The PGA Tour will bring the second leg of its FedEx Cup Playoffs to Delaware for the first time when venerable Wilmington Country Club hosts the BMW Championship Aug. 18-21. The top 70 players in the playoff standings still eligible to play on the PGA Tour will look to take the next step to the season-ending Tour Championship, with 30 players advancing in the penultimate event of the playoffs.
The tournament will be contested on the club’s ballyhooed South Course, a Robert Trent Jones-designed track that’s constantly ranked as the best course in Delaware. It will be the first ever PGA Tour event to be held in the Blue Hen State illustrating the draw of the South Course as well as Wilmington Country Club’s standing as one of the nation’s premier country clubs.
No stranger to the spotlight
Wilmington Country Club has a championship pedigree. It was established in 1901, with its original 18 holes covering 135 acres of land leased from William du Pont Sr. The club relocated in the 1950s to its present site in Montchanin north of the city, with RTJ’s course commissioned in 1951. Construction did not begin until 1957, taking almost two years to complete.
The club has long been known as a proving ground for the world’s best amateur players. The “Old Course” hosted the 1913 U.S. Women’s Amateur. Since its relocation, Wilmington Country Club has facilitated five other USGA events – the 1965 and 1978 U.S. Junior Amateur, the 1971 U.S. Amateur, the 1978 U.S. Girls’ Junior and the 2003 U.S. Mid-Amateur.
Wilmington Country Club also hosted the 2013 Palmer Cup competition between teams from Europe and the United States; the latter featured 2019 BMW Championship winner Justin Thomas and 2015 runner-up Daniel Berger.
Beauty in tradition
When golfers mention their love of traditional courses, Wilmington Country Club’s South Course has to be in the discussion. The venue has all the characteristics of a championship layout – length, beauty, strategy, and the constant requirement to produce great shot-making.
The South was renovated in 2008 by Keith Foster. Its manicured fairways, large trees, spacious putting surfaces will be a test. Bunkers here have been re-positioned to provide more challenges for the BMW golfers, often at 300 to 325 yards from the tournament tees.
Many other bunkers needed to be rebuilt after a tornado in the summer of 2020 ravaged the property and also tore down 300 trees on the South course alone.
The South Course
The South Course at Wilmington Country Club, with a routing reconfigured for the BMW Championship to help with infrastructure – especially at the start and in the middle of the round – will play at nearly 7,500 yards from the championship tees and is a par-71.
Routing changes for the BMW Championship keeps the 18th hole and holes five through nine in their normal locations. Others will be played on their side but in different spots, while still more will be contested on part of the other nine for the tournament.
What makes the South Course so challenging to play is its diversity of long and short holes and the variety of its fairways – some that are tight and others that are ample. If the wind and green speeds are up, expect the course to take its share of flesh from even the best players in the world.
The South Course is a testament to Jones’ design philosophy of “a difficult par but an easy bogey.” The course is one of 10 creations by the master golf architect that have been ranked among the top 100 greatest courses in America by Golf Digest.
The course certainly has a “classic,” Jonesesque feel. Its fairways are bordered by large, deep bunkers and water comes into play time and time again. Many of the putting surfaces are tiered and, in some cases, oddly shaped, the latter not usually on the radar for PGA Tour players.
The North Course
Wilmington Country Club has a second course, the North, which was designed by Dick Wilson and has smaller greens, narrower fairways and more sand bunkers than its bigger, slightly older sister. The North Course is considered less difficult than the South; however, when used for tournament play the North’s scores are no lower than those produced on the South Course.
Bear Trap Dunes
Public golf options in Delaware
Located on the eastern seaboard in the mid-Atlantic region of the country, Delaware is one of the smallest of America’s 50 states. It still boasts some great tracks designed and built by some of the most trusted names in golf.
Bayside Resort Golf Club (Selbyville)
Located near Fenwick Island and only a few miles from the beach in the far-south corner of Delaware, the Jack Nicklaus-designed Bayside Resort Golf Club has been ranked as the state’s best public track for 14 straight years. Dramatic views and holes routed along the Assawoman Bay coastline highlight the round. Because of the varied landscape of the region, the Bayside is at times wide open; other holes are lined by mature pines and some play into the marshlands, making the course offer three courses in one. This is a must-play when in the area.
The centerpiece of an opulent and all-encompassing residential development on Indian River Bay about 80 miles from Wilmington, Baywood Green is often described as the “Augusta of the North.” It is constantly ranked as the most visually spectacular golf course in Delaware. The Woodside’s fairways are lined with tall, mature trees and the Waterside nine is famous for the majestic ponds which lend to the aura come in to play on eight of its nine holes. Designed by Brian Ault and Bill Love and opened in 1998, the course has eight timbered bridges, two tunnels, 27 acres of man-made ponds, and more than 300,000 wildflowers, plants, shrubs, and trees.
Bear Trap Dunes (Ocean View)
Set on the south side of Indian River Bay on the far-south part of the state, Bear Trap Dunes has a 27-hole routing (Kodiak, Black Bear and Grizzly) designed by Nicklaus protégé Rick Jacobsen. The course has that familiar Nicklaus look and feel off the tee and many of the holes are framed by groups of three and four bunker configurations located at different distances on opposite sides of the fairway. Often considered the toughest overall public (semi-private) course in Delaware, the round here requires deep thinking and strategy Because Bear Trap Dunes has 27 holes, golfers can mix and match the three sets of nine to create three different 18-hole layouts.
Deerfield Golf Club (Newark)
Just 10 miles west of Wilmington near where Delaware, Pennsylvania and Maryland meet, Deerfield Golf Club is routed on just 145 acres of some of the most beautiful land in the state. Originally built by the DuPont Corporation for its employees in 1955, the club was originally called Louviers Country Club. The course is part of Delaware’s White Clay Creek State Park and is supervised by the Delaware Division of Parks and Recreation. It’s truly a local treasure, a championship-level, 18-hole track that plays at just 6,323 yards and is a par-70 but has long, sprawling fairways guarded by tall trees and littered with strategically placed bunkers. It’s likely the best value course in the state.