Best Golf Courses In Colorado

The spectacular landscape provides some superb golfing terrain, but which are the best golf courses in Colorado?

Country Club of the Rockies is one of the best golf courses in Colorado
Country Club of the Rockies
(Image credit: CC of the Rockies)

Best Golf Courses In Colorado

Colorado is the eighth largest state of the United States and includes the Rocky Mountains, the Colorado Plateau and the Great Plains. Its diverse and spectacular landscape has given rise to some equally diverse and spectacular golf courses. Here we give you the all the key info on the best golf courses in Colorado.

Ballyneal Golf And Hunt Club

Ballyneal 8th hole

Ballyneal 8th hole

(Image credit: Ballyneal)
  • Location: Hoyloke
  • Designed by: Tom Doak
  • Par: 71
  • Yardage: 7,147 yards
  • Green fee: Private
  • Visit website

This course has no dedicated tee boxes as it copies the early courses where players just teed the ball somewhere near the previous green. The inland course has been laid out among sand dunes and, in the words of its designer Tom Doak, “the player who can control the flight of his ball and who has the imagination to use the force of the wind and the contours of the ground to stop his ball where he wants to – in Scottish terms, the player who knows how to play real golf – will usually prevail.”

The Broadmoor Golf Club (East)

The Broadmoor (East) 18th hole

The Broadmoor (East) 18th hole

(Image credit: Getty Images)
  • Location: Colorado Springs
  • Designed by: Donald Ross; Robert Trent Jones
  • Par: 72
  • Yardage: 7,355 Yards
  • Green fee: $165-$295
  • Visit website

Jack Nicklaus won the first of his two US Amateurs here in 1959. Annika Sorenstam's first Major title, the US Women's Open of 1995, was secured over the East course’s wide, tree-lined fairways and large sloping greens. These putting surfaces are tricky to read so, if in doubt, remember they break normally away from the mountainside.

Castle Pines Golf Club

Castle Pines' 12th hole

Castle Pines' 12th hole

(Image credit: Castle Pines)
  • Location: Castle Rock
  • Designed by: Jack Nicklaus
  • Par: 72
  • Yardage: 7,701 Yards
  • Green fee: Private
  • Visit website

Boulder-filled creeks and waterfalls help to make this a most beautiful course. A prime example is the 11th, a par 3 which descends 66ft from the tee to a green defended in front by creek and on its flanks by bunkering. Another is the par-4 12th (above) – the par 4s are another strength of this course – where the creek runs the along the left of the fairway, hidden by trees until bursting into glorious view near the green.

Cherry Hills Country Club

Cherry Hills 18th hole

 Cherry Hills 18th hole

(Image credit: Getty Images)
  • Location: Cherry Hills Village
  • Designed by: William S. Flynn
  • Par: 72
  • Yardage: 7,314 Yards
  • Green fee: Private
  • Visit website

The club was founded in 1922, and hosted its first US Open in 1938. It has also held the PGA Championship, US Women’s Open and the US Senior Open. The high altitude helps you to boom your drives, and in 1960 Arnold Palmer drove the 355-yard 1st hole en route to his only US Open win. Keen golfer President Eisenhower was a member here and the par-5 18th (above) is named in his honour.

Colorado Golf Club

Colorado Golf Club

Colorado Golf Club 11th green

(Image credit: Getty Images)
  • Location: Parker
  • Designed by: Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw
  • Par: 72
  • Yardage: 7,604 Yards
  • Green fee: Private
  • Visit website

Colorado Golf Club was only three years old when it hosted the Senior PGA Championship. Five years later the club hosted the Solheim Cup. The opening two holes provide wonderful contrasts – and a 500-yard difference in lengths. The 1st tumbles leisurely down a gentle hillside, with wide open vistas; the 2nd is an uphill par 3 funnelled through trees to a wickedly sloping green, the smallest on the course, with a bunker guarding each of the four sides of the putting surface.

Country Club of the Rockies

Country Club of the Rockies

Country Club of the Rockies

(Image credit: Country Club of the Rockies)
  • Location: Edwards
  • Designed by: Jack Nicklaus
  • Par: 72
  • Yardage: 7,337 Yards
  • Green fee: Private
  • Visit website

Four holes on this layout, which opened in 1985, run along and across the Eagle River and water features on 11 holes. At 7,200ft above sea level, the length of the course is diminished as a challenge, instead, on this open layout, it is the sloping greens that prove the main defence. In the mid 1990s these were modified as it was felt they were just too tough. President Gerald Ford was a long-time member here.

Red Sky Golf Club (Fazio)

Red Sky Ranch (Fazio)

Red Sky Ranch (Fazio)

(Image credit: Red Sky Ranch)
  • Location: Wolcott
  • Designed by: Tom Fazio
  • Par: 72
  • Yardage: 7,116 Yards
  • Green fee: Stay & Play packages available
  • Visit website

The Fazio course enjoys similar mountainside vistas as the Norman but it is less steep and shorter in its routing than its younger sibling. Indeed it is has less slope in all senses – from the tips the Norman course has a slope rating of 147; Fazio 141. During construction 23,000 native plants were moved into nurseries and then re-planted on the course.

Red Sky Golf Club (Norman)

Red Sky Ranch Norman course 6th hole

Red Sky Ranch Norman course's 6th hole

(Image credit: Red Sky Ranch)
  • Location: Wolcott
  • Designed by: Greg Norman
  • Par: 72
  • Yardage: 7,580 Yards
  • Green fee: Stay & Play packages available
  • Visit website

Laid through the mountains, the elevation changes – the difference in height of the 3rd green and 14th tee is 400ft – makes for some interesting holes and indeed par allocations. The 8th is stroke index one and a par 5 of 575 yards, The following hole is a 549-yard par 4, stroke index 7.

TPC Colorado

TPC Colorado 16th green

TPC Colorado 16th green

(Image credit: Getty Images)
  • Location: Berthoud
  • Designed by: Arthur Schaupeter
  • Par: 72
  • Yardage: 7,433 Yards
  • Green fee: $175-$255
  • Visit website

The course can be extended to 7,991 yards when the pros visit, however the variety of tee options mean it can also shrink to 4,157 yards if needed. The pros play the 13th hole, called Longer Still, at 773 yards. Off the Black tees it is a mere 722 yards.

Which is the best golf course in Colorado?

This is generally held to be Ballyneal Golf and Hunt Club. The course at this private golf resort opened in 2006 and was designed by Tom Doak to lie gently upon the thousand acres of dunes there, with the land determining the hole designs rather than vice versa.

Roderick Easdale

Contributing Writer Golf courses and travel are Roderick’s particular interests and he was contributing editor for the first few years of the Golf Monthly Travel Supplement. He writes travel articles and general features for the magazine, travel supplement and website. He also compiles the magazine's crossword. He is a member of Trevose Golf & Country Club and has played golf in around two dozen countries. Cricket is his other main sporting love. He is the author of five books, four of which are still in print: The Novel Life of PG Wodehouse; The Don: Beyond Boundaries; Wally Hammond: Gentleman & Player and England’s Greatest Post-War All Rounder.