The Hotchkin Course at Woodhall Spa is firmly established inside the top 10 of the new and updated NCG Top 100s: England list for 2025.
The Lincolnshire heathland is regarded among Britain’s finest inland courses, and it has a long and storied history, dating back well over a century.
RELATED: Check out the new NCG Top 100s: England list
Why is the Hotchkin Course at Woodhall Spa so well liked?
Gorse and broom are prominent, as is colourful but unforgiving heather, and beyond that oak, fir and silver birches frame the perimeter. The land itself is flat, unusually so.
In fact, just about the only parts of the Hotchkin that are on a different elevation to the rest are the bunkers, the bottoms of which are generally located what seems like about 10 yards below ground level. Oh, and there are more than 100 of them.
Open legend Harry Vardon first designed 18 holes on the land the course stands on today. Harry Colt, something of an inland specialist with the likes of Sunningdale New, St George’s Hill and Swinley Forest to his name, was called in some seven years later to make revisions. Their work was considerably built on by Major SV Hotchkin in 1920.
Tom Doak recently carried out a three-year restoration, and his overhaul has resulted in expansive heathland views, firmer, faster turf and an increase in playability as well as strategy. Trees have been removed, but far from indiscriminately, while playing corridors have been widened and lost strategic elements are now back in play.
The routing remains sublime – inland golf in the British Isles simply doesn’t get much better.
READ MORE – NCG Top 100s: Woodhall Spa (Hotchkin)
What do our experts say about Woodhall Spa’s Hotchkin Course?
Steve Carroll, co-host of the NCG Golf Podcast, is a regular visitor to the home of England Golf.
“The Hotchkin Course – interestingly – is the one course in the top ten that I seem to have played the most, even though it takes me an absolute eternity to get there,” Carroll said on the NCG Golf Podcast.
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“We spoke a little earlier on about the work that Tom Doak has done there. It has been transformative and it is absolutely fantastic, and presumably it is why it holds such a high place in our rankings at No.6.
“Again, a course you can play anytime of the year. I have been there following some pretty bad weather and it was still fantastic. It is a great, great golf course.”
Tom Irwin, co-host of the NCG Golf Podcast, feels a sense of home at Woodhall Spa, thanks to his roots.
“It is such a familiar place for me. I grew up in Lincolnshire, we’ve done lots of work with England Golf over the years so we have probably visited more times than is normal, and I don’t think that is common,” Irwin said about the venue.
“If you talk to people in the golf industry, Woodhall Spa is often a gap because it is such an outpost. I mean, you never drive past Woodhall on your travels.
“We talked about Ganton being out of the way, but it is still only 40 minutes from the A1. Lincolnshire is not a place that people go by mistake, and Woodhall Spa is an utter pickle to get to. It is, for an inland, heathland course, very remote for people to travel to.
“It is also not a golfing tourist destination, so I think that in terms of our top ten or 20, it is one of the most unheralded or underplayed, which is weird. I think it is another one of these courses that is better for knowing. It is on a unique piece of land, in the Lincolnshire clay, so round and about, it is just arable farmland. It is on a strange sandbelt, plonked in the middle of Woodhall Spa.
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“The golf course, to the eternal point of how does a golf course move up the rankings, has improved immeasurably following the work that Tom Doak has done in restoring width to the golf course, removing trees and unearthing bunkers that they thought they had lost. It has improved the course in every regard.
“It has improved the routing of the holes, it has improved the visibility, it has improved the turf, it has improved the playbility. It is important that it is high up in an England list because it is heathland golf, and heathland is not something that you find the world over. It is a very unique thing to England. Woodhall is a really good example of that.
“Dan will have some more professional views than me because he was actually there when Doak was doing some of his work, which is pretty cool.”
Dan Murphy – chairman of the NCG Top 100s Rankings – visited Woodhall Spa to interview Doak about his work during its time of change, and he is a huge fan of the golf course.
“As you said, Ganton is another outpost, but at least it has the decency to be on a pretty main A road. Woodhall Spa really makes you work to get there, but it is even better now than it was,” Murphy said on the NCG Golf Podcast.
“It is one of those courses that occasionally people go and are underwhelmed by because it is not spectacular, because it is so flat, which is one of the things that we actually like.
“It is an incredibly fair golf course, and an honest one. It’s a course where the standard very rarely dips and it’s one that grows on you with every visit. A slow burner.
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“The changes that have been made by Doak have made the turf firmer and faster, and it is wider. I’m thinking about it and I just want to be taken there now, which says it all.”
Steve Carroll also had a good point to make in terms of the cost of playing the Hotchkin Course. Compared to some, there are deals for English players to play at the home of England Golf.
RELATED: How much are the green fees to play top 100 courses in Britain and Ireland in 2025?
“Just one other interesting point about Woodhall Spa in an era where we are talking continually about green fee prices and the increasing prices of how much it is to pay top 100-ranked courses,” Carroll added.
“While, no-one would describe a round on the Hotchkin Course as cheap, you do get a significant discount if you are a member of an English golf club, or an iGolf member, compared to the regular rack rate – which is not something you see at a lot of English golf courses, It is something that is more prevalent in Scotland, but certainly in England, that is a rarity.
“You might expect it because it is the home of England Golf, but at the same time, it is worth pointing out if you are an English club member, you can play the Hotchkin Course for a bit cheaper.”
Listen to the NCG Golf Podcast in full…
Now have your say
Have you been fortunate enough to play at Woodhall Spa? If so, what did you make of it? Would you agree with us that it is the best course in the country? Let us know your thoughts with a post on X, formerly Twitter!
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