Springfield Royal Country Club

The Golden Bear was at the top of his game in designing this stunning course. Beware: if you are prone to slicing to the ball, be prepared to be punished for it.The recent host of the Thailand Open and another classic design by the legendary Jack Nicklaus, Springfield Royal Country Club boasts an immaculately maintained 27 holes of sumptuous golf surrounded by dramtic rocky hills. As with a lot of Nicklaus's courses, you'll become intimately familiar with the waste bunkers and water hazards if you have a tendency to fade or slice, particularly on the back nine where tiredness only exacerbates the problem. After a straightfoward shot from the the first tee, the size of the challenge ahead of you slowly becomes clear with a very long tricky to reach green giving you plenty of opportunity to drop a shot straight away. While not being a particularly long course, it's a brave soul or a masochist who takes on this course from the black tips so unless that sounds like you, we would suggest any of the other 4 options from the tee which allow you to set the appropriate level of difficulty for your game. The 9th is probably the best hole, a short par-5 where your tee shot to a narrow fairway between the trees needs to be followed up by a second that avoids a lake and a third to an island green that slopes away at the edges meaning you are either land on the centre of the green of go fishing. A par is really something to cherish here.