Golfweek maintains a stable of +/- 800 raters, drawn from all 50 states and over a dozen foreign countries, who make up the Golfweek’s Best rating panel.
What do the Golfweek’s Best raters do?
The principal goal of the rating panel is to establish Golfweek rankings of the top golf courses from each of two eras: Classic (opened before 1960) and Modern (opened 1960 or after). We also use the same database to determine such U.S. lists as the top residential golf courses, the top resort courses, the best public-access courses, the best campus courses, the best casino courses; also for the best courses in Canada, the Caribbean & Mexico, Great Britain & Ireland, Asia & the Pacific Rim, Europe and South Africa.
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Where do the Golfweek’s Best raters go?
A group of Golfweek’s Best raters, including author Jonathan Cummings (right), enjoys lunch at a halfway house at Shanqin Bay in China.
Golfweek is unique among all publications for the range of community events it sponsors throughout the country. We have multi-day events, one-off gatherings, competitive match-play style team events (both men’s and women’s). We combine golf with architecture instruction. The point is to combine golf with learning and camaraderie.
How do you become a Golfweek rater?
Darren Clarke serves up a lesson to a Golfweek rater at the Abaco Club.
This is a membership-based program. In order to be considered, you must be nominated by a current and active member. That member would need to reach out to us and nominate you. From there, an application process begins.
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How to contact us:
Armand Cimaroli — Senior Director of Events & Rater Program
Diane Muratore — Manager of Events & Rater Program
Email: RaterStaff@Golfweek.com
Golfweek’s Best architectural panel
Responsible for creating new ideas, educating our raters, and writing for Golfweek. Raters have the chance to meet them at various rater events throughout the year.
Jay Blasi
Jay Blasi made a hole-in-one on No. 14 of Mammoth Dunes at Sand Valley Golf Resort in Wisconsin. (Courtesy of Jay Blasi)
A Los Gatos, California-based golf designer best known for his work at Chambers Bay, site of the 2015 U.S. Open. Blasi started his own firm in 2012 after working for 11 years with Robert Trent Jones II. Recognized on the Golf Channel as a top 5 designer under 40, Blasi’s projects have garnered numerous awards. New designs (as Project Architect at RTJII) include: Chambers Bay, The Patriot in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and The Stanford University Siebel Varsity Golf Training Complex. In 2013, Blasi (collaborating with RTJ Jr.) oversaw a major renovation of SentryWorld in his birth state of Wisconsin. Blasi also completely redesigned Santa Ana CC in Orange County, California, and continues to work with the San Francisco Public Golf Alliance in restoring Sharp Park, an Alister MacKenzie seaside municipal course in Pacifica, California.
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James R. Hansen
Jim Hansen in Ireland.
A New York Times bestselling author (First Man: The Life of Neil A. Armstrong) and a hall of fame professor at Auburn University, James R. Hansen is also an internationally known expert on the history of golf course architecture. The centerpiece of Jim’s work in golf is his monumental A Difficult Par: Robert Trent Jones, Sr., and the Making of Modern Golf, which received the Herbert Warren Wind Award from the United States Golf Association as the Best Golf Book of 2014. A Golfweek course rater since 1997, Hansen has published numerous articles and given public presentations on the subject in the United States, Canada, Northern Ireland, Scotland, England, Portugal, Spain, and Australia. In the 1990s, he was also an active invited participant in the national summits between the golf industry and various U.S. environmental organizations that produced the landmark document, Environmental Principles for Golf Courses in the United States (1996). A native Hoosier, Hansen graduated summa cum laude from Indiana University-Purdue University at Fort Wayne. tT IPFW, Jim played four years of varsity golf, his last two years as captain.
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Peter Flory
Golf historian Peter Flory helped with the Lido, a project that started with a video game created by the Chicago-based financial consultant and eager golf historian who dabbles at length in no-longer-existing golf courses as a hobby. Flory had never built a golf course, but he’s played plenty – his list of courses played is enough to send even a golf travel writer into fits of envy. Flory is also one of the best hickory golfers in the country, collecting and often utilizing a vast store of antique clubs so that he can appreciate how classic courses played in the era in which they were built.
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This article originally appeared on Golfweek: What is the Golfweek rater membership program?
