Top golf tournaments in Scotland

Gleneagles will host the 40th Ryder Cup from 26 to 28 September 2014. Europe and America will contest one of sport’s biggest prizes on the Jack Nicklaus-designed PGA Centenary Course and it will be the first time in more than 40 years that Scotland has hosted the tournament.

The Open Championship is staged at least every two years in Scotland, with St Andrews hosting it every five years. As well as the Old Course, Turnberry, Royal Troon, Carnoustie and Muirfield are on the Open rota. The 2013 Open will be held at Muirfield.

Turnberry has staged the Open four times. The Ailsa course was the setting for the famous Duel in the Sun between Jack Nicklaus and Tom Watson in 1977.

Royal Troon has hosted the Open on eight occasions. In 1962, the legendary Arnold Palmer produced some of the finest golf of his career at Troon to become Open champion for a second time.

The first Open was played at Prestwick in 1860. Though no longer an Open venue, Prestwick has hosted golf’s most famous tournament 24 times. Incredibly, Royal Troon, Turnberry and Prestwick lie within half an hour of each other on the Ayrshire coast. 

Some major European Tour events take place in Scotland too. The Scottish Open takes place at Castle Stuart Golf Links near Inverness in July.

The Johnnie Walker Championship is staged in Gleneagles in August and the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship takes place over three venues - the Old Course at St Andrews, Kingsbarns in Fife and Carnoustie in Angus - in October.

The Walker Cup, golf’s leading men’s amateur team event, was held at Royal Aberdeen in 2011, while the Curtis Cup, the women’s equivalent, was played at Nairn in June 2012.

The 2012 Senior Open Championship was played at Turnberry from 26 - 29 July.