket list destination for me and a must-play for any serious golfer heading out to Singapore.

I feel very lucky to have ticked off the Serapong, and now will make it my goal to tee it up on The Tanjong next time I'm in Singapore.

Go and play Sentosa, you won't regret it.