Inspired by the British Open? Here is Where You Can Get a Taste of Links Golf In Myrtle Beach

The eyes of the golf world will turn this week to the British Open and Carnoustie, regarded by many as the world’s most challenging links course.

While replicating golf on the British Isles is impossible,  a trip to Myrtle Beach can provide golfers a links-type experience and the opportunity to play a different style of golf.

If links golf is what you want, here are four Myrtle Beach golf courses your group needs to play.

— The Heathland Course at Legends Resort was an early Tom Doak design and it remains an outstanding experience. With runway-wide fairways, enormous greens and pot bunkers, there are few better links-style courses on the East Coast.

— The first 15 holes at The Wizard provide a glimpse of what golf is like in the old country. Stacked-sod bunkers, pot bunkers and huge mounds covered with 70 types of vegetation make The Wizard look and play like a links layout. “This course was built to give you a real Scottish feel,” course owner Claude Pardue said.

— Named for the original Thistle Golf Club in Leith, Scotland, our Thistle delivers a memorable round. The area’s best clubhouse features 1800s memorabilia from the original Thistle and the course gets better from there. The 27-hole Tim Cate design is heavy on mounded fairways and the prevailing wind amplifies the challenge. Thistle also has a bagpiper playing on weekends, which adds to the ambiance.

— Prestwick features some of the most challenging bunkers west of the nearby Atlantic Ocean. The P.B. Dye design is criminally underrated and has a links feel to it, especially along the memorable back nine.

What is your favorite Myrtle Beach area links style course?