Delamere Forest Golf Club #20

Every great golf story has a journey behind it, and ours is a decade-long mission to play the Top 100 golf courses in the UK and Ireland. Episode 67 of the Top 110 Golf Podcast lands at Delamere Forest Golf Club, the closest Top 100 track to us geographically and a course that surprises from the moment you arrive. We also look ahead to a huge Irish golf trip featuring headline names like Portmarnock and County Louth at Baltray, because planning is half the fun and the after-golf matters almost as much as the golf itself. If you love UK golf course reviews, heathland golf, and honest rankings debates, Delamere turns out to be a perfect case study.

The round itself becomes the “Duel At Delamere”, a scratch-style match play battle that quickly gets spicy as Chris and Hookie push each other into a rare scoring zone. The big takeaway is mindset: when the goal shifts from “a nice day out” to “I want birdie here”, focus sharpens, putting tightens, and suddenly every hole feels like a problem worth solving. We talk about how great competitive golf does not need money on the line, just a proper opponent and a course that rewards commitment. The greens feel true and makeable once the pace clicks, and the par threes stand out as some of the hardest we have faced, long enough to demand a real strike and punishing enough that a safe miss still leaves work.

Delamere Forest Golf Club also delivers a vibe we have not had at the big resort venues: it is a members’ club, quiet in the car park, relaxed on the first tee, and genuinely welcoming. The no tee sheet culture is a novelty, with simple windows for two-balls, three-balls, and four-balls, plus the kind of place where members bring the dog and wander out for nine. We meet head professional Martin Brown and discover, by pure chance, that he is a Top 100 panelist. That leads into one of our favourite conversations about golf course rankings, why huge jumps are rare, and how “options” around the greens can separate elite layouts from very good ones, especially when comparing links golf with inland courses.

On the course, Delamere feels like a Surrey heathland design dropped into Cheshire, built into rolling land with constant movement but no exhausting climbs. The round builds in quality, stacking strong holes into a crescendo rather than front-loading the fireworks. We pick out standout holes including the eighth, the wild ninth with its tiny landing area, the signature 14th with a brilliant reveal and second-shot vista, and a glorious 18th that deserves more attention among great finishing holes. Add in good practice facilities, a clubhouse terrace with views over multiple holes, and a summer weekend rate around £165, and Delamere becomes one of the best-value Top 100 golf experiences in the North of England. Whether you are new to playing Top 100 courses or chasing your own rankings list, this is a must-play test of strategy, nerve, and touch.