Charlotte’s
MAJOR
MOMENT
Quail Hollow debuts
new holes, new
grass for August’s
PGA Championship
I
by CHRIS LANG
t’s not often a new course cracks the PGA of
America’s rotation for the season’s final major,
the PGA Championship.
Recent sites like Baltusrol, Whistling
Straits, Valhalla, Oak Hill, Atlanta Athletic
Club, Hazeltine National, Oakland Hills, Southern
Hills and Medina have hosted multiple major cham-
pionships and have been PGA mainstays.
In fact, only one PGA Championship site since 2001 has
been a first-time major host: Kiawah Island in South Caro-
lina in 2012. But Kiawah is hardly an unknown, considering
its famed Ocean Course had hosted the Ryder Cup in 1991, the
year the course opened.
In that regard, Quail Hollow Club’s debut as a major championship
venue is notable. In addition, it’s fairly rare for a regular-season PGA Tour
venue to double as a PGA Championship host. The PGA Tour has stopped at
Quail Hollow every year since 2003, save for 2017, when the tournament moved
across the state to Wilmington to accommodate Quail Hollow’s PGA preparation.
While iconic courses like Pebble Beach, Congressional and Torrey Pines are part of
both the Tour schedule and the U.S. Open rotation, Riviera Country Club in Los Angeles
in 1995 was the last “regular” stop to host a PGA Championship.
So what can players—and Virginia fans who make the trek to the Queen City—expect
when they tee it up in Charlotte August 10–13?
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